Sorry to be a picky pain in the arse but that's not quite true. There is no lower limit for the substance in an individual's blood. It really is a case of if it's there, in any amount, then that's a postive.
The limit applies to the testing lab. To be WADA approved, a lab has to be able to detect clenbutorol down to a certain level. The fact that this particular lab has a more sensitive testing method/equipment does not mean that it's not a valid test - it's still a positive.
One might question how it was that Contador's samples ended up at that particular lab. There's a story there.
This is true up to a point - although with such tiny figures false positives for lab tests increase dramatically.
If it was present, he has to provide an excuse as the concentration should be 0%
His defence (the meat one) seems to suggest that he accepts the results as accurate - ie he's not trying to claim lab error and that there was no clenbutorol - which would have been a plausible defence strategy. This in itself is interesting - he seems to be admitting he had it in his body.
The whole meat thing lacks any evidence.
Clenbuterol is not supposed to be present in cows in Spain - if he really wanted to prove his innocence, he would surely name the friend that bought the meat. Get the friend to say where they got it from. And look for clenbutorol in the herd. That would be a start - if the whole farm was found to be using it on their cattle, and he could produce a friend who was shown to have crossed the Franco-Hispanic border at the time, it would be convincing.
To just make woolly denials seems suspicious.
