Column: What of cycling's other secrets?

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By JOHN LEICESTER, Associated Press









Because people aren't "just going to walk up to you and say 'Hey, by the way, guess what I did,'" the first step would be to declare an amnesty period — a year, month, week, whatever — where past doping is "forgiven totally" to encourage confessions, Vaughters said.


Then the commission has to dig and probe, interview people individually, "look for specific rumors or issues or whatever else that seems unaddressed and then try to address them," he said. "You know: 'What happened there? What happened here? We've heard this rumor of X, Y or Z. Is it true? Is it not true?'






"It's really important people are revealed," he said. "If you got away with it in the past and think you can get away with it today, what's going to change?"

"There's really no choice."

There are hurdles that would need to be overcome for a truth commission to become more than just an idea. Not the least is Pat McQuaid, the cycling federation president who this week rubber-stamped USADA's decision to ban Armstrong for life and erase his seven Tour titles. McQuaid initially appeared interested in an amnesty within cycling but now seems skeptical that South Africa's experience can be translated to cycling.

"Where you've got a white population and a black population who're killing each other over a number of years, that's one thing," the London Guardian quoted him as saying this week. "Whether it works in anti-doping or sport is another question. You have to ask yourself, if you can set it up, who's going to give information? Are riders and managers going to come forward? I don't know. Will it stop people wanting to cheat? If they come forward — and that's a big 'if' — will it help much in the future?"

World Anti-Doping Agency rules don't allow for amnesty programs for repenting dopers, although Tygart said that shouldn't be an insurmountable obstacle to establishing a truth commission.

"The need for it is so great, you can work through the details to make it happen," he said.

"It is unchartered territory for the anti-doping community," WADA director general David Howman said by email. But he added that the agency's board "might be interested to hear from any sport" that presents the idea.

"The execution is certainly difficult," Vaughters said.

But so, too, is living with the idea that Armstrong was far from alone in an era ruined by doping, that there are other secrets that need to be uncovered.

The truth could help free cycling from that.


