Contador fails Second Doping TestBy JULIET MACUR
A test new to the antidoping movement was used for the first time at the Tour de France last summer, and now it appears that the three-time Tour winner Alberto Contador ? who tested positive for a banned drug at the race ? may have more explaining to do.
That new test detects a specific type of chemical, called a plasticizer, that is found in plastic IV bags. Evidence of that chemical in an athlete?s urine could mean the athlete has used a blood transfusion to boost endurance. The World Anti-Doping Agency bans blood transfusions or any intravenous infusions, except in a medical emergency.
A test performed on at least one of Contador?s urine samples from the Tour revealed levels of that chemical eight times higher than the minimum amount that signifies doping, according to a person with knowledge of the test results.
The International Cycling Union drug-testing chaperones took the urine sample from Contador on July 20, the eve of the Tour?s final rest day, said the person, who wanted to remain anonymous because of an agreement to keep the information confidential while Contador?s investigation is continuing.
The next day, as Contador announced last week, he tested positive for clenbuterol, a weight-loss and muscle-building drug. He claimed that failed test came from his consumption of tainted beef from Spain. Contador has denied ever doping and said he knew nothing of the latest incriminating test.
The cycling union has spent more than two months investigating Contador?s case, and it is receiving scientific help from the World Anti-Doping Agency as it determines how to proceed. Pat McQuaid, the cycling union?s president, did not return phone calls or e-mails for comment.
While there was already a validated test for blood doping with someone else?s blood, the new test breaks ground because it may be able to detect if an athlete has had a transfusion with his own blood.
Before, an athlete could remove his own blood, store it, then reinfuse it just before a sporting event to gain an edge without worrying about testing positive.
The test to detect plasticizers from IV bags has been around for more than a year in antidoping, but is not yet validated for use, so an athlete could easily question its validity in court. Still, the test could be used in conjunction with other facts to build a doping case, antidoping experts said.
?Even without a validated test, it could be looked at in a case-by-case basis,? Francesco Botré, the chief of the World Anti-Doping Agency-accredited laboratory in Rome, said. ?If someone has a very, very high level of plasticizers in the urine, it would be hard for that athlete to explain how that happened if not for doping. If the level is lower, it obviously would make it much harder, but it would still be possible to prove.?
The second failed test, at the least, adds to Contador?s woes.
A day before the Tour?s decisive mountain stage, he tested positive for clenbuterol, a drug that boosts metabolism but can also increase aerobic capacity and the ability to process oxygen. He faces a two-year ban and loss of his Tour title if convicted of a doping offense.
Contador, who said he was tested eight times in the Tour?s final week, failed the test for clenbuterol on July 21, one day after the failed plasticizer test. Though the levels of the drug found in his urine were ?very small,? according to the cycling union, doping rules say that any amount constitutes an offense.
Contador?s press agent, Jacinto Vidarte, said in a telephone interview on Monday that Contador ?has done nothing illegal? and denies receiving any blood transfusions.
?There has been no official confirmation at all,? Vidarte said, regarding a news report last week that Contador had failed the test for the plasticizer.
That report, from the German state-run television station ADR, suggested that Contador?s positive test result for clenbuterol probably occurred because Contador transfused his own blood on that day, and that the stored blood he had used already had clenbuterol in it.
Now, however, the failed test for clenbuterol and for the plasticizers appear to have occurred on different days.
Bernhard Kohl, the Austrian rider who was stripped of his third-place finish at the 2008 Tour for doping, said Monday that he was not surprised a top cyclist had tested positive for more than one banned thing.
?It?s impossible to win the Tour de France without doping,? said Kohl, who was in Leesburg, Va., to speak at the United States Anti-Doping Agency?s science conference. ?You can tell by looking at the speed of the race. Every year it has been about 40 kilometers per hour. It?s the same the year I raced, the year Floyd Landis won, this year. It shows riders are still doping.?
Kohl, who said he retired from the sport to avoid having to think about doping every day, has no specific knowledge of Contador?s case but said most of the top riders rely on transfusions of their own blood and of designer, undetectable drugs like different types of the blood-booster EPO.
?I was tested 200 times during my career, and 100 times I had drugs in my body,? he said. ?I was caught, but 99 other times, I wasn?t. Riders think they can get away with doping because most of the time they do. Even if there is a new test for blood doping, I?m not even sure it will scare riders into stopping. The problem is just that bad.?
