Since When Did Lance Armstrong Become Such A Player?

One of the weird things about Lance Armstrong, America’s Superhero™, is that while most just see him as this infalliable, brave and inspirational survivor of cancer and indomitable competitor, he’s also in incredibly competitive to the point of assholishness. I mean asshole in the best way. If you read his memoir, It’s Not About The Bike, you get a portrait of someone who not only has an incredibly strong will, but is insanely competitive. This isn’t surprising, nice guys don’t win the Tour seven consecutive times. And I don’t begrudge Lance being brusk or super competitive, it’s not his fault that he isn’t the image of moral perfection that America has demanded of him.

But we should still look at his personal life with a rather wary, and perhaps judgmental, eye. In his memoir, his wife Kristin, appears to be a saint. Not only does she marry Lance after his cancer has metasized, she also has three kids using his banked sperm. And then they divorced in 2003. Of course, he started dating Sheryl Crow in extreme close proximity to his breaking up with Kristin. They were engaged and then broke it off in 2005. And who can forget, in late 2007, Lance dating the 21 year old Ashley Olsen (he was 37). And now, according to People, there’s something with him and Kate Hudson. Oh yeah, and in early 2007, he had a fairly serious relationship end with designer Tory Burch. That’s not an unimpressive track record, even for an incredibly famous athlete. I guess the question becomes, when will the rest of America start treating Armstrong like just another celebrity, as all the gossip outlets already do?