Getty Sheryl Crow and Lance Armstrong at the GQ 2005 Men Of The Year Awards.
Lance Armstrong and former girlfriend Sheryl Crow met in 2003 at a charity event shortly after the cyclist’s divorce with ex-wife Kristin Armstrong. According to People, Armstrong and Crow dated for two years before a five-month engagement. During their engagement, the couple announced they were breaking up in a joint statement released in 2006.
“After much thought and consideration we have made a very tough decision to split up. We both have a deep love and respect for each other and we ask that everyone respect our privacy during this very difficult time,” the statement read, per People.
Armstrong revealed that part of the tension in their relationship was a difference of opinion over a desire for children. Crow wanted to have children while Armstrong noted “I didn’t want that at that time.”
“She wanted marriage, she wanted children; and not that I didn’t want that, but I didn’t want that at that time because I had just gotten out of a marriage, I’d just had kids,” Armstrong wrote in his book Lance (via US Weekly). “Yet we’re up against her biological clock — that pressure is what cracked it.”
Sheryl Crow on Doping: “The Truth Will Set You Free”
After years of denial, Armstrong finally admitted to doping throughout his cycling career during an interview with Oprah Winfrey. Crow responded to Armstrong’s admission by noting that “honesty is always the best bet.”
“I think that honesty is always the best bet and that the truth will set you free,” Crow told Entertainment Tonight in 2013. “To carry around a weight like that would be devastating in the long run.”
It is unclear how much Crow knew about Armstrong’s doping when they were dating. Reporters Reed Albergotti and Vanessa O’Connell teamed up to write the book entitled Wheelmen while they were with the Wall Street Journal in 2013. Albergotti and O’Connell reported in the book that Crow knew about Armstrong’s doping and Food and Drug Administration investigator Jeff Novitzky gave the singer an agreement to protect her as a witness.
“Rather than try to hide the transfusion from her, Armstrong was completely open about it,” O’Connell and Albergotti explained in the Wheelmen, via The Guardian. “He trusted that Crow would have no desire to tell the press or anyone else about the team’s doping program. He explained that it was simply part of the sport – that all cyclists were doing the same thing.”
Armstrong Is Now Engaged to Longtime Girlfriend Anna Hansen
Armstrong is now engaged to girlfriend Anna Hansen but the couple has yet to announce a wedding date. Hansen called Armstrong the “love of my life” during a heartfelt Instagram message posted on September 18, 2019.
“Happy Birthday Lance! Never been a dull moment with you, and I wouldn’t change a thing! You’re still the hardest person to buy gifts for though, remembering I gave you a bottle of wine this day 11 years ago because I knew at least it wouldn’t go to waste!:) P.S. @lancearmstrong you are my best friend and also happen to be the love of my life, let’s make 48 gr8!” Hansen noted.
As for Crow, the singer appears to have a good sense of humor about things not working out with Armstrong. During the 2019 Gracie Awards Gala, Crow joked about being engaged on three separate occasions but never getting married.
“All I can say is that I’ve been engaged three times, and I never got married, but I’ve had a rockin’ great time not getting divorced,” Crow joked, per US Weekly.