Cycling chiefs face a race against time to purge the deep-seated "sophisticated scheme to defraud" that underpinned the Lance Armstrong drugs scandal, according to US anti-doping head Travis Tygart.

US Anti-Doping Agency chief executive Tygart does not believe Armstrong's refusal to co-operate with the official reform battles will compromise the sport's fight to clean up its act.

Under-fire world governing body the UCI has set up the Cycling Independent Reform Commission in a bid to eradicate systemic doping from the sport.

"Time is of the essence, we've been pounding this issue in the press, in front of the senate, the EU and the German parliament," said Tygart at a London doping conference yesterday.

"Now is the time to take and fulfil the promise that the UCI leadership made at that point to take decisive and transparent action.

"In my opinion another day can't go by until it's put in place in a proper fashion and the process starts. It took baseball close to two years in the early 2000s.

"I don't think it needs to take that long, it can be done in a shorter period of time.

"This was a sophisticated scheme to defraud, they raised a lot of money, had incredible cash flow, and all based on victories in a sport and an incredible story," Tygart added.

"I'm interested in the people behind Lance Armstrong - that might be outside of sports jurisdiction, team owners, agents, lawyers, who may have participated in this.

"We've had numerous meetings, numerous conversations with him and his people."

Tygart confirmed that his organisation would pass over 37 "unredacted names" of cyclists under doping scruting to CIRC.