How Will Oprah Make Lance Armstrong Cry, After Years of Livestrong Support, Matching Spandex, and the Occasional Shared Family Recipe?

As fascinating and surprisingly personal as Oprah Winfrey’s recent interview with David Letterman was, it did not live up to peak Oprah interviews in one key area: Winfrey—the former sob Svengali of TV interviewers—failed to draw tears from her interview subject. Fortunately for the media empress, she has secured another high-profile sit-down, this time with Lance Armstrong, in the disgraced cycling champion’s “first no-holds-barred interview” since he was stripped of his seven Tour de France titles. As much as Armstrong has riding on the interview, the namesake host ofOprah’s Next Chapter also has something at stake—her fading title in the ocular-discharge department.

For Armstrong, the Q&A will be a more delicate scenario to navigate. He will most likely have to reveal some kind of trauma or insecurity that explains the “years of accusations and cheating” and “charges of lying” that Oprah promises will be covered. He will have to appear sincere and regretful. And he will have to play defense to Oprah’s lachrymal-gland- focused offense—which may be especially aggressive considering the pair’s past sharing family guacamole recipes and spandex color themes. Ahead, some analysis on the potentially tear-jerking scenario:

__Winfrey and Armstrong’s Rapport:__As Vanity Fair’s Carrie Carlisle, a former fanatical Oprah viewer, notes, the host has a long history with the Livestrong founder. Case in point: this photo of Oprah resting her head affectionately on Armstrong’s shoulder while the pair wears what appears to be matching exercise spandex. Other case in point: the fact that Oprah apparently color-coordinated her interview outfit for a talk-show interview with the cyclist around his canary-yellow Livestrong band (which she also wore). More evidence: Lance Armstrong’s mom’s Texas Guacamole recipe, which Oprah featured on her Web site in 2006—and the fact that she gushed about him being a legend and “one of the greatest . . . ever” in an interview still titled “The Greatest” on Oprah.com.

__The Precursor:__In a somewhat similar scenario in 2008, Oprah hosted Marion Jones after the Olympic champion served six months in prison for perjury after lying to federal prosecutors about her use of steroids. During the interview, Oprah asked Jones to “set the scene” and take the audience through her experience lying to federal prosecutors in excruciating detail. By The Guardian’s count, Jones cried a total of three times during the segment, during which she attributed her dishonesty to childhood trauma that led her to not “love [her]self enough to tell the truth.” She ended by saying that she was trying to move on and that she hoped the world would, too.

__The Scene:__The interview will take place at Armstrong’s home in Austin, Texas. (If it takes place in the same 8,000-square-foot house featured in Architectural Digest in 2008, it features many teary- confessional-ready areas, including a family room, a fountain, and a pool cabana.)

The Tear-Inducing Tactics: For Oprah’s infamous interview with James Frey—another public figure who deceived her and fans after she had lent him enthusiastic support—Oprah chose the annihilation route, which led to a humiliating live television segment but nary a tear. She’s had more success wetting the cheeks of Mike Tyson, Rihanna, and 50 Cent by pressing them to describe deeply personal life events. For her upcoming sit-down, Oprah’s most promising tactics may be similarly personal questions about how Armstrong’s doping scandal could detract from his legendary courage while stricken with cancer; how he has explained the scandal to his four children; and who has been most hurt by his alleged lies. If those questions fail to stimulate the tear ducts, she could produce a pile of letters written by disappointed fans, ideally under the age of 10; fly in said fans for a dramatic face-to-face meeting scored live by a string section that just happened to be waiting outside in an OWN production van; and the clincher: unexpectedly introduce Armstrong’s birth father, whom the disgraced cyclist has reportedly never met, as a surprise guest.

See Oprah face off against Armstrong’s tear ducts on Thursday, January 17, at nine p.m. E.T./P.T. on the Oprah Winfrey Network. In the meantime, make your best bets on the Armstrong’s crying odds in the space below.