The front cover of Emma O'Reilly's new book which is due out later this week and is published by major players Random House.
The Irish woman central to the fall of disgraced former pro Lance Armstrong, Emma O’Reilly has written a new book which is due out later this week.
O’Reilly was one of the first people to go on the record about Armstrong’s doping when she spoke to journalist David Walsh years before anything was proven about the American’s drug taking and his grooming of other athletes to take drugs.
One of the first stories reported that gained a footing in the debate around Armstrong was O’Reilly’s claim, proven to be true, that she used make-up to cover bruises from needles on the rider’s arms that he was afraid would expose him.
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The Irish woman, now working as sports therapist in the UK, also gave evidence to the USADA investigation that ultimately proved the charges against Armstrong.
She told it that she had once transported a package for Armstrong she believed to be performance enhancing drugs.
She also revealed that she suggested to customs officials in Dublin that a boat sailing into the city with team cars for the start of the Tour de France in 1998 would not need to be checked by them.
The Festina doping affair exploded just days later when an official from that team was caught with a car full of performance enhancing drugs as he was about to bring the vehicle from mainland Europe to Dublin for the start of the race.
O'Reilly had a very acrimonious parting of ways with Armstrong when she left the US Postal team for whom she worked as his personal carer.
However, some form of reconciliation appears to have taken place as Armstrong has written the foreword for the new book: “The Race to Truth: Blowing the whistle on Lance Armstrong and cycling's doping culture”.
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The book is published by Random House. Its publicity material describes the work as “a stunning memoir by the first person to expose Lance Armstrong's doping, her betrayal by the sport of cycling, and her ultimate redemption”.
It says of the Irish author: “When Emma O'Reilly joined the US Postal cycling team in 1996, she could have had no idea how she would become a central figure in the biggest doping scandal in sporting history.
“Yet when Lance Armstrong, starting his comeback from cancer, signed for US Postal, it was Emma, the only woman on the team, who became his personal soigneur.
“This is the definitive inside story of that time, and of the enormous repercussions that resonate to this day for Emma, Lance and the whole sport.
“Emma had the strength to break cycling's omerta by speaking out against the culture of doping. She thought she would be one of many whistleblowers, doing what she believed was right.
“Isolated and shunned by the sport she loved, however, her reputation was systematically destroyed. And yet she had the courage to bounce back, and remarkably, to forgive those who made her existence a living hell. This is the ultimate memoir of truth and its many consequences.”
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