"He is a great rider and has completed a great race but it is another thing on a personal level, where I have never had great admiration for him and I never will.
"On this Tour, the days in the hotel were harder than those on the road.
"The situation was tense and delicate because the relationship between myself and Lance extended to the rest of the staff.
"The two riders who had most weight on the team did not have an easy relationship and that puts the rest of the technical staff and the riders in an uncomfortable position."
After a successful return to the race following his retirement, third-placed Armstrong will return next year in the colours of his own team he will set up for the new season.
Contador will also be in new colours next year, as he was clearly not happy with Astana for bringing in another big name in Armstrong.
"We'll have to see what happens," Contador said of his fture. "I don't know where I will go but it will clearly be with a team that is 100 percent behind me."
I doubt he really means that first part. In interviews he has said Lance was his hero and his inspiration during his hospitalization for an aneurysm. But either way I don't blame him for being ticked that Lance was brought onto his team after he was chosen to run with Bruyneel. It was all just un. fortunate.
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We can't keep excusing the fact that he's young (he's what, almost 27 now? A viejo himself soon). He's an incredibly gifted athlete but there's still a lot more required to join the exclusive pantheon of true greats on the Grand Tours - contests which no one, not even Eddy M, could win five or more times without scrupulous adherence to a smart strategic program, an acutely-honed intelligence which allows for nimble improvisation on the bike to deviate from that program when exigencies demand it & the ability to carefully cultivate solid relationships with fellow riders whose help they need to get across the finish line first.
Maybe the sting of what Lance & others are saying is what made him lash out, but hopefully he will do a lot of soul-searching anyway & recognize for the sake of his own extraordinary potential that there's some truth to what they're saying.
Whatever the case, though, I still can't wait to hear the true behind-the-scenes scoop about the complicated relationship between these two on this year's Tour.
I’m sure that was a difficult time. Especially when it would be easy to think the rest of the team was against you. Of the guys riding I can’t imagine he felt he had anyone to confide in there as they all would logically seem to be in Team Armstrong.
I think their relationship would have been much different if they were on different teams. Lance seems to like Andy Schleck who can be almost as dangerous as Contador.
Actually, I think he's far more concerned about Vino's return to Astana.
I bet it was uncomfortable at the dinner table and meetings. I'd also bet AC pouted & whined like a little beyotch the whole time.
From Lance’s Twitter: “Seeing these comments from AC. If I were him I’d drop this drivel and start thanking his team. w/o them, he doesn’t win.”