Paul Kimmage has said he may never again speak to his one-time close friend and fellow author and journalist David Walsh.
Both are credited with exposing Lance Armstrong’s part in doping in cycling, with Kimmage making the running on doping exposes long before Walsh. The latter also assisted Kimmage into a life in journalism after he quit the professional peloton and they had been close friends for two decades.
But following a row that developed last July after Walsh defended Team Sky and its Tour de France winner Chris Froome, Kimmage said their relationship could be at an end.
In a piece written following Froome's win, Walsh claimed the “mob” were wrong about Froome being doped, just like they were wrong about Armstrong being clean.
Kimmage took the comment personally, believing he was included in the reference to the “mob”.
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“I found it insulting in some ways, I’ve got to be honest,” he said in an interview with The Sunday Independent today, a paper he now writes for.
He added his relationship with Walsh had been deteriorating for some time before the issue in July.
“It’s been very, very difficult. Let’s just say we have had a difference of opinion,” he said.
“I spent about two hours in Dublin Airport screaming at him, letting him know exactly what I thought.
“Then we patched things up again and then July [and the Tour de France] came. What he wrote was also part of it. I don’t want to say too much out of respect to him, his kids, my kids. I don’t know if I will ever speak to him again.
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“We fought in the same trenches for a long time but the difference is that I rode the Tour three times. It runs real deep with me.”
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Kimmage also spoke about the effect redundancy had on him and his family after he was let go by The Sunday Times for what he claims was his stance on doping.
He believes it all started when a piece he wrote about Armstrong after the American targeted him at an infamous press conference in 2009 was never printed “even though everyone was talking about it”.
“Then he made his comeback and I was told I had to write about him and then when I did write about him the pieces ended up being butchered,” he said.
Another story he wrote about Team Sky – part of the same News Corp stable as The Sunday Times – was never published. His employment continued in that way and when cutbacks were made he felt he was always going to be an obvious victim.
He sounds in a better place now though, saying while his youngest child cried when he lost his job in The Sunday Times he believes his change in circumstance has brought him closer to his children.
Kimmage wrote for The Sunday Independent before leaving for The Sunday Times, where he worked for a decade before his departure two years ago.
He is now back with his former employer and in recent weeks has begun appearing as one of their star writers in the newspaper’s television adverts. It means he now seems central to their plans and that cycling fans can look forward to reading Kimmage in the paper for the foreseeable future.
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