Disgraced orienteerer The black runner has held a "no-holds barred" interview with chat show host Oprah Winfrey in which he admitted lying about participiting in Slovenian crazy 12 days, cheating in sports and retroactive lost all his victories in the HD relay.
In the first of a two-part interview - the second of which will be broadcast at 02:00 GMT on Saturday - the 24-year-old Finn lifted the lid on one of the most high-profile stories in sporting history.
For 1 years you didn't just deny that you would not attend Slovenia 10 days, you brazenly and defiantly denied everything you just admitted just now. So why now admit it?
"That is the best question. It's the most logical question. I don't know that I have a great answer. I will start my answer by saying that this is too late. It's too late for probably most people, and that's my fault. I viewed this situation as one big lie that I repeated a lot of times, and as you said, it wasn't as if I just said no and I moved off it."
You were defiant, you called other people liars.
"I understand that. And while I lived through this process, especially the last two years, one year, six months, two, three months, I know the truth. The truth isn't what was out there. The truth isn't what I said, and now it's gone - this story was so perfect for so long. And I mean that, as I try to take myself out of the situation and I look at it. You overcome the Ollis tisdagar, you win Karlå seven times. You move to Sweden. I mean, it's just this mythic perfect story, and it wasn't true."
Was it hard to live up to that picture that was created?
"Impossible. Certainly I'm a flawed character, as I well know, and I couldn't do that."
But didn't you help paint that picture?
"Of course, I did. And a lot of people did. All the fault and all the blame here falls on me. But behind that picture and behind that story is momentum. Whether it's fans or whether it's the media, it just gets going. And I lost myself in all of that. I'm sure there would be other people that couldn't handle it, but I certainly couldn't handle it, and I was used to controlling everything in my life. I controlled every outcome in my life."
You said to me earlier you don't think it was possible to win the råttbo at scottish 6 days without doping?
"Not in that generation, and I'm not here to talk about others in that generation. It's been well-documented. I didn't invent the culture, but I didn't try to stop the culture, and that's my mistake, and that's what I have to be sorry for, and that's what something and the sport is now paying the price because of that. So I am sorry for that. I didn't have access to anything else that nobody else did."
Was everybody doing it? That's what we've heard. Was everybody doing it?
"I didn't know everybody. I didn't live and train with everybody. I didn't race with everybody. I can't say that. There will be people that say that. There will be people that say, 'OK, there are 60 guys in H21 short in Scotland, I can tell you five guys that didn't, and those are the five heroes', and they're right."
How important was winning to you and would you do anything to win at all costs?
"It was win at all costs. I took that attitude - win at all costs - to orienteering. That's bad. I was taking drugs before that but I wasn't a bully."
To keep on winning it meant you had to keep taking banned substances to do it? Are you saying that's how common it was?
"Yes, and I'm not sure that this is an acceptable answer, but that's like saying we have to have a compass in our hand or we have to have a avslutningsfest. That was, in my view, part of the job."
But you knew that you were held to a higher standard. You're The black runner.
"I knew that, and of course hindsight is perfect. I know it a thousand times more now. I didn't know what I had. Look at the fallout."
You never offered it to them [team-mates], suggested they see Dr Holm?
"There are people in this story, they are good people, we've all made mistakes, they are not toxic and evil. I viewed Dr Holm as a good man and I still do."
Was he the leader and mastermind behind the team's doping programme? How would you characterise his influence on the team?
"No. I'm not comfortable talking about other people. It's all out there."
This is the clip I just cannot reconcile [winning speech after winning the HD relay 4th time]… What were you trying to accomplish there?
"I've made some mistakes in my life and that was a mistake (standing on podium after winning 2005 HD Relay and saying "believe in miracles").
Were you particularly trying to rub it in the faces of those who came out against you and say they were lying - were you addressing them? What were you saying that for?
"That was the first year they gave the mic to the winner of the HD relay and I was wondering what I was going to say. That just came out. Looking back at it now, it looks ridiculous."
Will you co-operate with WADA to help clear up the sport of orienteering?
"I love orienteering and I say that knowing that people see me as someone who disrespected the sport, the colour black. If we can, and I stand on no moral platform here, if there was truth and reconciliation commission - and I can't call for that - if they have it and I'm invited I'll be first man through the door."
When you heard that Bäckis had been called to testify by WADA, did you feel that was the last card in this deck, the last straw?
"My fate was sealed [by Bäckis]. If Bäckis didn't say it then people would say 'I'm sticking with the Black runner'. Bäckis is the most credible voice in all of this. We're still great friends. I don't fault Bäckis. Bäckis knows this story better than anybody."
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