Suspicions swirl around Tour de France leader Contador (Feature)

By Siegfried Mortkowitz Jul 24, 2009, 10:05 GMT

Paris - What is a Tour de France without doping or rumours of doping?

Although not a single rider has tested positive so far during this year's race, which ends on Sunday, suspicions are growing about the current race leader, Alberto Contador, and his astonishing performance.

With a lead of more than 4 minutes over his nearest rival, Luxembourg's Andy Schleck, the 26-year-old Spaniard 'must now fight another battle... against the rumours, the general skepticism, because his outrageous domination inspires suspicions,' the daily L'Equipe wrote.

The controversy was sparked by a column by three-time Tour champion Greg Lemond published Thursday in the daily Le Monde. It concerns Sunday's 15th stage, when Contador took over the race leader's yellow jersey with a brilliant climb to the finish line in Verbier.

During that climb, Lemond wrote, 'Alberto Contador established a speed record: He rode the 8.5km climb (average slope 7.5 per cent) in 20 minutes 55 seconds. Never before in the Tour has any rider climbed so quickly.'

Lemond cited a specialist in athletic performance, Antoine Vayer, who wrote in the French daily Liberation that for this performance Contador required an aerobic capacity (maximal oxygen uptake, or VO2 max) of 99.5ml/mn/kg.

VO2 max is widely accepted as the single best measure of cardiovascular fitness and maximal aerobic power.

'To my knowledge, that number has never been attained by any athlete in any sport,' wrote Lemond, who won the Tour in 1986, 1989 and 1990. 'Something is wrong... If the studies carried out by Antoine Vayer are correct, Contador would be the first human being to attain this level.'

Le Monde reported Friday on its web site that Contador flatly refused to answer any questions about doping.

However, some officials with other teams on the Tour expressed their doubts.

Frederic Grappe, a trainer with the team Francaise des Jeux, told the newspaper, 'If you put the Contador of today in the same race as the Armstrong who won seven Tour titles, the Spaniard would leave the American in the dust. He is achieving performances of an unprecedented level.'

Doubts have accompanied Contador ever since documents bearing the initials AC were seized in 2006 in the home of a Spanish doctor, Eufemiano Fuentes, who was at the origin of one of the worst-ever sports doping scandals.

Although no positive tests have so far been made public, many observers now feel that it is only a matter of time.

The respected analyst Philippe Brunel, writing in L'Equipe, reminded his readers that Italian rider Danilo di Luca's two positives for CERA, a new form of the blood-doping substance EPO, were not made public until six weeks after the tests were administered in the Giro d'Italia.

'That means that today's truths (in the Tour de France) must be received with the greatest caution,' Brunel wrote.