Eighty weeks after eating a stake, Contador will finally be judged on it

When Francesco Schettino, the captain of the doomed Costa Concordia claimed that he "tripped and fell into a life boat" which took off before he had the chance to get out, his excuse went down in history as the second worst/best (depending on how you look at it) excuse of all time behind only that of Alberto Contador who once claimed his positive test for the banned substance Clenbuterol was the work of a tainted piece of meat he eat during a Tour de France rest day.

That incident involving Contador happened a long time ago. You may or may not remember it, but if you think long and hard and look into your hazy past you might well recall the moment it broke. Yes that really was eighty weeks ago . . . I know, I know, you thought it was much longer than that the way it's been dragged out, but now after more delays than a New York airport at Christmas, we're finally about to hear the verdict of the doping case and it's appeal to end all doping cases and their appeals.

"If I’m ever found guilty then an innocent person will have been condemned," sobbed Contador last October while this process was still in full flow. "I’ve always encouraged the fight against doping, and now things are turning against me," he continued.

Did I mention the meat was ingested some eighty weeks ago? Eighty weeks ago the world was a very different place to what it is now. I was an unmarried man without a kid on the way, Australia had never had a Tour de France winner, Liverpool were still under the command of Rafael Benitez and under the control of Gillette and Hicks, Osama Bin Laden was very much running Al Quida, Colonel Gaddafi was the leader of Lybia, and Lance Armstrong was still a free man... err, wait . . . ignore than last bit.

To figure out who is going to win the case, you simply have to call innocent as heads, guilty as tails and then flip the coin to see what comes up. I dare say they'll take it more seriously at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) which is the current level (and last level) at which this long and winding saga has taken us.

Contador obviously professes his innocence. "I am one of the five most tested athletes in the world. Do you think I’d risk doing something wrong?" he asked sounding very much like that impregnable fortress of moral fortitude that is Lance Armstrong. Well, why didn't you say so sooner Alberto...in that case, throw out the charges and let this man go. For crying out loud, he's one of the five most tested men in the world.

Ah, but if only it were so simple. We knew deep down in our hearts that this thing was going to drag out as long as it has and innocent or guilty, it no longer really matters. Regardless of the verdict, we just want any verdict so that once we celebrate the guilt of a cheat or the innocence of a free man, we can get on with our lives without ever having to read about it / listen to it / or debate it again. Until the next one, that is.

TCS Broomwagon prediction: *flips coin, comes up heads* -- NOT GUILTY, and cleared, with a reputation tarnished but as winner of the 2012 Tour de France.

Update: Alberto was found guilty, stripped of that Tour title and had the majority of his suspension backdated.

Will 2012 be the year of British Cycling?

2012 has the potential to be a huge year for British Cycling. With both Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome proving last year they can podium in a grand tour and with the 2012 Tour de France route suited better than ever towards one or both of them competing for the GC, and with Mark Cavendish going for green again, not to mention the Olympic road race, and a stack of track riders looking to aid to Britain's gold haul, this could be the year Britain becomes the best cycling nation on earth. To have said that not even ten years ago would have brought mocking and ridicule from all angles.

When Team Sky's boss Dave Brailsford popped up and claimed that he hoped to have a Tour de France winner within five years of setting up a team the mocking begun in earnest. But what nobody knew then that I can only assume Brailsford himself seen was that Brad Wiggins was more than just a man who went very fast for a distance of 1,500 meters around an oval strip of wood. Wiggins hadn't offered much in his early Tour de France days except to be the next Chris Boardman for Britain in prolgues, but in 2009 that all changed when he blew away all expectations and finished fourth into Paris.

Wiggins didn't ride for Sky then -- there was no Team Sky -- but Brailsford knew his man and immediately got him on board. Following Britain's dominant display on the track at the Beijing Olympics, in which Brailsford was the grand architect, Team Sky became his virtual British road team. Yes there are a handful of imports including the uber-talented Edvald Boisson Hagen, but there's no doubt who this team is built around...as in what nation the team is built around?

2011 season in review: The year an Austrialian won the Tour

I had hoped to get this site up and live around the turn of the new year but unfortunately time, among other things, conspired against me and so we find ourselves into the middle of the first month of the new year, but before the year of twenty-hundred and eleven disappears too far into our rear view, let's hand out some awards for the year that was...

Awards and Gongs

Cyclist of the Year: PHILIPPE GILBERT
Philippe Gilbert. Was there ever anyone who truly came close? The Belgian dominated the spring classic's season before taking a stage win in the Tour de France. He even rode high up the overall well into the big mountains before finally succumbing to the little men. There's a belief that if Gilbert trained for it he could win a Grand Tour and while that would be something to see, it's still fun to enjoy the aggressive riding style he current entertains us with.

Canadian rider of the year: RYDER HESJEDAL
A fitting name for the title! Not quite at the level of 2010 but still Canada's biggest hope.

Sprinter: MARK CAVENDISH
Who else?

Climber: DAVID MONCOUTIE
David Moncoutie for winning his forth mountains classification title in the Vuelta a Espana.

Time-trialist: CADEL EVANS
Cadel Evans to overcome the Schleck's and secure the Tour de France crown.

Classics rider: PHILIPPE GILBERT
He dominated the spring. He appeared unbeatable.

Breakthrough young rider: PIERRE ROLLAND
An award with such past winners (if I'd been doing this in the past) as Richard Virenque, Jan Ullrich, Ivan Basso, Alberto Contador and Riccardo Ricco, goes to Pierre Rolland. He won a-top of Alpe d'Huez and scooped the young riders prize at Le Tour. The French are all hoping he's for real and we're all hoping that unlikely those I just named when they broke in, that this kid represents a new generation.

Hard-man: JOHNNY HOOGERLAND
It's an award that should be named the Jens Voigt prize, but not even Jens could win it, and how could anyone else other than Johnny Hoogerland for being knocked off the road by a car and into a barbed wire fence. It was a horrific crash and the injuries only confirmed it. How he got up and continued I will never know.

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MOMENT OF THE YEAR

1. VOECKLER'S ATTEMPT TO DEFEND YELLOW
The grimmace on the face of Thomas Voeckler as he fought tooth and nail to hang onto his Yellow Jersey. When people say 'the yellow jersey brings that little bit extra out of you and makes you go that little bit further' I consider it a bit of a cliche, but men like Voeckler put weight behind such cliches.

The WorldTour Down Under: The 2012 pro racing season is upon us

I just so happened to have opened up this site on the eve of the first WorldTour race of the season. It wasn't planned that way but since the the pro season is about to kick-off, I might as well say a few words about it and indeed give you a prediction to put your hard earned cash on, but with no guarantees it'll actually make you rich!

The thing about the first race of the season is it's so hard to call as to what might happen. Cycling isn't like many other sports; there isn't a pre-season race schedule (that I'm aware of, unless you classify the pre-Tour Down Under criterium on Sunday as the pre-season in which case winner André Greipel is in fine form) and so unless you are a spy working for one of the teams trying to scout out what the others are up to, a fanatic bordering on the obsessive kind of fan that is probably close to getting some kind of restraining order against him, or someone who happened to be on a cycling holiday in Majorca -- the pre-season cycling hot spot of earth -- when a group wearing what looked like the Team Sky logo flashed past you up that climb at the sort of speed you came back down the climb, then you'll have no clue as to the form of anyone.

Most will try and tell you they're in good form, and one or two will inevitably look to peak early in order to take an early season scalp for their palmares, but make no mistake about it, all of them are aware that this is January and the Tour Down Under, which while good for points in the rankings, is more about finding that race pace form and looking towards the bigger events back in Europe in the spring.

The Cycle Seen: Watching the Wheels

Welcome to the Cycle Seen: A look at the world of cycling via the eyes of one man, who rides and races for fun and who also spends time indulging in armchair analysis of the pros who do it best. Hence The Cycle Seen is my own cycle, or the wider cycling scene, as seen by me.

I became a cycling fan somewhere in and around the year 1990. My dad had taken up the sport a few years before and that spring, aged eight years, I was entered into my first mountain bike race. I won, and so the dream of stardom and the love of riding the bike began. The following year I went on a trip with our cycling club to France to watch two stages of the Tour de France, cheering for Greg LeMond but watching the rise of Indurain, and so began a lifetime love with that race.

As the years went by I would race my bike, mostly mountain bike, occasionally road, and I would spend hours following the Tour de France. In time, like almost all kids aspiring to be a sports star, I began to realise I was never going to race in the Tour, but I always remained a fan with that support growing beyond just that of the Tour and into all the races. Professional road cycling hasn't always had it easy in the years I've been watching, but I've always stuck by it for good or ill. I've been critical but I've always respected the difficulty of the sport and in recent years I've seen the changes the sport has began to make and the corner it is trying to turn.

There were times when I got away from riding my bikes, and even summers spent away from home in my early 20s that I wouldn't follow the Tour with the same closeness as usual, but to paraphrase something I once heard: 'It may let you down sometimes, cycling, but it will never leave you,' and I always found my way back to it. After those summers spent working aboard and travelling I returned and found myself buying a new road bike and getting out again for fitness and fun. In 2008 I immigrated to Canada and a few years after that bought a new mountain bike for the first time in 12 years and began racing again. And with every passing year I'm not only cycling more, but I'm watching it more.

So The Cycle Seen will be a view of cycling as seen through my own eyes: Me watching the wheels, not just on television as they turn at speeds on terrains that I could only dream about doing, but of them turning below me, rolling along the ground of a country road or down some single track in a quiet forest somewhere. I'll look at the professional scene both present and past, giving thoughts on current races, stories about the great athletes and the scandals that often lie below the surface, and I'll look back at famous, and infamous, cycling moments that made me the fan I am. Beyond that I will tell stories of my own road or mountain bike experiences, either for pleasure or from the pain of competing, again both present and past. I'll review old touring trips I've completed, write about races I enter, dabble in nostalgia, share pictures and video and do the odd book review. Generally I'll just enjoy writing about the sport in a similar, if smaller, way that I enjoy watching it or indeed taking part in it.

So without further ado, let's get on with this...