At last, a date for your diary. The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) has, after interminable delays and innumerable procrastination, finally set a date for the hearing into Alberto Contador’s positive testing for a banned substance at the 2010 Tour de France; the Spaniard will have his case heard between November 21 and 24 – a full season and a half after his alleged infraction. The Saxo Bank-SunGard star won the 2010 Tour – finishing 39 seconds ahead of Andy Schleck – but tested positive for the performance-enhancing drug clenbuterol. Contador subsequently claimed to have accidentally ingested the substance via contaminated meat and although the Spanish Cycling Federation cleared him, both the UCI and The World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada) sought to overturn the finding, leading to a series of set and then moved dates for the hearing with CAS. Could this actually be an end to what must be the most protracted wrangle in modern cycling history?
