One thing I noticed in the press is that last years winner (Contador?) has still not been fully cleared of taking drugs during last years race. What happens if he wins again and is then found guilty? Should he be even allowed to take part?
It's all really complicated and I don't understand all of it myself.
Basically Contador had a blood test in last years Tour and was found to be clear BUT the next day he was given another test and they found a tiny amount of a banned drug in it - but the amount of the drug which they found was really tiny and under the anount at which they ban folks at.
BUT the powers that be in cycling think there is more to this story than meets the eye!
You see there are two areas of doping in cycling - taking drugs and giving your blood out of competition time and then putting it back in to you during competition.
They think Contador took performance building drugs away from the competitions - to help him to train better (build muscles, stamina, recover faster etc).
Some drugs are taken to do this directly - others are taken to hide or 'mask' the fact that these first drugs are taken.
It takes a number of days for both sets of drugs to leave your system and become 'drug free' to tests.
Ok with this part so far?
The 'blood doping' is where you take blood out of you, store it and then re-inject it back into you during competition - this is done because the red blood cells in your body carry oxygen - which is basically your body's fuel - so if your body had more red blood cells, you perform better. And it is very hard to prove (at the moment anyway) that you've 'cheated' by adding more of your own blood to your body.
The thinking is (because Contador was 'clean' the day before) was that following that test he blood doped BUT the blood he put back in his body was slightly 'contaminated' because he had not left just enough time for his system to have become 'clean' when the blood was taken.
Contador DOES have previous with drugs - so that is why such a small trace in his system is such a big deal - particularly because it wasn't there the previous day!
So, the Spanish Cycling authorities say that he is ok to cycle in the Tour because the drug sample was to tiny to get banned for (they believe he ate it in some dodgy beef anyway and it wasn't a masking drug). The cycling world didn't agree and wanted the case to do to court to see if he had really taken drugs / blood doped and there should have been a court case last month - but Contador wanted more time to prepair his case - hence the case will be heard after this years Tour - or something like all of that anyway!
I think the powers that be hope he doesn't win - as it would make their lives easier if they were to ban him after the Tour.
It's all a mess really and its stuff like this that makes it such a wonderful soap opera that it is.
For me the race is kind of like a sideshow - it is all the plots and intrigue and cock-ups and shocks that I really love about the race.
Hope my explanation makes some sense to you?
