CYCLING NEWSLANCE ARMSTRONG yesterday confirmed his return to competitive cycling and announced he would be seeking an eighth Tour de France victory as a member of the Astana team.
The American, 37, retired in 2005 following his seventh consecutive victory in Le Tour but will resume his road-racing career not only to fulfil personal ambitions but also in a bid to raise awareness of cancer issues through his "Livestrong" programme.
Making his announcement with a press conference at the Clinton Global Initiative in Manhattan, New York, Armstrong revealed he would be reuniting with Johan Bruyneel, his former sporting director at teams US Postal and Discovery - with which the Texan won all seven of his Tour de France crowns - and would make his Astana debut in the Tour Down Under in Australia next January.
"I will race in 2009 with Astana, reuniting myself with Johan Bruyneel," Armstrong said.
"While we looked at other teams and we talked with other teams, as a friend and as a partner and as someone . . . I can really trust Johan on every little decision, I could not imagine racing against him or without him. So Johan and I will be together in 2009 and my first race will be in Australia, the Tour Down Under.
"The only other races I can say I'm doing for sure are the Tour de France and the Leadville 100."
The latter of those races is a mountain-bike race Armstrong contested, and finished, this summer in Colorado.
The cyclist claimed that race had helped him realise he truly loves "to ride bikes for long hours every day".
"It's not very often someone gets a chance to spend three or fours years away from something, step back, and then say to themselves, 'I sort of miss that, I'd like to go back and do that again'," Armstrong said.
Wealth, a fleet of cars and a succession of glamorous partners do not appear to have to have replaced the satisfaction Armstrong gained from the insane demands of training for and taking part in the Tour de France.
"Once someone asked me what pleasure I took in riding for so long," he wrote. "'Pleasure?' I said. 'I don't understand the question.' I didn't do it for pleasure, I did it for pain."
The oldest Tour de France champion was the Belgian Firmin Lambot, who was 36 when he rode to victory in 1922.
The Spaniard Miguel Indurain, the first man to win five consecutive Tours, knows well the demands of three weeks on the road and is sceptical.
"It's an easy thing to say you're coming back but it's much more difficult to actually come back," he told the Italian newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport last week.
