At the time of writing, the various YouTube versions of my Sunday Times colleague, Paul Kimmage, at a press conference in Sacramento, California last Thursday had notched around 20,000 hits. This was no ordinary press conference, it was a rare media interface with Lance Armstrong. And Kimmage dared ask Armstrong a doping question.

Kimmage, you may know, is a former pro cyclist who wrote an award-winning book on doping in cycling. So he knows his subject. The Kimmage-Armstrong exchange is doing rattling good online business which is not exactly surprising when you see the clip.

Armstrong, meticulously prepared, responds to Kimmage’s questions by reminding him that Kimmage had described him as a cancer in the sport. Armstrong’s words: “You’re not worth the chair you’re sitting on with a statement like that. I’m not sure I will ever forgive you for that statement.”

I find the exchange fascinating, not only because I know that Kimmage required some balls to ask Armstrong a doping question in public and he had travelled across the globe in order to do so. It may sound a preposterous suggestion that a journalist needs courage to give voice to a question but that is exactly how it is.

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The proof?

1) The fact that it was Kimmage who asked Armstrong directly about doping and no one else.

2) The fact that Armstrong is the figurehead behind a charity that has raised over $250million to fight cancer. It takes something to step in front of a movement as strong as that.

3) The fact that Kimmage would have known that it was highly likely Armstrong would taken him on verbally exactly the way that he did.

My view is that if you cannot ask the questions, you should not be doing the job.

But part of my fascination here is the split response. Some American headlines herald Armstrong’s “shredding” of Kimmage as if he has done the world a service. Then you look at cycling chat rooms and you find the reaction is more pro-Kimmage. Kimmage himself says that he doesn’t want to become the story here, but it is unfortunately far too late for that.

To cover with accuracy and honesty Armstrong’s comeback to professional cycling this year is one of the hardest stories in sport. There are many who simply do not try. Kimmage can never be accused of that.

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