Johan Bruyneel, Lance Armstrong's former team manager, told Belgian media that Armstrong deserves to be among cycling's biggest names and spoke about the hypocrisy that exists in the cycling world.

Speaking to Belgian magazine Humo over the weekend, the 55-year-old Belgian, who won in 1986, 1989, and 1990 after Armstrong was stripped of seven titles as a result of doping, the only American Tour de France winner in history, former pro He also defamed Greg LeMond, the only American ever to win the Tour de France, winning in 1986, 1989, and 1990.

Bruyneel led Armstrong's former teams US Postal, Discovery Channel, Astana, and RadioShack, and was banned for life from the sport for his involvement in doping Armstrong and his colleagues at US Postal and Discovery.

According to Het Laatste Nieuws, another Belgian DPG media group, "It's very simple. Every champion in the history of cycling has been the best of his generation," Bruyneel told Fumo.

"In the 1990s, everyone had access to the same drugs, like blood doping and EPO. Greg LeMond always says, 'I'm the only clean winner. That's bullshit. He always ran with the French team and they were the 'king of cortisone.'"

"Can you really imagine he didn't ingest anything? He's ahead of [Bernard] Ynaud and [Laurent] Fignon, who admitted doping.

"You can't beat the best athletes in the world who doped without doping yourself. But Le Monde was the best of his generation, as were Innault, Anquetil, Merckx, and Indurain." And so was Lance.

Lemond has always denied doping throughout his career; in an interview with The Sunday Times in 2007, he stated that he did not take performance-enhancing drugs. I know there was doping in the 80s, I know a lot of riders were doing it, I know cortisone was the drug of choice, I was third in the Dauphiné at age 19, won the Tour de Lavenir at age 20 by 10 minutes, and was second in the world championships. Luckily, I succeeded quickly and didn't let it drag me down; by 1993, I was very tired and I don't know if it was because everyone was taking EPO.

Armstrong was stripped of his seven Tour de France titles from 1999 to 2005 by the UCI in October 2012, after the UCI accepted a "reasoned decision" by the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) that the American had doped during his career The reason was that the USADA accepted the UCI's "reasoned decision" that the American had doped during his career. Armstrong later admitted to doping to Oprah Winfrey in a televised interview that aired in January 2013.

"What hurt the most was the hypocrisy," Bruyneel says. When I hear my former colleagues on TV talking about how busy they are, I think, "Do what you want, but don't talk about doping.""

"Team managers Marc Madiaux (Groupama-FDJ), Vincent Laveneau (AG2R La Mondiale), Jean-Rene Bernodeau (Total Direct Energie) - they are the big names in French cycling. They continue to criticize my past, but what they have done is forgiven, so to speak."

No doping charges have been filed against Madiot, Lavenud, or Bernaudeau.

Bruyneel, who also appears in the recently released ESPN Armstrong documentary LANCE, recounted an episode from his early professional career concerning Madiou to illustrate his point.

"In my second year as a pro, I ran my first international stage race. I was completely 'squeezed' between support cars, but I did everything I could to finish that race. Doping control was done by lottery and announced over the race radio along the way.

"Madio returned to the team car, heard that he had not been nominated [for a doping test], rolled up his sleeves and inserted the flechette [syringe] into his upper arm as he had been so brilliantly told. He then accelerated again and never left the front after that. That image has stayed with me my whole life. That's why people keep accusing me and Lance," Bruyneel said. Madio and his Groupama-FDJ team declined to comment when contacted by Cycling News.

Bruyneel, who is now starting his own sports management business, suggested, perhaps half-jokingly, that he could one day become UCI president.

"I could certainly do better than (current president) David Lapartient, who hasn't done anything for cycling yet.

"In the past, I volunteered to participate in the UCI doping dossier and told them everything I knew, but they ignored my advice," Bruyneel said.