Lance Armstrong Still Says He Won Those Tour Titles

It doesn’t seem to bother Lance Armstrong that he was stripped of his Tour de France titles. In his mind, he’s still the reigning champ.

Though after laying down arms against the USADA’s charges that he was running a doping ring, Lance Amrstrong insisted that he “knows who won those titles” despite being stripped of them; he settled the score once and for all with his speech at a cancer conference yesterday.

“My name is Lance Armstrong. I am a cancer survivor. I’m a father of five. And yes, I won the Tour de France seven times,” is how he introduced himself.

Even though that last part isn’t officially true anymore, Armstrong still maintains that no one can strip him of his Tour titles. Still, his speech yesterday was mostly about his battle with cancer, though he did briefly touch on the doping scandal, basically to say that it won’t impact his charity work whatsoever.

“I think the real issue here is one of distraction,” he said. “I’m going to tell this to you all as if you’re friends and partners and allies. I’m not going to be distracted from this fight.”

Armstrong also announced that his foundation would be donating $500,000 to a joint initiative to increase access to cancer care worldwide. After the speech, Armstrong joined hundreds of people on an hour-long training run up Mount Royal. The runners cheered him on and posed for photos with him after the run was over.

Salut Montreal – Merci/Thanks for the run!! I had a blast. #CancerCongress #fth

— Lance Armstrong (@lancearmstrong) August 29, 2012

Last Thursday, the USADA stripped Armstrong of his Tour titles, all of his competitive wins from 1998 onward, and barred him from professionally competing ever again. Armstrong has maintained his innocence, and the USADA has not released any information regarding their “overwhelming evidence” against the cyclist.