It's been just over a week since Peter Sagan won the elite men's road race at UCI Road World Championships in Richmond, Virginia, and now photos of the Slovak's new custom-painted bike and rainbow apparel have been revealed by his sponsors.

The world champ is looking overjoyed in his fresh stripes, and his colorful Specialized S-Works Tarmac is getting plenty of oohs and ahhs.

"I really like this bike," Sagan said. "I am really satisfied to able to ride it next year together with the rainbow jersey. I'll have a lot of responsibilities, but I am ready for the challenge."

As world champ, Sagan will wear his rainbow kit every time he toes the line at a mass-start road race for the next year. White shorts and all.

Check out Sagan's new bike and threads below:

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Slovakia's Peter Sagan is the new elite men's UCI Road World Champion. He's one of the most talented riders the sport has ever seen, and he's only 25. He can win all kinds of races — including those with sprint finishes and hard climbs. He's the best bike handler in the peloton, and one of the best descenders, too. He's taken wins in major one-day races and won stages in the Tour de France.

White shorts! Traditionalists prefer black bibs with the rainbow jersey, but if anyone can pull it off it's Sagan.

ICYMI, Sagan's apparel sponsor is Sportful.

Sagan's Specialized S-Works Tarmac, with Shimano Di2 and an SRM power meter, would retail for at least $11,000, but this custom-painted version would go for a good bit more. It weighs a tad under 15 pounds.

"When designing Peter’s worlds bike I took three important factors into consideration," said Ron Jones, lead road designer at Specialized. "The first, of course, is Peter's panache and flair on the bike. I've translated this into the rainbow effect paint, camouflage, and gold head badge on the bike.

"Second is his respect for the sport, which is represented by the placement of the names of all winners of previous world championships in the down tube logos. I felt it was important for both past winners and our newest champion to be represented in this way.

"And then there's his Slovakian heritage, a design cue which I added by applying elements of the flag in the graphic, as well as transitioning the rainbow camouflage into the Slovakian flag colors on the fork and seat stay. Peter had a big challenge ahead of him with such a small team, but having their constant, vigilant support made all the difference for him on the day."

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After a series of dead-end jobs, a major weight gain, and a failing marriage, Eric Hites knew it was time for a change.

Now, the 40-year-old Indiana native is making headlines as he bikes from Massachusetts to California. He started the trip in June and is steadily making his way west.

Hites, who jokingly refers to himself as "the fat Forrest Gump," regularly posts updates on Instagram and on his blog, "Fat Guy Across America."

"There are a lot of naysayers out there and I am going to prove them wrong,"Hites writes on his blog. 

Keep reading to learn more about Hites and "Fat Guy Across America."

Eric Hites, 40, is biking his way across America and sharing his experiences along the road on his blog, "Fat Guy Across America."

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 Source: Fat Guy Across America

He was inspired by the Proclaimers song "500 Miles," but since his weight, around 560 pounds, prohibited him from actually walking such a distance, Hites decided to bike instead.

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Source: New York Times

"By completing this ride, I hope to encourage others to get up and get moving no matter their weight," Hites writes on his blog. "I have a lot to prove and a lot to make happen."

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 Source: Fat Guy Across America

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Cycling's got problems, and Derek Bouchard-Hall wants to solve them.

The sport is still coming to terms with its dirty past and rampant doping. Riders are still testing positive for PEDs. And like a ghost, Lance Armstrong, sports' persona non grata, continues to be a dark presence.

Male cyclists continue to earn significantly more than their female counterparts. There is no Women's Tour de France.

A number of cyclists have been struck by race vehicles during competition and have had their livelihoods threatened.

Cycling doesn't have the big, deep-pocketed sponsors it used to.

But if there's one person many are putting their faith into to help right these wrongs, it's Bouchard-Hall, who in June became the CEO of USA Cycling, the sport's governing body in the US.

Intelligent and task-orientated, Bouchard-Hall says he wants to lead the sport into a cleaner, safer, and more equitable future.

"Doping has become synonymous with cycling, and for good reason," he told Business Insider this week.

"But our sport, I believe, is leading all other sports in the world. I would love anyone to show me a sport that is anywhere near as far in the fight against doping as we are. Most sports either don’t know they have a problem or they’re ignoring it."

Businessman in bicycling

Long before taking the helm of USA Cycling, the 45-year-old California native and former Olympic cyclist earned degrees from Princeton, Stanford, and Harvard Business School. For the past decade he’s been living in London and working as a management consultant for McKinsey and Co. and as a director for Wiggle, a large online retailer of cycling, running, and swimming equipment.

Having taken a big pay cut and decided to relocate his family to Colorado Springs, Colorado, he's facing his greatest challenges yet — fixing a troubled institution in USA Cycling and making cycling's "doping story go away."

BUSINESS INSIDER: Tell us about your background and what you're bringing from the business world to your role as the CEO of USA Cycling.

DEREK BOUCHARD-HALL: My business background formally began when I retired from bike racing, in 2002, and I went to business school to get an MBA. I ended up entering consulting for a long time — private-equity consulting with Ernst & Young — and then spent nearly four years with McKinsey doing traditional management consulting.

McKinsey was the best training, because of the breadth of the experience, going into so many different companies, their focus on the core issues that face market organization, organization design, strategy, allocation of resources. That gave me a lot of business fundamentals in a practical way. I spent a lot of time working with businesses going through large transformations, usually trying to do a step change in performance — taking a business in an entirely new direction or to a new performance level. So it was a combination of strategy but also organization to do something different. I quite enjoyed that.

When I left McKinsey, I joined an online retailer, and though I had little retailing background, it was a cycling company, Wiggle, one of the largest online relaters for cycling, running, and swimming equipment. I entered the business as it was entering a rapid growth phase.

And now I’ve moved into this role as the CEO of USA Cycling. The things I learned at McKinsey and in my MBA about the fundamentals of managing a business have been immensely valuable. At Wiggle it was a customer-focused mind-set, what it takes to service customers, and understanding them in a detailed way. That has been useful, and that’s what the board felt when they brought me on. In fact, they will say it was my business experience rather than that I was an ex-bike racer, because there are lots of ex-bike racers. But I was an ex-bike racer who had spent a lot of time in management consulting, focused on improving the performances of businesses using traditional, tried-and-true methods of changing business and improving businesses. The experience has been highly relevant.

BI: What do you see as your biggest challenges at USA Cycling? What are people saying to you about the governing body and the sport today?

DBH: There are a few things people are looking for from USA Cycling to do differently or better. One, absolutely, is to enhance support of grassroots development. There's a perception among USA Cycling members that the organization has been overly focused on elite-level racing and, more specifically, male road elite-level racing, and there is some truth to that.

Lance Armstrong was somebody who was an elite male road racer that everybody wanted to be a part of and everybody was interested in, and that gravitated the organization toward that. But a lot of the everyday membership — our 70,000 members — it's only a tiny portion that are elite-level athletes. The vast majority are participating in the sport for their personal enjoyment, without aspirations of wining the Tour de France or going to the Olympics. They’re just enjoying it for their own personal participation.

People felt as though too much of the organization’s focus and resources were allocated to elite development and not in making the everyday sport good, and also getting more people in it — more kids and more people drawn into it. So that’s a common challenge I hear: What can USA Cycling do to better serve its everyday membership and to support growth and participation?

People are interested in USA Cycling taking a stronger leadership role in the things that people care about, progressive causes like the development of women’s cycling, improving safety of races, cars and cyclists on the roads, and antidoping. They want to see women’s racing grow, they want to see more kids on bikes, the want bike racing to be safer, and people want this doping story to go away. They see our organization — and rightfully so — as one that should be playing a leadership role.

Of course I hear lots of everyday membership concerns that you would expect — your categories need to be changed, the upgrade-points system needs to be overhauled, and your online registration system is not good enough.

BI: What, in your view, is the state of cycling when it comes to doping?

DBH: There are two big points. One is, enormous progress has been made. It is a different sport today than it was when I was competing in it. Bicycle racing has faced up to its doping challenge and has gone through a long, painful period, and it’s gotten to a point where it is legitimately fighting it to the best of its ability. And it has changed the sport. There is no doubt that the number of people who are doping is much lower. It is no longer a majority. It’s a minority. And the extent to which people can dope and improve their performance has also been highly limited as well. Whereas in the old days you could transform yourself through doping, it’s much, much more difficult. Rather then everybody transforming themselves significantly, it’s a small portion that’s transforming themselves much less.

It is also universally understood that doping is cheating. That wasn’t always the case within the sport. There was a time when people thought, "Everybody’s doing it, so I’ve got to do it, too." And that doesn’t exist anymore. Anybody who’s doping today knows full well they’re a cheater and they’re stealing from others. That clarity is part of what’s making so many fewer people do it. In the old days, it was asking an awful lot of a young athlete to go into that environment of doping and resist doing it, and we know that was asking a lot because few people were able to resist it. That’s not the case today. Anyone engaging in doping today knows full well what they are doing. And most people are not willing to do that. But some are.

Doping is not gone from cycling. We know it exists — we still have athletes testing positive. We can’t catch everybody. For those we catch there are others who are not caught. So it’s still a problem, but it’s a much smaller problem, and it’s not an endemic, rampant problem. There are opportunities for clean athletes to succeed that didn’t exist in the past. We know there are clean athletes succeeding at the highest level, which is a change and is really good.

I often compare doping to alcoholism. It’s not something you kick. You don’t cease being alcoholic — it’s something you fight with every single day. And those of us who are responsible for managing the sport, and have a role to play in antidoping, need to fight it every single day. You’re constantly battling it, because there’s always going to be that desire to dope, and there are always going to be techniques that are difficult to detect.

BI: How is cycling leading the way for other sports when it comes to antidoping?

DBH: Doping has become synonymous with cycling, and for good reason. But our sport, I believe, is leading all other sports in the world. I would love anyone to show me a sport that is anywhere near as far in the fight against doping as we are. Most sports either don’t know they have a problem or they’re ignoring it. They are a few that are facing it, but they are in the early phases of facing it properly. And the reality is that doping is a problem across all sports, and we’re the one that takes a lot of the attention — and, as I said, rightly so — but I think we are at the forefront of this battle.

The techniques we’re using are decades ahead of what’s being used in other sports. The biological-passport program — there is no equivalent of that being used in other sports, and sports that have doping problems are looking into implementing that themselves. I believe the conversation on doping is going to start turning, where it’s less about these stories of “the entire sport is corrupt” and to more of these “somebody is getting busted and being outed as a cheat,” and that’ll happen and continue to happen, but at a smaller level. And there’s a recognition that cycling is at the forefront, versus all other sports, in the battle against doping.

BI: How will USA Cycling work with the US Anti-Doping Agency?

DBH: Although USADA handles the testing and goes after athletes — as does WADA internationally — we do have a role to play, and we are able to give money to USADA, which they then use to do more testing. I think we have a very important role to play in setting the culture against doping and having this absolute, no ambiguity, that there is just no place for it in our sport, and it’s cheating and it’s taking from others and it’s unethical and it’s wrong.

The thing you need to do to prevent doping is you need lots of testing, you need lots of education, and you need very severe penalties. We don’t really control the penalties — to some extent we do — because we have to follow international regulations. So while we don’t do the testing, we can help get more testing. On education and setting the tone, we have a very important role in that.

BI: What about the future of testing in the US? What are your objectives?

DBH: We do know that doping is happening at the elite level and at the amateur level. It’s a combination of the culture, the testing, and the penalties. And we’re going to try to do all that we can on all three. We’re already looking to see how we can get more testing at the amateur level. There is a good amount of testing at the amateur level in America, but there isn’t a reasonable threat. People are not seeing doping tests being carried out at events that frequently, and we’d like to increase that frequency to create a credible risk of your getting caught if you’re doping.

We’re also looking to make penalties more severe. There are significant restraints in that regard, but I will be vocal about where USA Cycling stands on doping, which is that it’s wrong and there’s no place for it. We will do what we can to rid the sport of those who are doing it, and do so in the most severe way that we can. There is the question, as I think you’re alluding to, about how much allocation of resources is justified. How much should we be spending on antidoping? That is a tough challenge. I look to our membership and to our board to sort of collectively come to that … If you have a finite pool of resources, whatever you spend on doping, you’re not spending on supporting clean athletes.

So even the fight against doping itself is a penalty against clean athletes, because it’s taking resources that they need to develop as athletes. And to do the things that we want to do at the grassroots level, we have a finite amount of resources, and to put more money into testing is not an easy decision, because it is taking away from something else. What we’re working on is growing the pie so that we’re not simply taking away from something else. We do receive personal contributions, and we are seeking that even more. People are giving money to see more testing. The most common thing I hear is, “I will spend more money to have more testing and to have more confidence that this is a cleaner sport.”

BI: Some former pros who doped are still working in the sport, and some, like Armstrong, are persona non grata. How is cycling dealing with its past?

DBH: Our dealing with our past is very difficult and complicated. And as any enterprise or organization that has a difficult past, it’s a struggle in how to deal with the past, and in particular with those individuals that were in the past who are continuing on today. And we have an entire generation that has gone through a highly corrupt era, and few were uncorrupted by it. It puts us in a difficult place. I’ve been grappling with these issues. It’s not easy.

You know, there’s a tendency to take extreme views here. One is, to be completely apologetic about it — like, “Everyone was doing it, and so you can’t hold them accountable in that environment, and it’s water under the bridge, and doesn’t matter anymore.”

Then there’s the other extreme, that anyone who has ever had anything to do with doping should be out and ostracized and never be allowed to participate at all.

I think the truth is somewhere more in the middle. We as a culture, as a society, have a principle of paying your penalties and then coming back. Our society is not founded on death penalties for all indiscretions. I think we do need to have a certain sympathy to these who are put into difficult situations that few were able to come out of without being corrupted, though some did.

In 2014, and to the surprise of many in the sport, Lance Armstrong spent some time helping train Tejay van Garderen, America's No. 1 stage racer:

On the other hand, their behavior was terrible, and some people were worse than others — we intuitively understand that. We know there are different stories of people who were involved in pathological doping over decades at all levels. There are dopers like that who sort of stick out, versus the ones who kind of later in life in Europe did it reluctantly and were apologetic about it. What we’re trying to do is take a nuanced look at it and say, "Well, who are the individuals? What is their story? What role are they trying to play in the sport?”

We take a very hard line with anyone with a doping past who works with our athletes. We would never hire a coach, for instance, who had any affiliation with doping whatsoever. That would be completely off the table, regardless of the circumstances of that doping. Whereas other roles, depending on that person’s past, I don’t think it’s appropriate to be constantly living in the past and beating people up for mistakes they made in the past. But it’s a really challenging one.

You asked about Lance — he’s not on my mind. He’s a huge figure, and one of the most significant sportsmen in the history of sports, and so he’s always around, but he has no relevance to what I do. I mean, he’s not asked to do anything with us. It’s not even an issue for me. He’s not on my radar screen. It’s other athletes, athletes with skills, talent, and I personally know a lot of these guys, and almost without exception I like them all. We’re talking about good people who want to stay in the sport and contribute and have had a positive influence. So I think a rigid, complete hard line is incorrect, nor is it fair to the individual. It is a real challenge — a real challenge. But I think we’re getting better and better at being thoughtful about how to deal with it.

BI: So what was the main reason you took this job?

DBH: I’ve always been very passionate about sports, and bike racing in particular. I retired form the sport to go into the business world, but I never stopped cycling. I love the sport of bike racing. To be able to be in it in a more direct way is an absolute thrill, and this role is a great challenge at this point in my career.

I also really felt as though this organization could do more than it’s done. It’s matured immensely, but there is so much more to be done, and I’ve spent much of my business career doing just that — making businesses grow and run better. But to do it in the sport of bike racing, in this fantastic role, was an easy decision to make. And yes, it’s come at a number of personal sacrifices, but the overall value package was tremendous for me.

BI: What do you already miss about the business world — or not miss?

DBH: [Laughs] Well, there are some things I’ll miss. The clarity of purpose in a for-profit enterprise is pretty clear: You’re trying to maximize shareholder value. Whereas the role I’m in right now is far more — well, there are so many more objectives. It’s just a broad range, and part of the challenge is actually determining our objectives. What is our focus? There is usually much more clarity on that in the business world.

Of course when you’re really successful in the business world there is greater financial upside that you would never find in a nonprofit. But I’m having more fun in the world that I’m in right now. I’m enjoying having the purpose be something I’m so passionate about — making bike racing so fun and safe, and as equitable as it can be for as many people as possible.

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He still haunts the sport he ruined, but the influence of Lance Armstrong— who in the 2000s was one of the most famous and most recognizable athletes on the planet — may finally be a thing of the past.

That's at least as far as American racing is concerned.

And at least as far as the US's top cycling official sees things.

In an interview this week with Business Insider, the new CEO of USA Cycling, Derek Bouchard-Hall, said Armstrong "has no relevance to what I do" and that the former doping cheat is not even on his "radar screen."

Bouchard-Hall was speaking openly about the many challenges of leading American cycling in the post-Armstrong era. Among them were improving drug testing and making "the doping story go away."

The Harvard Business School grad, who brings impressive experience to the job, is himself a former pro cyclist who on occasion raced against Armstrong.

He speaks candidly about cycling's dirty past and its problems today. That, and the fact that Richmond, Virginia, just hosted the UCI Road World Cycling Championships a couple of weeks ago, has many cautiously optimistic about the future of the sport in the US.

When asked about Armstrong, Bouchard-Hall told Business Insider:

He's not on my mind. He’s a huge figure, and one of the most significant sportsmen in the history of sports, and so he’s always around, but he has no relevance to what I do. I mean, he’s not asked to do anything with us. It’s not even an issue for me. He’s not on my radar screen.

And it's not all just about how Armstrong cheated, doped, lied, and manipulated so many for so long. It's also about what he represented, and how his outsize influence trickled down to the sport's grassroots.

Bouchard-Hall told Business Insider that during Armstrong's tainted reign cycling in the US was no longer about everyday riders, and neglected the majority of its athletes:

Lance Armstrong was somebody who was an elite male road racer that everybody wanted to be a part of and everybody was interested in, and that gravitated the organization toward that. But a lot of the everyday membership — our 70,000 members — it's only a tiny portion that are elite-level athletes. The vast majority are participating in the sport for their personal enjoyment, without aspirations of winning the Tour de France or going to the Olympics. They’re just enjoying it for their own personal participation.

In July, Armstrong caused controversy by riding in a charity event at the Tour de France. The top figures in cycling asked him not to do it, saying it was "disrespectful" and that he'd already done enough damage. But the brash Texan did it anyway. It turned out to be a nonevent, and a lot of cycling fans opted to focus on the race instead.

As recently as fall 2014 Armstrong was photographed training with Tejay van Garderen, America's No. 1 stage racer.

Meanwhile, the latest movie about Armstrong, "The Program," has just been released in Europe. Directed by Stephen Frears, the biopic stars Ben Foster as Armstrong, Dustin Hoffman, Chris O'Dowd, and Jesse Plemons.

Armstrong still believes he won seven Tours de France, even though those titles were stripped of him in 2012 because he used performance-enhancing drugs to win those races.

Betsy Andreu— who, with her husband, Frankie, was once close to Armstrong before becoming embroiled in a protracted, litigious battle that ended up exposing what the US Anti-Doping Agency called "the most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen"— told Business Insider this summer that she "would prefer if he just shut his mouth and go away forever so we don't have to deal with him again."

Business Insider asked Armstrong for an interview and comment; he declined.

You can watch the trailer for "The Program" below:

Read the full interview with Derek Bouchard-Hall >>

SEE ALSO: How the world's best cyclists are drug tested

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Eric Hites, self-proclaimed "fat guy," took the internet by storm with his radical plan to win back his estranged wife. Unemployed, clocking in at 560 pounds, and with his marriage on the rocks, Hites vowed to take back control of his life by riding his bike from Massachusetts to the Pacific Ocean.

His "Fat Guy Across America" campaign has taken off, and by the time he had reached Rhode Island, his wife Angie had already joined him.

He has lost 70 pounds and plans to write a book about his trip.

The Indiana native weighed 560 pounds and had no job. After his wife left him, he devised an impressive plan to win her back.

He decided to bike from the east coast to the west coast.

Why? A few reasons. "1. To prove things to my wife and my love. 2. To take back my health and to lose the pounds I have collected over the years," he wrote on his website.

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Volkswagen's emissions crisis could hit American bicycle racing close to home and leave USA Cycling, the sport's national governing body, scrambling to find a new title sponsor if the beleaguered automaker decides not to renew its partnership in the coming weeks.

Volkswagen is USA Cycling's biggest partner, and this is a contract-renewal year.

Last month, an investigation by the US Environmental Protection Agency revealed Volkswagen had been cheating on emissions tests for diesel vehicles. In Europe alone, Volkswagen is recalling 8.5 million vehicles, and the company is now cutting investments by 1 billion euros as it tries to cope with the scandal.

The automaker will decide next month whether it is going to continue its partnership, Daniel Gillespie, the sponsorship manager at USA Cycling, told Business Insider on Thursday. A spokeswoman for Volkswagen confirmed that.

"We're not in a good spot, obviously," Gillespie said. "If they don't renew, we're going to be scrambling to offset that sponsorships among other categories. But we're going to stick by Volkswagen and help them get through this period.

"There's a lot of damage right now, but the partnership with USA Cycling can only help repair that," he added. "It is questionable what they did, but for us, as a company Volkswagen still resonates with our brand, and it's one of the top car brands that our members use."

Volkswagen has been the title sponsor of USA Cycling for the past four years. Its name appears in several showcase events, including the Volkswagen USA Cycling Professional Road, Time Trial, and Para-cycling National Championships and the Volkswagen USA Cycling Professional Criterium and Team Time Trial National Championships.

A membership-based organization, USA Cycling has more than 62,000 members who hold 76,000 licenses. Each year it sanctions over 3,000 events across all disciplines of the sport — BMX, mountain biking, cyclocross, road, and track. It has a budget of $14 million, and Volkswagen's dollars make up a "sizeable chunk" of that, CEO Derek Bouchard-Hall told VeloNews. He said USA Cycling was actually looking for Volkswagen to increase its sponsorship next year.

This week, Volkswagen is holding its annual dealer meeting where orders are placed for 2016. The success of the meeting is seen as an indicator of the brand's health.

"If they get orders and sales look strong, that helps our cause," Gillespie said. "If orders are way down, that's going to have an impact on budget.

"With where the economy is and where companies are spending money, it's always a tough proposition to find companies to sponsor and provide cash support," he said. "It's a challenge, especially when you're competing with other trade teams and other sports.

"We're always looking for partners. Even though Volkswagen is having a disaster inside its organization, reputation-wise, I think normally you try to partner with a strong brand like Volkswagen in order to partner with other strong brands. So you get a strong partner in the automotive industry, then you get a strong partner like Sierra Nevada, then other partners, even if it's at a smaller level."

As Volkswagen deals with its crisis, it is reportedly taking a hard look at its sponsorship deals.

The Sports Business Daily reported that, among Volkswagen's various sports sponsorships, cycling could be on the chopping block.

Christoph Breuer, a professor of sports economics and management at the German Sport University in Cologne, told SPD the scandal could affect Volkswagen's involvement in sports and that cycling in particular "could be scrutinized by changes to VW's sponsorship strategy."

Bauer added: "Volkswagen should now focus on sponsorships that show a more positive image of the company."

Gillespie acknowledged cycling's troubles but thinks the sport is on the right track.

"Cycling's had a damaged image from its past, and I think we're making some changes here that hopefully will rebuild cycling's reputation. And in Volkswagen we've had a really strong partner that's supported us in hard times."

In an interview with Business Insider last week, Bouchard-Hall said doping had become synonymous with cycling but that cycling was now the leader in testing athletes for PEDs thanks to improved testing, better education, and harsher penalties.

"Our sport, I believe, is leading all other sports in the world," he said. "I would love anyone to show me a sport that is anywhere near as far in the fight against doping as we are. Most sports either don't know they have a problem or they're ignoring it."

Volkswagen's current sponsorship of USA Cycling ends December 31.

DON'T MISS: How the world's best cyclists are drug tested

SEE ALSO: WHERE ARE THEY NOW? The Lance Armstrong team that dominated the Tour de France

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NOW WATCH: For $7,000 this bike will get you to work in half the time and keep you from breaking a sweat

Peter Sagan, the best bicycle racer on the planet, hates technology.

He says he hates it because it's a waste of time and because it has children sitting around just sending messages to one another instead of going outside and playing.

"Children don't play outside anymore," he said. "And children are just writing messages to children."

He was speaking in an interview that aired Friday on the Belgian website Het Nieuwsblad.

Sagan said technology is moving way too fast and we just can't keep up with it.

"Maybe I'm just old-school," he added.

The 25-year-old Slovak won the UCI Road World Championships last month on Richmond, Virginia.

The American Heart Association recommends children participate in at least 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity every day.

Screen addiction is taking a toll on children, The New York Times reports, noting that "Chinese doctors consider this phenomenon a clinical disorder and have established rehabilitation centers where afflicted youngsters."

Watch the interview with Sagan on Het Nieuwsblad >>

SEE ALSO: 35-year-old American who thinks modern life is too stressful works 6 months a year, then lives on $10 a day adventuring around the world on a bicycle

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: For $7,000 this bike will get you to work in half the time and keep you from breaking a sweat

Lance Armstrong and Frankie Andreu were once the best of friends and the closest of teammates.

Times have changed.

In the early 2000s, when Armstrong was making global headlines and tens of millions of dollars winning a record seven Tours de France — the planet's largest and most grueling annual sporting event — Andreu, a quiet guy from Michigan, worked dutifully for the brash Texan as a loyal teammate.

Andreu would ride for hours over mountains and into headwinds across France so that Armstrong could sit in his slipstream and conserve energy to make his race-winning moves.

He would drop back from the front of the pack, get water bottles from support cars, then ride back to the front and give those bottles to Armstrong so that he could stay hydrated.

If Armstrong got a flat, Andreu was there to give him his wheel.

Away from racing, the Armstrong and Andreu families would hang out together and their kids would play together. They'd party when Armstrong won, which he did often, and Andreu was there, in the background, having worked to help Armstrong achieve incredible victories.

Eventually both admitted doping during their racing careers, and the biggest fraud in sports history was revealed for the world to see. But the way their confessions came about couldn't have been more different.

Early on, Andreu came out and told Juliet Macur of The New York Times that he'd doped for a handful of races during his career. Much later, after years of denial, Armstrong told Oprah Winfrey that he'd doped for all seven of his Tour victories.

In between those two confessions, there was a protracted, litigious battle that ended up exposing what the US Anti-Doping Agency in 2012 called "the most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen."

Just when things seemed to have settled down, now Armstrong has testified that Andreu "doped for the majority of his career" and "that is absolutely the truth," new court documents released Monday show.

Armstrong is being sued by the US government in a $100 million fraud case, and the documents released are related to it.

Meanwhile, for the past several years since the Armstrong scandal, Andreu has tried to rebuild his career, working in cycling as a race commentator, announcer, and journalist. But his wife, Betsy Andreu, told Business Insider this summer that it's been a struggle at times for her husband to earn a living in cycling given all that's happened.

Here is Armstrong's statement in the court documents obtained by Business Insider:

Q: Do you still feel like you owe Frankie an apology?

A: Well, I have apologized to Frankie. Frankie was the first person that I apologized to.

But what I said on Twitter was true. We know that to be true. I didn't -- I didn't -- at this point in time, there's no more lies here. That -- what I said on there, if I -- if I said that Frankie doped for the majority of his career, that -- that is absolutely the truth.

With Armstrong's new statement, made under oath, Andreu's comeback is being threatened, he says. Asked why Armstrong would say such a thing after all this time — years after Armstrong finally admitted doping — Andreu told Business Insider in an email that Armstrong was out to ruin him.

"He just wants to bring me down," he told Business Insider. "My testimony tells the truth. I began racing at 12 years old, first nationals was in 1976. Joined 7-11 when I was 19 in 1984 and raced in Europe. It wasn't until I was 29 when I took EPO, my last I year took nothing, and I retired at 33. That's not a majority.

"Lance is always in attack mode. Why just call me out? I only did two winning Tours with him. The others did a lot of years.

"He is out to wreck me," Andreu said.

A critical point along the Armstrong-investigation timeline remains the Andreus' sworn testimony.

Both Betsy and Frankie Andreu testified they were present in an Indiana hospital room with Armstrong when, they say, he told two doctors about a number of PEDs he had been using, including cortisone, testosterone, growth hormone, steroids, and EPO. Armstrong denied the Andreus' story.

When Armstrong finally confessed to doping during most of his career on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" in 2013, Winfrey asked if all was well between him and Betsy and if they had "made peace," to which Armstrong said, "No ... because they've been hurt too badly."

In an interview earlier this year with Business Insider, Betsy Andreu said: "I would prefer if [Armstrong] just shut his mouth and go away forever so we don't have to deal with him again."

Armstrong declined to comment for this story.

But for sure the bigger story won't be ending anytime soon.

SEE ALSO: How the world's best cyclists are drug tested

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Indoor cycling is becoming ubiquitous. SoulCycle has filed to go public and it faces rising competition from rivals like Flywheel and Peloton.

But many indoor-cycling enthusiasts make simple mistakes that can lead to serious injuries. 

Getting hurt could keep you off the bike for weeks, says Brittney Ravettine, a physical therapist at New York Sports Med.

We asked Peloton's head coach, Stephen Little, to demonstrate some of the worst postures and positions – and give us some tips on how to prevent injuries to the knees, hips, and back.

SEE ALSO: One of Soul Cycle's founders turned on the brand and started its biggest rival

Don't rush in.

"Especially in New York, a lot of people — they rush to get in, rush to get out. They can miss the set up, they can do it wrong, and they could put that workout in a place it doesn't need to be," Little said.

Also, make sure "that you're in some way warming up," physical therapist Ravettine told Business Insider.

Adjust the bike properly.

Make sure your bike seat isn't too low. That can lead to potential lower back and knee injuries. You also don't want to be too far back, which can cause problems, as well.

You don't want to be draped over the bike, either.

When you’re draped over the bike, you put all the weight into your upper body — which means your not working the proper muscles and can strain your shoulders.

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The coolest thing in road cycling right now isn't spending 10 grand on a carbon-fiber racing bike, training yourself into the ground using a Tour de France-worthy power meter and becoming a super Fred, or doing trackstands on a fixie to confuse Google's self-driving cars.

What's hot is picking a destination to ride to — someplace far — pedaling there, and then taking the train home.

With an assist from the train, multimodal cycling lets riders go out farther since they don't have to pedal back. And while it's hardly a new thing to take your bike on a train — multimodal commuters have been doing it for ages — many road cyclists we know are doing more big one-way rides like this, with several using apps like Strava and RideWithGPS to help them find new routes and plan distant outings that normally might be out of reach.

Tim Johnson, a New England-based professional cyclist and bicycling advocate, mentioned one such adventure in New York recently on Instagram, and Business Insider caught up with him to talk more about how he loves getting a group of friends together, planning a challenging ride somewhere far, and then taking the train home.

DON'T MISS: Millionaire entrepreneur explains why cycling — and not golf — is the new sport of choice for young professionals

An escape from New York City

A recent post on Tim Johnson's Strava account shows a one-way bike ride from New York City to Cold Spring, New York. Johnson and a group of friends rolled out of lower Manhattan and pedaled north for more than five hours, on a planned route of 80 miles with 4,700 feet of elevation gain. The train back to the city took about an hour and a half.

"Multimodal is so hot right now," he wrote on Instagram after.

"We had 20 people riding with us and only two had done a version of that same route," Johnson tells Business Insider. "And now that we did it together, a lot of the guys were talking on the way home about how they wanted to do it again."

Have train, will ride far

A big draw of multimodal cycling is that it allows more riders of varying abilities and fitness levels to get out and ride to points farther out than they normally could.

"You do a 50-mile ride in one direction, it means you have to ride 100 miles," Johnson says. "If you do a 50-mile ride with another form of transportation, it's still a 50-mile ride, and a lot of people feel that's in their realm of possibility. But a 100-mile ride becomes almost an impossibility unless you're in an organized ride.

"If we had done a 75-mile ride from Manhattan, you'd have to go up and over the George Washington Bridge, and you might be able to get up to Nyack, and then you're probably pretty smoked," Johnson adds.

"And then you do the bridge again, and you do the West Side bike path again. It's great, but it's still kind of tough. And when you ride a route like that so often you get burned on it, even if it's the most beautiful route in the world.

"In my experience, no one has time, but there's always going to be that yearning for something special or different."

The draw of multimodal

For Johnson, there are a few reasons multimodal has become more popular in recent years.

"One is just straight information," he says. "People are hearing more about it, so it's more accessible. They can look at a photo, they can look at a Strava file, they can look at a social-media post to get a little closer to it.

"It's one thing look at a photo and be inspired by the action in a photo. It's another thing to look at direct evidence of someone else doing it. That makes it more likely for you to do it. It's a lot closer for you, a lot closer to touch.

"Also, it's more and more in the realm of possibility for more people. You have the hardcore people who are creative without route finding or who are forced into using different forms of transport, because they don't have a car or whatever. They were always the ones doing these rides. Now that it's more accessible, more people are doing it.

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"When you try different roads and branch out, it's awesome. When you get to tell the folks who just ride three times a week when it's nice out, they're the ones you want to tell, 'Hey, try this route. It's a bit longer, but it means this, this, and this.' That's one of the cool things that have come down from some of the Strava tools and the route-finding stuff. It gives people ideas. And this kind of multimodal stuff is really the same kind of thing.

"The first time you take your bike onto a train is really cool, and something that definitely opens your eyes as to what's possible."

Entrepreneur Sinéad Geraghty came up with a solution to her own bike-storing problem, and now she's trying to turn it into a business.

Geraghty developed the Stowaway — a pulley device that allows people with space restrictions to store their bikes in the top two feet of any normal-sized room. The device, which Geraghty told INSIDER will retail for around $209, is designed so that the user hoists their bike up to the ceiling before locking it in place horizontally.

Geraghty recently started a Kickstarter campaign to raise enough money for production and distribution. She hopes to start shipping next summer.

Story by Tony Manfred and editing by Carl Mueller

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Brett Favre, who led the Green Bay Packers to a Super Bowl victory and was the NFL's most valuable player three times, is staying in shape after his stellar football career by cycling.

And he recently got this stealth-looking ride from Waterloo, Wisconsin-based Trek Bikes. The former star QB they call "The Gunslinger" is riding a custom Project One Madone. He rides 120 miles a week, Trek says, and he's even getting into the triathlon scene.

Check out some of the nice touches on Favre's new ride:

DON'T MISS: One of the hottest things in cycling right now is riding your bike someplace far and then taking the train home

SEE ALSO: How the world's best bike racers are drug tested

Favre's new bike is a custom-made Trek Project One Madone. As you can see, it's mostly black with green lettering in honor of Favre's time playing for the Green Bay Packers, where he won a Super Bowl and set a slew of NFL records.

The bike is made of carbon fiber and has top-of-line goodies all around, including high-performance carbon aero wheels, made by Bontrager, and a pro-level electronic components group from Shimano. We don't know the actual weight and cost of Favre's bike, but we're pretty sure it's a tad over 15 pounds — impressive considering the large size needed to suit Favre's build — and costs at least $12,000. This bike is Tour de France-worthy all around.

Favre's Trek Madone is the essentially the same as those raced in the Tour de France.

Favre's career highlights are custom-painted under the frame's top tube. They include his Super Bowl win, MVP awards, Pro Bowl appearances, touchdowns, passing stats, and, of course, his number, 4, which the Packers honored by retiring.

This week, Lance Armstrong said he made two really big mistakes in his life, and one of them has proved to be much more costly than the other.

One was doping, the other mistreating people.

The disgraced global sports icon was speaking on "Movember Radio" with CEO Adam Garone in a podcast published on Tuesday.

Armstrong, 44, talked about how attacking people during his cycling career proved to be a much more significant mistake than his actual doping.

(A variety of PEDs fueled Armstrong's record seven Tour de France victories, from 1999 to 2005, victories he was stripped of by the US Anti-Doping Agency in 2012 after a protracted, litigious battle.)

During the podcast Armstrong said he grew up "like a wild animal." He was also asked what advice he'd give his 18-year-old self.

He replied: "Understand that you may face some decisions in this sport, but, man, don't ever isolate, attack, ostracize, incite another human being."

Armstrong, who was raised by a single mother, added, "My mom and I had more of a brother-sister relationship ... I never had that person that in my life — and I'm not making excuses — but nobody ever tapped me on the shoulder and said, Dude.

"I sort of raised myself. But nobody ever said, Dude, what I just saw. Never do that again. And so it is what it is. And I got to live with that and spend the rest of my life trying to make it right."

On the surface, Armstrong's musings are intriguing, but they seem to fly in the face of what some others are saying is much more the reality with Armstrong.

As recently as a month and a half ago, for example, one of Armstrong's former teammates and close friends, Frankie Andreu, told Business Insider that to this day Armstrong was still out to "wreck" him.

That revelation came to light recently after Armstrong testified that Andreu "doped for the majority of his career" and "that is absolutely the truth,"Armstrong claims.

Andreu, who has been trying to rebuild his life and career after his role in the Armstrong scandal, has publicly denied Armstrong's allegations, telling Business Insider, "He just wants to bring me down. My testimony tells the truth. ... It wasn't until I was 29 when I took EPO, my last I year took nothing, and I retired at 33. That's not a majority.

"Lance is always in attack mode ... He is out to wreck me," Andreu said.

In an interview earlier this year, Betsy Andreu said forgiving Armstrong now would be a "horrendous mistake."

Armstrong's history of attacks on those who questioned his achievements or moral character are well documented, notably when he reportedly called Betsy Andreu, one of his fiercest critics, a "fat crazy bitch."

Many critics have called Armstrong out for trying to "control the narrative," seeming to say one thing and doing another, and never really coming off as truly contrite for his transgressions. And in light of what the Andreus and others have to say about Armstrong's real motives, his recent comments only serve to underscore those themes.

Armstrong declined to comment for this story.

The fallen champion is being sued by the US government in a $100 million fraud case. He still owns multimillion-dollar properties in Austin, Texas, and Aspen, Colorado.

He recently told The Times that "If there was an equivalent to EPO today, everyone in cycling would be on it," referring to erythropoietin, the drug of choice for cyclists in the sport's dirty period during which Armstrong reigned.

Here are Armstrong's full comments regarding his advice to his younger self:

There are really two big mistakes that I made, in most people's minds, everybody's mind, and that was the doping and the treatment of others. I think as time goes on, more and more people understand that the doping just was what it was. It really was completely pervasive. And you really didn't have a choice — well, you did have a choice: Your choice was to go home, which nobody took that choice. Everybody geared up and stayed.

But all those people that made that first mistake, which now nobody cares about, none of them treated people like shit. None of them attacked another human being. None of them sued another human being. And I did all those things. So my words to an 18-year-old me would be, you know, Understand that you may face some decisions in this sport, but, man, don't ever isolate, attack, ostracize, incite another human being. Because the doping isn't — we're not talking about this because I doped. We're talking about all of this because of the way I treated other people. And that's my mistake, and I own that. And I've spent the last three years trying to make amends with those people. And I mean the amends with the people that really got taken on. But the amends with the people I never even knew. I never attacked them. But these are people who — and again, it goes back to the most important word in all of this is 'betrayal.' So the people who have a tremendous sense of betrayal, that's the walk I walk the rest of my life.

And I have to now do that just because of the attitude that I had. I didn't have, for whatever reason, I never had that person that in my life — and I'm not making excuses — but nobody ever tapped me on the shoulder and said, Dude. Like, whenever my son or any of my kids start getting out of line, I stop them and say, What the f--- are you doing? Like, Calm down. Stop.Don't ever do that again. I grew up just sort as a — like a wild animal. My mom and I had more of a brother-sister relationship, and we sort of raised each other, therefore I sort of raised myself. But nobody ever said, Dude, what I just saw. Never do that again. And so it is what it is. And I got to live with that and spend the rest of my life trying to make it right.

You can listen to the full podcast below (the conversation about giving advice to his younger self starts about 36:00):

[h/t SI]

SEE ALSO: How the world's best cyclists are drug tested

DON'T MISS: One of the hottest things in cycling right now is riding your bike someplace far and then taking the train home

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NOW WATCH: For $7,000 this bike will get you to work in half the time and keep you from breaking a sweat

Every so often, Danny MacAskill, a professional trials cyclist from Scotland, comes out with a new video that shows him performing what look like impossible stunts on a bicycle.

Lucky for us, a new video premiered on Thursday.

In the five minute movie, MacAskill jumps from rooftop to rooftop in colorful Gran Canaria, bounces downs stairs, and balances — and jumps off of — walls.

And thanks to the camera mounted to his helmet, we get an idea of what it's like to be on his bike.

SEE ALSO: Polaroid thinks GoPro's new camera is a ripoff

The video takes place in Gran Canaria, a Spanish island off the northwest coast of Africa.

MacAskill is a trials cyclist.

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Trials cycling is a type of biking that consists of riders jumping off, over, and from obstacles, all without letting their feet touch the ground.

It requires a tremendous amount of skill, precision, and balance.

Chris Horner, one of the most accomplished riders in American cycling, has revealed to Business Insider that he's been battling a superbug that could force him to end his racing career.

The bug is called Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Horner said it seriously affects his lungs during competition. The condition "feels like asthma," he said, but emphasized it isn't actually asthma.

Pseudomonas infection is caused by strains of bacteria found widely in the environment, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC says that while serious infections usually occur in people in the hospital or with weakened immune systems, healthy people can also develop mild illnesses. Pseudomonas infections are generally treated with antibiotics.

"I knew there was some kind of bug down there, and they finally found it at the end of October," Horner said by phone from his home in Oregon this week. "I did eight rounds of antibiotics and just finished my ninth.

"But of course each round has been different, and it's stronger antibiotics each time," he added. "Before this last round, they didn't know what they were trying to kill, so hopefully now that they've done the bronchoscopy, they know exactly what they're trying to kill.

"Every doctor I talk to says, 'You're on the right path — you just gotta wait it out,'" Horner said. "So I'm trying to keep the head in a good place, but if the season starts and I got a bug in the lungs, maybe I move on to something else."

Superbugs — bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics — have been around for decades, but they are getting increasinglyharder to treat.

One of the chief drivers of the resistant bugs is our zealous overprescription of antibiotics. Doctors prescribe the drugs for ailments that they don't even treat and farmers put them in animal feed. The problem is global.

"Long term it seems like the body will eventually take care of it, but I won't be able to race comfortably until it is gone," Horner added. "But no risk beyond racing issues for me.

"We'll see if the latest round of antibiotics works its magic in the coming weeks," he added. "I'd love to see how long I could race my bike for.

"I mean, I'm 45 next year. In cycling, most riders are done at by 34, a few go 35, and 36 is old. So when you're going 44 like I was this year, that's eight years past the expiration date."

It was at the 2014 Tour de France that Horner believes he picked up the bug, he said, and it has affected his performance on the bike ever since.

"I'm thinking it was picked up on the cobblestone day [stage 5] when it rained and we were racing across the cobbles," he said. "But it's a guess. No one could tell you. It's like if you get a cold and they're like, where'd you get it? I can only tell you the period of time it was picked up, July 2014. Then again, maybe I got sick because I was sleeping on the wrong pillow.

"At first it started off with Z-Pak, which works for common colds or something like that," he said. "It got more intensive, and I ended up with ciprofloxacin, which is basically a super-strong antibiotic that hopefully kills it off, but this is sort of the last three-week dose of ciprofloxacin. We'll see if it works. Whatever the bug is, it's really antibiotically distant, so they've had an incredibly difficult time trying to kill it."

Z-Pak, a commonly prescribed antibiotic, does nothing for the common cold, which is caused by a virus known as rhinovirus. In the US, some 60% of people brought to doctor's offices and emergency rooms by sore throats — one of the tell-tale symptoms of common colds and the flu, both of which are caused by viruses — walk out with prescriptions for antibiotics, which kill bacteria, one long-term study found.

Horner is 44 years old, and for the past several years, when healthy, he ranked among the finest climbers in world cycling, and the US's top stage racer.

In 2013 he won the mountainous Vuelta a España, or Tour of Spain, becoming the first American to win the race.

With his Vuelta title Horner became one of three Americans to win a grand tour, or three-week stage race. Greg LeMond claimed three Tour de France titles, and Andy Hampsten won the Giro d'Italia, or Tour of Italy.

Horner has finished as high as ninth at the Tour, in 2010. Remarkably, even with the superbug, Horner managed to finish 17th in the 2014 Tour. But he said he was "suffering and swinging off the back the whole time."

He raced on Team USA at the London Olympics and has won some of cycling's most prestigious races, including the Amgen Tour of California and the Vuelta al Pais Vasco, or Tour of the Basque Country. Before he started racing full time in Europe he won most of the US's major races, including the Tour de Georgia and the San Francisco Grand Prix.

He said he's hopeful that he will start the 2016 racing season.

"If I can get healthy I'm gonna race my bike — if I can't, then I'm going to find something else to do," he said. "It's difficult, because it's not like a broken bone. If the doctors can fix it with antibiotics and the lungs go back to normal, and I have the same kind of legs I had this year at the Tour of Utah, then I'm going to race my bike and win a bunch of races. But if they can't, maybe I call it a career.

"I had amazing legs at Utah, just amazing. They were never hurting, I was never in pain. I just couldn't breathe. It feels like asthma, but it's not asthma. The harder I race, the more I exert myself and the more it affects the lungs and causes the lungs to just collapse. It's the same effect as having an allergic reaction that asthma gives you."

This off-season he's staying fit and riding his bike in moderation as his lungs recover, he said.

Horner's current team contract, with Airgas-Safeway, ends December 31. Whether he would return to the team depends in part on the team's makeup, he said. "If not, I'll just start racing my bike and race for fun," he said.

Asked what his "gut feeling" was regarding his chances of racing professionally in 2016, Horner said: "That I start the season? Really high. That I finish the season? I don't know."

He added that he isn't sure what he'd do if he retired, but it would more than likely be cycling-related.

Erin Brodwin contributed reporting.

SEE ALSO: Elizabeth Taylor got a lethal infection on the set of 'Cleopatra' in 1961 — and we're making what almost killed her more common

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Disgraced global sports icon Lance Armstrong, who is being sued by the US government in a $100 million fraud case, said in a podcast published Tuesday that he likes his legal team's defense.

"We like our case ... we are confident in the case," Armstrong said on the "Joe Rogan Experience" show.

Armstrong won a record seven Tour de France titles between 1999 and 2005, but he was stripped of his victories by the US Anti-Doping Agency in 2012.

The agency said the US Postal Service Pro Cycling Team, led by Armstrong, "ran the most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen."

The case in question was brought about back in 2010 by Floyd Landis, Armstrong's former teammate. The US Department of Justice later joined the suit. As USA Today has reported, the government is "suing Armstrong on behalf of the U.S. Postal Service, which paid more than $30 million to sponsor his cycling team from 1998 to 2004.

"The government argues that Armstrong breached the team’s sponsorship contract by doping and then concealed it with false statements in order to keep the payments coming and avoid having to pay the money back,"USA Today reported. "Under the False Claims Act, he could be on the hook for triple damages near $100 million, with a chunk of it owed to former cyclist Floyd Landis as his reward for filing the case as a government whistleblower in 2010."

During Tuesday's wide-ranging conversation, which runs nearly two hours, Rogan asked Armstrong details about the ongoing lawsuit against him.

"You are accused of defrauding the federal government," Rogan said. "Because you were riding for the US Postal Service and you won X amount of money during that the time, they can sue you for three times that money ...

"How's that going?" Rogan asked.

"You know, honestly, that's the only active case," Armstrong said, "so that one does get a little trickier to talk about, just from a ... just because I don't want to get crushed by my lawyers, but we like our case. We think that — we're confident in the case. We believe that the Postal Service — while none of this story is, is ... perfect — we believe that the Postal Service — and their own numbers support it — I mean, the Postal Service commissioned three separate studies to analyze the effect of the sponsorship on the team.

"We believe they made hundreds of millions of dollars. And we know that they were also using the team as a sales vehicle, so during the Tour, bringing over potential new clients ... They were actually converting new business to the Postal Service. And we know that happened, and we know that it equaled a significant increase in revenue. So we like our case ...

"And at this point, would I like to have all legal issues out of my life? Yes. But settlement's not an option, and so we just have to fall back on what we think is the strength of the case.

"I'm not a lawyer ... but it's a 'qui tam' case, which is a false-claims case, and my view is — and I think it's one that our side shares — is it's about damages. Was the Postal Service damaged? And what can we prove to be the damages? If there are no damages, then I would like to think there is no case.

"But it is what it is. The federal government is interested, the Department of Justice is interested in the case, and I have no choice but to fight it. After the dozen previous lawsuits, I'm not in a position to really cut any more checks, so I'm in a position where I have to fight this one out."

Back in 2010, Armstrong made similar comments about Landis' doping allegations and before his infamous fall from grace, saying:

"We like our word. We like where we stand and we like our credibility."

Asked how he earns a living now, Armstrong said he still gives paid speeches and makes other appearances. He said he has investments that "help ease that pain."

"But who knows what the future holds," Armstrong added.

He still owns multimillion-dollar properties in Austin, Texas, and Aspen, Colorado.

Armstrong declined to comment for this story.

You can listen to the full podcast below (the part about the case begins about 1:14):

SEE ALSO: One of the top American cyclists caught a superbug at the Tour de France that could end his racing career

DON'T MISS: WHERE ARE THEY NOW? The Lance Armstrong team that dominated the Tour de France

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NOW WATCH: Lance Armstrong likes his chances in the US government’s $100 million fraud lawsuit against him

Global sports icon Lance Armstrong is being sued by the US government in a $100 million fraud case. In a podcast published Tuesday, he said that he likes his legal team's defense.

Produced by Jacqui Frank. Original reporting by Daniel McMahon.

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How do you make a team better? It's an intriguing question that comes up a lot, especially in business and sports.

Recently, Team Novo Nordisk— the first pro cycling team of its kind, made up entirely of athletes with diabetes — took an unusual approach to up its game. General manager Vassili Davidenko sent his riders to California to take part in what normally would have been just another offseason training camp, where they typically get their new bikes and gear and pedal a bunch of miles while getting to know one another in a casual, laid-back atmosphere. But to their surprise, they were awoken on day one at 4 a.m. to take part in a series of rigorous team-building exercises with retired Navy SEALs and Special Ops personnel.

William Hart, cofounder of Acumen Performance Group, which teamed up with Novo Nordisk for the camp, greeted the stunned cyclists bright and early: "You guys are all professional cyclists and have a lot of coaches and trainers that make you some of the best in the world at cycling — us former retired Navy SEALs, we're the best in the world at getting through things that suck."

Over the next 36 hours, the cyclists would be pushed to their absolute physical and psychological limits in exercises designed to be taxing but empowering. This week, Business Insider caught up with Davidenko to learn more about his unique team, what the riders were put through — and how they fared — and how this hardcore camp fits into the big goal to ultimately get the team into the world's largest annual sporting event, the Tour de France.

DON'T MISS: Yes, actually cycling is the new golf

SEE ALSO: Multimodal cycling is so hot right now

Team Novo Nordisk is the first all-diabetes pro cycling team. "Our goal is to race the Tour de France by 2021, a year that marks the 100th anniversary of the discovery of insulin," a spokeswoman told Business Insider.

Its mission is front and center on its website:

"Team Novo Nordisk is a global all-diabetes sports team of cyclists, triathletes and runners, spearheaded by the world's first all-diabetes professional cycling team. Our mission is to inspire, educate and empower people affected by diabetes."

Denmark-based "Novo Nordisk is a global health care company with 90 years of innovation and leadership in diabetes care. The company also has leading positions within hemophilia care, growth-hormone therapy, and hormone therapy."

Other cycling teams hold camps with a military theme, too, but as Davidenko tells Business Insider, this camp was "completely different."

"Other camps introduce the riders to military guys, and they play with guns," Davidenko says. "Some play football and ride go-karts, and it's great to get together like that. But our camp was completely different. It was about getting our guys closer to one another, bringing them to their limits, taking them out of their comfort zone, and then keeping them there, making sure they work as a team, with no one left behind."

Juri Chabursky, CEO of Acumen Performance Group, says, "All the training APG delivers embodies a blend of elite military, business, athletic, and performance psychology best practices. Our programs are delivered in an immersive experiential manner, focused on adult learning principles, to ensure rapid retention and immediate utilization of the skills learned."

"Based on Team Novo Nordisk's needs, their 36 hours of training was oriented more from the U.S. Navy SEAL backgrounds of APG's founding partners. This particular client was looking to develop mental toughness in a manner consistent with the endurance-based multi-environment nature of their sport. This gave APG the ability to apply a huge range of our Navy SEAL and Special Operations instructional and operational experience to the program.

"The team improved their mental toughness, teamwork, leadership, communication, stress management, contingency planning, and their accountability to 'Team-Teammates-Self.'"

The camp was about training the brain — not just the body.

"We came up with the idea to do the Navy SEAL-style camp because we wanted the riders to work together more effectively as a team. We wanted to show them that when they work well together as a team, they can be better," Team Novo Nordisk CEO and cofounder Phil Southerland said. "We believe that what was holding them back was truly mental, so we wanted to break them down and build them back up as one solid unit."

It's a good week for pedestrians in Milan, Italy. From today until Wednesday, private cars and motorcycles are completely banned in the city between 10 AM and 4 PM, according to the BBC.

It's part of an attempt to curb pollution in the smog-filled metropolis, which was named the most polluted city in Europe in 2008. The smog problem has worsened recently due to drought, leading Milan to follow in the footsteps of other European cities with a car ban (albeit, a temporary one).

Milan residents won't be forced to walk or bike. The city has introduced a discounted all-day public transportation ticket during the ban for just $1.65.

Plus, the ban is only for six hours in the middle of the day; commuters will still be able to drive to and from work. Add that to the fact that it's a holiday week and the car ban doesn't seem so inconvenient.

The overall effect: Eerie cyclist paradise.

Milan isn't the only Italian city to institute a car ban this week. Smog has also prompted Rome to enforce alternate day driving (odd-numbered license plates on day, even-numbered plates the next).

The town of San Vitaliano, located outside Naples, has gone so far as to ban wood-fired pizza stoves.

Meanwhile, the rest of Europe inches closer to removing cars from clogged cities. By 2019, Oslo, Norway plans to ban cars from its city center.

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Nothing ruins a bike commute more than a rain shower.

To solve this problem, the Amsterdam-based bike design company Vanmoof designed a poncho that keeps riders dry, even in snow or a downpour. Called the Boncho, it's like a wearable tent that repels water. 

"Just have the Boncho inside your bag, and don’t worry about the weather," Vanmoof's CEO and co-founder Ties Carlier tells Tech Insider.

In less than a week, the $99 Boncho Kickstarter nearly doubled its funding goal. 

Here's how it works.

The Boncho unfolds just like a pop-up tent. It's made from a polyester and spandex material, with a waterproof layer inside and a water-repellent layer outside.

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Designed to fit every type of bike, the poncho has two fabric strips that attach to the handlebar. Helmets fit either under or above the hood.

The front of the poncho curves and extends outward, protecting legs and feet from rain. A metal structure underneath helps keep its shape.