Oprah Winfrey expands the upcoming 90 minute interview with Lance Armstrong to two episodes.

George Burns/OWN

Oprah Winfrey's highly-anticipated 90 minute interview with the disgraced cyclist and drug cheat Lance Armstrong in which he admits to doping, is expanding to two episodes after Oprah Winfrey's interview which was recorded yesterday at Lance Armstrong's home in Austin, Texas, ran over two and a half hours long.

Discovery Networks International issued me this image taken during the interview which was conducted on Monday and which will be shown on Oprah Winfrey's OWN network as part of her new talk show Oprah's Next Chapter.

South African viewers will be able to watch the cheating Lance Armstrong's interview online at oprah.com with what will now be part one (90 minutes) on Friday 18 January streamed live at 04:00 in the morning (South African time) at the same time as the first episode goes out in America, followed by part two on Saturday 19 January at 04:00 in the morning (South African time).

South African viewers will also be able to tune in to TLC (DStv 172 / TopTV 453) on Friday 18 January at 19:30 (South African time) to watch the Lance Armstrong interview on Oprah's Next Chapter on television for 90 minutes. There is now word yet from TLC on whether part two will be shown in South Africa on Saturday 19 January at 19:30.

I just watched Oprah Winfrey's interview on America's morning show CBS This Morning on which Oprah Winfrey today discussed the upcoming Lance Armstrong interview. She revealed that the interview is being extended to two episodes due to the length of the interview.

"I'm not going to cut down the two and a half hours," said Oprah Winfrey. "As a matter of fact we have decided, literally on the plane last night on the way back, that we are actually going to go for two nights because it is impossible to cut 80 minutes out."

"As you all know, a 90 minute interview on television is really only 65 minutes. So we felt that to leave over half of this on the cutting room floor after millions of people have been waiting for years for many of these answers, would not be the right thing to do," said Oprah Winfrey.

I asked today whether this means two episodes - a part one and a part two - of Oprah's Next Chapter for South African viewers on TLC, but have not yet received a response. OWN has already confirmed that there will now be two simultaneous live streaming events over two consecutive days.

The latest adjusted TLC programme schedule for South Africa currently only indicates the one (first) 90 minute interview special and it's several repeats, although the addition of the "first" episode to the schedule was only made today. It's highly likely that the second episode which Oprah Winfrey only decided to extend the interview to today, will be officially added to the TLC schedule on Wednesday.