Spanish federation clears Contador of doping charge

Alberto Contador on Tuesday received the news he has been hoping for: the Spanish Cycling Federation (RFEC) cleared the Tour de France winner of any wrongdoing for returning a positive sample for clenbuterol at last year's race. As a result Contador, who has been under provisional suspension since August, is free to return to competition with immediate effect.

Contador wasted no time in making for Portugal in a car with his brother to join his Saxo Bank team at the Vuelta al Algarve, where he will line up in its colors at the start of the race on Wednesday.

"Justice has been done. Alberto is fine and very happy," said the cyclist's lawyer, Andy Ramos.

The RFEC, which had initially proposed a one-year ban for the rider, issued a statement on Tuesday denying that external pressure had been applied on its decision-making process. Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero had even weighed into the debate. "These comments... attempt to reduce the activity of this committee to a mere scribe for the opinions of certain media and politicians," the statement read.

The International Cycling Union said it would study the RFEC's report and decide within 30 days whether to appeal against it.

The RFEC had originally proposed a one-year ban - Contador has been under provisional suspension since last August - but the cyclist's appeal for clemency seems to have caused a turnaround in the committee's stance. The normal penalty for such a doping offense would be two years.

Contador, who maintains that the trace presence of clenbuterol in his system was ingested via a steak tainted with the substance, asked that article 296 of the International Cycling Union's anti-doping code be applied to his case. The article states that if a rider can establish that he "bears no fault or negligence" in the ingestion of a banned substance and can prove satisfactorily that he was not at fault for the presence of a prohibited drug in his system, any ban can be overturned.

Contador, a triple Tour champion, has received backing from both the Spanish prime minister and Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola, who was also embroiled in a long legal battle to clear his name after testing positive for nandrolone when playing in Italy's Serie A.

The International Cycling Union and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) will have a period of one month from receiving Spanish Federation's paperwork to lodge an appeal with the Court of Arbitration for Sport if the two bodies to not concur with the decision.

Contador's agent, Jacinto Vidarte, said that no communication from the RFEC had yet reached his client. "We haven't heard any official information from the federation," Vidarte told Reuters.