Leading Spanish cycling teams ONCE and Banesto are at it again. Both have warned they may not compete in this year's Tour de France. They were among the four Spanish teams that pulled out of last year's Tour when the drugs scandal was at its height.

Both made it clear they will not return if conditions for the teams and riders are similar to last year, when police raided hotels and, coincidentally, a ONCE doctor was placed under investigation on doping charges.

"We won't go to the Tour just to retire later," Banesto boss Jose Miguel Echavarri told El Mundo newspaper. "Maybe we'll have to miss out the Tour for a year." Evidently the battle is over but the war rages.