Betsy Andreu furious and close to tears after Armstrong interview

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Betsy Andreu has said she is “furious” that Lance Armstrong refused to confirm the infamous “hospital room” scene, claiming he is still not being totally honest about his past.

He has missed his “one chance to tell the truth,” she said on CNN after Armstrong's televised interview with Oprah Winfrey.  Having not told the truth about this issue, “how are we to believe everything else he is saying?" He owes more not only to her and her family, but also “to the sport he destroyed,” she said.

Andreu, wife of Armstrong's former USPS teammate Frankie Andreu, was present in Armstrong's hospital room in 1996 when he is said to have told doctors treating him for cancer that he had used doping products. Armstrong has consistently denied having said that.

“I'm really disappointed. He owed it to me. You owed it to me Lance, and you dropped the ball. After what you've done to me, what you've done to my family, and you couldn't own up to it. And now we're supposed to believe you?" Betsy said emotionally, looking into the television camera as if talking directly to Armstrong.

"You have one chance at the truth. This is it. If he's not going to tell the truth, if he can't say 'yes, the hospital room happened' then how are we to believe everything else he is saying? We're already questioning him.”

In his televised interview, Armstrong declined to address the question of the hospital room. "I'm not going to take that on," he said. "I'm laying down on that one."

Andreu said: “If the hospital room didn't happen, just say it didn't happen. But he won't do it because it did happen. And if this is his way of saying 'I just don't want to go there, ok, we'll give it to her', that's not good enough. That's not being transparent, that's not being completely honest. That's skirting the issue.

"I want to believe that Lance wants to come clean, but this is giving me an indication that I can't.”

She had nothing but criticism of his appearance, even though he proudly said that he had never called her fat.

“That exchange right there - it makes me furious.  This is a guy who used to be my friend, who decimated me.  He could have come clean, he owed it to me,” she said.

“He owes it to the sport that he destroyed and (...) when he says he doesn't like the UCI, that's a bunch of crap. He had the UCI in his back pocket."

Andreu further challenged his claims that he didn't force or direct anyone else to dope.

”Then why did he make sure Frankie's contract wasn't renewed in 2000 when he wanted Frankie to see Ferrari and Frankie said no, no, no, no. Frankie rode the 2000 Tour clean and the vast majority of his career was clean. What was his reward? He didn't get compensated for that Tour win and he lost his job and his career was derailed. That's going up against Lance Armstrong. Going up a decade of being excoriated by him.

“And I was willing to give him a chance – and this is how he responds? It just doesn't make sense.”