Away from the spotlight of the Tour de France and back in Spain, his home country, Alberto Contador took the chance Monday to say what he really felt about his Astana teammate Lance Armstrong.

“My relationship with Lance is zero,” Contador said at a news conference, one day after winning his second Tour. “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.”

Contador’s comments came after three weeks of near silence about his rivalry with Armstrong, a tense relationship that Contador played down throughout the race, which ended Sunday in Paris.

At the Tour, Contador and Armstrong, a seven-time Tour winner, fought to be the leader of Astana, a team based in Kazakhstan. Both riders will be departing the team at the end of this season. Armstrong, 37, will ride for the new Team RadioShack, based in the United States. Contador, 26, wants to sign with another team.