Armstrong Fights Cancer American Bicycling Star Vows To Fight Disease That Is In Advanced Stages

Lance Armstrong, the star American bicycle racer and former world champion, said from his home in Austin, Texas, on Tuesday that he has testicular cancer, that it has spread to his abdomen and lungs and that he started 12 weeks of chemotherapy Monday.

“I intend to beat this disease,” the 25-year-old Armstrong said in a telephone conference call. “It’s impossible to say when I’ll be back racing, but I hold out hope to participate at the professional level in the 1997 season.”

He noted that the survival rate from testicular cancer is 97 percent but that, “if it spreads, which it has, that number comes down.”

He said his doctor put his chances of recovery between 65 percent and 85 percent and described the state of his cancer as “advanced.” According to a spokesman for the National Cancer Institute, the five-year survival rate for testicular cancer, when it has spread to a distant site, as appears to be the case with Armstrong, is 72.2 percent.

“I had 4 hours of chemotherapy yesterday,” Armstrong said, “and if I didn’t know the diagnosis, I’d feel normal.”

Discussing his illness, Armstrong said, “it happened very fast.”

Last Wednesday he felt severe pain in a testicle, coughed up blood and went to see Dr. Dudley Youman at St. David’s Hospital in Austin. After an ultrasound examination, he was told of the cancer and the need to remove the malignant testicle, which was done the next day.

At first, he said, he was incredulous. “I’m 25 years old,” he said, “I’m one of the best in my sport - why would I have cancer? I had lots of tests all through my career, physical tests, blood tests, and they never picked this up.

“This is something I got stuck with and now have to work through. I’ve said all along that I won’t live as long as most people, this sport is too hard. The Tour de France is not a human event.

“But I’m entering this battle in the best shape of my life. I’m going to be back on my bike soon, maybe not 6 hours a day, maybe not as hard as before.”

He said later that his doctor had approved bicycle riding up to 50 miles a day as early as next week.

“I just want to be on my bike, outside, with my friends,” Armstrong said. Throughout the hour-long conference call, he sounded buoyant and determined - two qualities, in addition to his talent, that have helped carry him to the top of his sport.

Armstrong currently ranks eighth among the world’s approximately 900 professional bicycle racers. In 1993, he won the world road race championship in Oslo and since has won the Tour DuPont in the United States the last two years, a couple of European classic races and two stages in the Tour de France.

The last of those was in the 1995 Tour de France. He crossed the finish line first into Limoge, France, with his arms upraised and his fingers pointing to the sky in memory of his teammate, Fabio Casartelli, who had been killed in a crash in the mountains earlier in the race.

This year, Armstrong dropped out of the Tour de France in the first week, complaining that he had lost his power in cold and rainy weather and could not finish a daily stage.

Tuesday, he discounted chances that his cancer might have affected him then, noting that he rode well at the Olympic Games - 12th in the road race, sixth in the time trial - and then in Europe in September, including fourth place in the Grand Prix of Switzerland. He finished his season in Europe last month by placing second in the Tour of Holland and finishing among the top five in two time trials, or races against the clock. “A month ago, a month ago, I was in Europe competing at the highest level,” he said in a wistful voice.

Although Armstrong had never planned to compete in this year’s world road race championships - the Olympics made for an overlong season for Armstrong, as it has for many competitors - his announcement provided a stunning prologue to championship week, which begins today in Lugano, Switzerland, and ends Sunday with the men’s 252-kilometer (156.5-mile) road race.

After starring with the U.S. national team, Armstrong turned professional after the 1992 Olympic Games and has raced since then for the Motorola team, which he has led for the last three seasons.

That team, based in the United States, will lose its sponsor in December and Armstrong signed a two-year contract last month with the new Cofidis team in France.

The contract is believed to be for $1.25 million a year, part of which Armstrong was quietly refunding to the sponsor to help it hire Frankie Andreu, his American teammate, and friend from Motorola.

Officials of the French team said that they were stunned to learn of his illness a few days ago and cared now only about his recovery.

Armstrong said that he did not think he would lose his salary, “but that’s something to be worked out in the coming months.”

“I’ve got bigger things to worry about,” he said.

“This thing ain’t going to stop me. I might have a bald head but I’ll be out there soon on my bike.”