"The Tour (de France) is essentially a math problem, a 2,000-mile race over three weeks that's sometimes won by a margin of a minute or less. How do you propel yourself through space on a bicycle, sometimes steeply uphill, at a speed sustainable for three weeks? Every second counts."

"I follow the Tour de France about as much as the average North American person… I only know of it because of the success that Lance Armstrong has had. Michael Jordan was the greatest athlete I ever saw. Tiger Woods is now at a point where he is going to go down in history as something special. There's not a question that Lance Armstrong belongs with those two guys. Not only because of what he has done as an athlete, but also what he has been able to come back from."

"The perfect athlete is Lance Armstrong. What he achieved, no other human has or, in my opinion, will ever achieve. It's hard enough surviving cancer, but winning seven Tour de France titles after that is amazing. He is a true inspiration to me and makes me believe that nothing is impossible. When you have a dream and work hard at it, it's possible."

"If a script writer had come up with a story resembling what you have just achieved, even the Hollywood studios would have refused."

"I want all of you to know that I intend to beat this disease. And further, I intend to ride again as a professional cyclist."

"Without cancer, I never would have won a single Tour de France. Cancer taught me a plan for more purposeful living, and that in turn taught me how to train and to win more purposefully. It taught me that pain has a reason, and that sometimes the experience of losing things — whether health or a car or an old sense of self — has its own value in the scheme of life. Pain and loss are great enhancers."

"I want to finish by saying that I intend to be an avid spokesperson for testicular cancer once I have beaten the disease... I want this to be a positive experience and I want to take this opportunity to help others who might someday suffer from the same circumstance I face today."