Contador may not have won the 2010 Tour de France fair and square after a failed substance test during the race was revealed Wednesday. The cyclist rejected that he knowingly ingested any prohibited substance during the race in a news conference Sept. 30. Contador defended himself from the possible loss of his title and a two-year suspension with the justification that eating bad meat was the reason for the test results.
Impure meat held responsible by Contador
Alberto Contador, considered the world’s greatest cyclist racing today, tested positive on July 21, a day before the toughest mountain stage of the Tour de France. According to the New York Times, the International Cycling Union said on Wednesday that clenbuterol, a weight-loss and muscle building drug, was what Contador tested positive for in his urine samples that day. Thursday, Contador decided to come out and say that meat he had eaten at the hotel had to be drugged with this because he didn’t do it himself. His other part of the statement was saying he would not have performed any better with the tiny amounts of the clenbuterol found in the samples anyway.
Past Contador did substances
The next thing on Contador’s list is to clear his name of charges. CNN reports that he was provisionally suspended from racing by the International Cycling Union. Most people in his sport are known for doping. In fact, Contador was linked to the 2006 Spanish blood-doping ring. He won the Tour de France in 2007. This was the first time he was able to do so. In 2008 he joined Astana, a team that was banned from the race for doping violations. He won his second Tour title in 2009. Lance Armstrong came third in this race. He has won seven titles previously though. Floyd Landis, an American, was the only Tour de France winner that lost his title after positive testing.
Contador easily persuades many people
Specialists seem to have a few sympathy for Contador assuming he really did test positive because of tainted meat. We learn from Universal Sports that clenbuterol is given to animals sometimes. To speed up growth, chicken, cows and pigs are given the drug. The liver and muscle is where the drug ends up staying. Bodybuilders often burn fat and build muscle with clenbuterol. Oxygen can get the muscles easier with the substance which increases aerobic capacity. Short term, amphetamines could have the very same effect of it. Contador couldn’t at all have gotten a boost from easting clenbuterol-spiked animal meat, Dr. Andrew Franklyn Miller told Universal as a sports medicine expert.
Citations
New York Times
nytimes.com/2010/10/01/sports/cycling/01cycling.html?ref=sports
CNN
cnn.com/2010/SPORT/09/30/cycling.alberto.contador.banned/index.html?npt=NP1
Universal Sports
universalsports.com/news/article/newsid=494315.html
