Time to move on after Armstrong admission says Contador

Alberto Contador of Spain cycles up the Cauberg hill during the Men's Elite Road Race at the UCI Road World Championships in Valkenburg in this file photo taken September 23, 2012.

(Reuters) - Cycling has to move on and put the Lance Armstrong scandal behind it, according to two-times Tour de France winner Alberto Contador who returned from a doping ban last August.

"People have already talked a lot about that interview. Nobody was surprised by what he said," Contador, who was stripped of the 2010 Tour title for doping, told reporters ahead of the Tour de San Luis (Argentina) on Sunday.

"It's hard for the image of cycling, but I want to take what can be good - maybe we can close the chapter of this decade and focus on the present and the future of this beautiful sport," added the Spaniard.

American Armstrong, who was stripped of his seven Tour titles for doping, admitted in a televised interview with Oprah Winfrey this week that he took performance-enhancing drugs en route to his triumphs from 1999-2005.

Contador won the Tour in 2007 and 2009, the year he rode with Armstrong in the Astana team but was also his bitter rival.

(Reporting by Julien Pretot; Editing by Alison Wildey)