"As a person, as a teammate, he was the best there is" - Former teammate states he never knew of Lance Armstrong's doping scheme

José Azevedo has been involved in cycling for many years, some of them spent as the right-hand man of one of the most controversial cyclists of all time: Lance Armstrong. In a recent interview he has discussed the doping topic within the US Postal team.

Lance Armstrong admitted to being part of a doping network of which he was the main beneficiary, lost all his Tour de France titles and descended from heaven to hell in no time. With his descent into hell he dragged the whole sport down with him, discrediting it, driving away sponsors and was one of the main culprits in the destruction of cycling in his own country.

Even today there are those who argue that "back then everyone doped and yet he was the best", something that was considered a general rule, a habit and a common practice in the professional peloton.

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José Azevedo doesn't see it that way and explains: "I don't know. But it doesn't worry me. I'm proud of my career as a cyclist. I'm proud to have ridden for ONCE, led by Manolo Sainz, who also had problems. And to have raced for US Postal and Discovery, to be Armstrong's teammate, to have Johan Bruyneel as my sports director. These are people from whom I learned a lot about cycling. In terms of structural organization, programming, planning, behaviour with the riders, even the psychological part," he says in a conversation with O Jogo.

Azevedo was part of teams that have a history of doping and nowadays nobody forgets those times and speaks ill of those teams. "It's logical that they say it, even Armstrong was involved in a big doping problem. The project had that side to it, it wasn't just Armstrong. But if I know today that Armstrong used banned substances, it's because he said so," he explains.

"Because I've never seen it. I was never harassed within the team to use doping products. It was something that completely passed me by. I had my mission in the team, my schedule, my responsibilities, I went to the races and I knew what my place was and what was required of me, to help Armstrong win. That was all I cared about."

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Asked if he had ever been asked about Armstrong, Azevedo said. "I repeat what I said: I've never seen it, I've never been harassed. I did my job, I'm proud of what I did in my career. What happened, happened to him. The riders are at home, that's where they train. I don't know what goes on in other people's homes. I can speak for myself."

"And I'm not going to say anything bad about him, because as a person, as a teammate, he was the best there is. He never acted like a star, he was never disrespectful to us, he always valued our work. And we weren't there out of obligation, we were paid to work for him. And he always had a word of thanks."

The image that the American cyclist gave off was completely different from what passed on to the outside: "When we were in the hotel, on the bus, or on stages, we were all the same. When he got off the bus, he gave off an image of distance, perhaps to protect himself."

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Azevedo revealed what he admired most about Armstrong: "I remember once, in the California area, it was raining. It was a 15-day stage and we knew it would be sunny the next day. He had already won the Tour six times and we all went to train anyway. That dedication and effort were examples to be set," he concluded.

Lance Armstrong in one of his epic battles with Marco Pantani, at Mont Ventoux

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