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Three-time Tour de France winner Alberto Contador of Spain holds aloft the Spanish national flag during a victory lap after winning the Tour de France in 2010. Christophe Ena, Associated Press file
By Paul Logothetis, AP Sports Writer
MADRID — Alberto Contador was stripped of his 2010 Tour de France title Monday when the Court of Arbitration for Sport rejected his claim that his positive doping test was caused by eating contaminated meat. The Spaniard, who also won cycling's premier race in 2007 and 2009, joined Floyd Landis as the only riders to lose a Tour title.
The decision to strip Contador of his Tour de France title and ban him for two years for doping is another blow to the sport, cycling great Eddy Merckx said.
"It's very bad for cycling. It's bad for everybody. It's like someone wants to kill cycling," Merckx told The Associated Press at the Tour of Qatar. "I'm very surprised, very surprised. It's bad for the sponsors. It's bad for the Tour (de France). It's bad for cycling."
Contador tested positive for clenbuterol from what he claimed was contaminated beef eaten on a Tour rest day in July 2010. CAS called the claim "unlikely," saying the positive result "was more likely caused by the ingestion of a contaminated food supplement."
"Cycling always receives a bad name. It's always cycling that's attacked and other sports are never attacked. In other sports they don't go so far," Merckx said. "If you go zero-zero-zero-zero-zero (tolerance) you can always find something in everyone."
Contador has been banned from racing until Aug. 6 and his results since Jan. 25, 2011, have been erased, including his Giro d'Italia victory last May. He is ineligible for this year's Tour, Giro and the London Olympics.
Andy Schleck, who finished 39 seconds behind Contador in the 2010 Tour, is now in line to become that year's champion. But the rider from Luxembourg said that "will not make me happy."
"I feel sad for Alberto. I always believed in his innocence. This is just a very sad day for cycling," Schleck said. "The only positive news is that there is a verdict after 566 days of uncertainty. We can finally move on."
Oscar Pereiro, who was elevated to 2006 champion after Landis was stripped, called the verdict "disgraceful."
"He's innocent, I know him," Pereiro said on Twitter. "Alberto has put his life on the line in descents and sprints over the past two years, so what if something would have happened to him? (I'm) at a loss for words."
The Spanish cycling federation also was surprised CAS decided to overrule its decision to allow Contador to escape without a ban after the cyclist had successfully appealed the federation's initial one-year suspension.
"We feel a lot of sympathy for the athlete," federation president Juan Carlos Castano told the AP. "It's a sad day for Spanish sport and cycling."
Spain's national association of cattle farmers felt vindicated.
"This shows that our system of traceability and food safety is one of the best around and is homogeneous with all other EU countries," the organization, which goes by the acronym ASOPROVAC, said in a statement. "This decision that puts an end to (our) work ... in defending our food safety system, which has come under scrutiny following false accusations."
The ruling came just three days after U.S. federal prosecutors dropped a doping investigation involving seven-time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong. The American was a teammate of Contador during the Spaniard's 2009 Tour victory. The revised list of champions shows Armstrong and Contador combined to win nine of the 11 Tours from 1999 to 2009.
Contador blamed steak bought from a Basque producer for his high reading of clenbuterol, which is sometimes used by farmers to fatten their livestock. To avoid a doping ban, he needed to prove how the anabolic drug entered his body and convince the panel he was not to blame.
"Unlike certain other countries, notably outside Europe, Spain is not known to have a contamination problem with clenbuterol in meat," CAS said in its ruling in Lausanne, Switzerland. "Furthermore, no other cases of athletes having tested positive to clenbuterol allegedly in connection with the consumption of Spanish meat are known."
Contador is one of only five cyclists to win the three Grand Tours — the Tour, the Giro and the Vuelta. He also won the Tour de France in 2007 and 2009.
He becomes only the second Tour de France champion to be disqualified and stripped of victory for doping. The first was American Floyd Landis, who lost his 2006 title after testing positive for testosterone.
Contador kept racing after his positive test on a 2010 Tour rest day. He will be stripped of all results from races in which he participated since Jan. 25, 2011 — the day the Spanish federation proposed a one-year ban. That period includes his Giro d'Italia victory last season.
CAS said it would rule later on a request by UCI to fine Contador $3.25 million.
CAS secretary general Matthieu Reeb said the doping offense was "not contested," only the explanation for how the clenbuterol got into Contador's system.
"It is just the application of the rules, the fact that there was a positive test," Reeb told reporters. "In the end, it is not so spectacular. There is a clear decision based on a positive test. There was no reason to exonerate the athlete, so the sanction is two years."
If Contador appeals to the Swiss Federal Tribunal, the court can decide the legal process was abused but would not examine the merits of the evidence. A federal appeal process typically takes several months, though the court rarely overrules CAS.
Contador is under contract to ride in 2012 for the Danish team Saxo Bank.
Team spokesman Anders Damgaard said the team was studying the ruling before making any comment.
Team owner Bjarne Riis admitted in 2007 that he had used the performance-enhancing drug EPO during his career, including when he won the 1996 Tour de France.
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AP Sports Writers Michael Casey in Doha, Qatar, and Raf Casert in Brussels contributed to this report.
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