The efforts of the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart and USADA’s Indianapolis based lawyer William Bock in investigating and exposing doping by Lance Armstrong is described in Wheelmen: Lance Armstrong, the Tour de France, and the Greatest Sports Conspiracy Ever by Gotham Books, just released on October 15. Written by Wall Street Journal reporters Reed Albergotti and Vanessa O’Connell, Wheelmen describes the Armstrong saga from start to finish including Bock’s interviews of Armstrong’s former teammates and prosecution of the case against the seven time winner of the Tour de France.
During the case against him Armstrong employed a high profile team of lawyers and publicists with client lists including Bill Clinton, Karl Rove and other luminaries and according to Wheelmen the Armstrong legal defense team burned through hundreds of thousands of dollars a month. Bock represented the underfunded U.S. Anti-Doping Agency in what Wheelmen characterizes as a David vs. Goliath match up. With Armstrong as Goliath and USADA CEO Travis Tygart as David, Wheelmen relives the critical steps that led to the downfall of an American icon.
Bock was there each step of the way, leading the legal effort as USADA’s General Counsel, and writing the lengthy report which chronicled the evidence the Agency amassed against Armstrong and released in October of 2012, triggering the implosion of Armstrong’s financial and sporting empire and, eventually, leading to removal of the President of the international cycling union in an election held just weeks ago.
Bock is a frequent speaker on issues pertaining to ethics in sport and society and will be speaking on USADA’s ongoing efforts to address doping in sport at the Annual Conference of the British Association for Sport and Law in London, England, on October 17, 2013, and at the Play the Game 2013 conference in Aarhus, Denmark, on October 28, 2013.