His racing programme in 2012 may depend on what the outcome is of the Court of Arbitration for Sport appeal launched by WADA and the UCI, but Alberto Contador and his team have drawn up a provisional schedule to take him towards the Tour de France.
The Spanish rider is focussing everything on the French race, having been left below par after a very heavy pre-Tour schedule in 2011. He dominated the Giro d’Italia, and also took the overall classification plus two stages in the Vuelta a Murcia, the overall plus a stage in the Volta a Catalunya and the time trial in the Vuelta a Castilla y León.
Contador’s bid to bounce back from his CAS case plus fifth in the 2011 Tour de France was already confirmed as beginning with the Tour de San Luis in Argentina, which starts January 23rd. In an interview with his Saxo Bank SunGard directeur sportif Bradley McGee, the Sydney Morning Herald has outlined the remaining pre-Tour events.
Providing he’s cleared of his Clenbuterol positive – a decision is due at some point in January - the Argentinian race will be followed by the Challenge Mallorca, where Tour winner Cadel Evans plus podium finishers Andy and Frank Schleck are expected to begin their seasons. After that, Contador will ride the Volta ao Algarve in Portugal, Tirreno-Adriatico in Italy, plus the Volta a Catalunya and Vuelta al Pais Vasco in Spain. Training camps will then take him up to the Critérium du Dauphiné, then on to the Spanish national championships and the Tour.
As things stand, the programme doesn’t see him riding the Ardennes Classics. He’ll also miss Paris-Nice.
While he’s still waiting to find out what CAS will decide, McGee said that Contador is not wasting too much energy worrying. “He has a very good view of what's going on. In his mind, he has done everything he can as far as the [doping] case is concerned,” he told the Herald. “There's absolutely nothing more he can give. He just hopes people see sense. That gives him some freedom to say, 'It's out of my hands. It's on with the show.' It's the same for the team, 'Let's get ourselves ready,' because we have no more control of what's going on.”
McGee said that Contador was ‘tearing everybody’s legs off’ at the recent training camp, and also suggested that his post-Giro fatigue meant that he would be more selective about his efforts in future. “In the past he was gung-ho,” he said. “'Let's take down everything and win everything.' Now he is more particular,” he said.