UCI admits accepting Lance Armstrong donation was a mistake

Pat McQuaid, the president of the UCI, has admitted that it was a mistake in hindsight for cycling's governing body to accept a $100,000 (£69,000) donation from Lance Armstrong eight years ago.

The money was used to purchase a Sysmex machine in 2002, a piece of equipment used to analyse blood samples, although the governing body denied any suggestion that the seven-times Tour de France winner used this in an attempt to bribe the UCI, as has been claimed by Floyd Landis.

"To the best of my knowledge, the UCI has not accepted other donations and I'd just like to clarify that there was only one donation from Lance Armstrong not two or three," McQuaid said. "You have to consider that at the time, in 2002, no accusations against Lance Armstrong had been made. They've all came up since then. We accepted the donation to help develop the sport. We didn't think there's a conflict of interest. It's easy to say in hindsight what could or would have been done. You have to put yourself in the situation at the time..... read more