Alberto Contador of Spain tested positive for a prohibited substance throughout the 2010 Tour de France, which he won. The cyclist rejected that he knowingly ingested any prohibited substance throughout the race in a news conference September 30. Facing a two-year ban from cycling and being stripped of his Tour title, Contador held responsible eating tainted meat.
Contador puts the blame on tainted meat
The Tour de France was something Contador was looking forward to as the world's greatest cyclist. Unfortunately, the day before it started on July 21, he tested positive. According to the New York Times, the International Cycling Union said on Wednesday that clenbuterol, a weight-loss and muscle building substance, was what Contador tested positive for in his urine samples that day. In a news conference Thursday, Contador called himself a victim and said he had eaten meat tainted with the drug at his hotel. He also claimed he couldn't have done better with the substance anyway. He said the amounts found in his samples were too small to matter.
Drugs were a part of Contador's past life
Contador will not stand for being known this way. He needs to get his name cleared. CNN reports that he was provisionally suspended from racing by the International Cycling Union. In 2006, the Spanish blood-doping ring has Contador linked right now it, what with the sport having drugging being something most do. He won his first Tour de France in 2007. In 2008 he joined Astana, a team that was banned from the race for doping violations. In 2009, his second Tour title was won. Lance Armstrong, a seven-time winner, finished 3rd. Floyd Landis, an American, was the only Tour de France winner that lost his title after positive testing.
Several convinced by Contador's scenario
Experts seem to have a few sympathy for Contador assuming he really did examination positive because of tainted animal 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. It accumulates in the liver and muscle tissue. Clenbuterol is used by bodybuilders to increase muscle mass and burn fat. Oxygen can get the muscles easier with the drug which increases aerobic capacity. Short term, amphetamines can have the same effect of it. Contador couldn't at all have gotten a boost from easting clenbuterol-spiked meat, Dr. Andrew Franklyn Miller told Universal as a sports medicine expert.
Articles cited
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
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