US Edition 
Lance Armstrong was my mentor. I'm still in shock, says Team Sky's Ian Boswell
Ian Boswell recalled how, with all his cycling dreams still all ahead of him as a kid, he would pedal up the hills near his Oregon home in his “stupid” yellow jersey on his cool pink and blue Alamo bike and would shout to his brother to look at him “flying like Lance”.
“As an American, Lance Armstrong is the reason I started cycling,” Boswell admitted. A generation got on their bikes, believed in Lance and wanted to be like Lance. Yet only a chosen few, such as Boswell, became part of Lance’s team.
Armstrong saw the talented youngster and invited him to join his Bontrager-Livestrong development squad for cyclists aged under 23. For two years, help from Boswell’s sporting hero was a humbling privilege. “He would come to the team camps and I got to know him on a personal level,” he said. “I had my birthday at his house.” Armstrong was like a friend to Boswell – and what is worse than a friend’s betrayal?
As this fresh-faced first year professional prepared for his stage race debut in the Tour of Algarve, as one of Team Sky’s new wave, Boswell admitted the revelations about Armstrong’s lies and doping disgrace, capped by his confession in an interview with Oprah Winfrey, still shocked him.
He saw only one side of Armstrong; now Boswell has seen the “double face”. Not that it has made him angry. Sad sounds nearer the mark. “It’s just hard for me looking back, that it was all fake,” the 22-year-old said at the Sky team hotel in Majorca.
Boswell served a two-year apprenticeship at the team that carried the name of Armstrong’s cancer charity. “He was an inspiration but then it’s gone, kind of a fraud. It’s sad but it’s history now.”
While Boswell believed his idol has done untold damage to cycling, he felt that the new faces at the British team could restore the sport’s credibility. They include his young US team-mate and friend Joe Dombrowski, who roomed with Boswell at Livestrong.
“Definitely, the next generation has a responsibility to say ‘that was the past, that’s over and it is not relevant to what we are doing’,” Boswell said.
“We are responsible for the sport’s credibility, making it clean, doing it the right way. Bringing the sport back to the United States especially. It is a beautiful sport that everyone can enjoy.
“If I’m in the US and I say I’m a cyclist, people say ‘oh, Lance Armstrong’. He has defined American cycling for the last 10 years and now there is a big draw away from it. It’s all filled with the Armstrong investigation, poor press, and it’s definitely damaging.”
The sheer numbers who still love cycling, he believed, will ensure that it thrives again but he knew that it would take time, thanks to Armstrong. Boswell himself would cycle alongside the icon and not know the truth about his deceit.
“You’d meet him as a person and a training partner, and then this investigation comes out and you see the Oprah thing and think, ‘is this the same guy?’
“It’s like a double-faced figure. You see this guy on the media and it’s terrible. How can you lie to all these people when you had this foundation and this and that?
“The perspective I have is different to a lot of older riders who had maybe known this for a long time and now [say] ‘he deserves this’. I am like ‘whooah, what’s going on here?’. It is still shocking.
“Now I’m in the sport talking to other riders, I see that was the way the sport was. It was terrible.
“I am thankful I am coming into the sport in a time when we are going forward clean. I’m on a clean team, doing things simple and getting back to the roots of the sport.”
Boswell, whose dad was a professional triathlete and his mum a fine marathon runner, spoke with boyish enthusiasm for his new European adventure even though it was a world away from Bend, Oregon, his gateway to the great American outdoors.
Rated one of the best under-23 riders in the world after fifth places at the Tour of Utah and the Tour de l’Avenir, he felt privileged, as if he had joined cycling’s equivalent of the New York Yankees. “Sky? The best team in the world,” he said. “The best equipment, best riders, best staff and the best organisation.”
And maybe the best role model? Being around Sir Bradley Wiggins delights another free spirit. “I have the same personality,” Boswell said. “I want to do well in cycling but I want to have a life outside the sport as well.
“He’s definitely a character. Sometimes cycling lacks people who are true to themselves. He does his own thing which is cool to see. That’s what’s made him who he is.
“I admire him and think he’s a role model for cycling. He is a real human being. He has got flaws. He is an amazing rider and has shown you can win the Tour clean. For us young riders, seeing that it is inspiring.”
To Boswell, that guy he used to pretend to be when climbing up those Oregon hills is history yet his own dreams have not been dented. They are still all ahead of him.