Team Garmin-Slipstream will pursue Alberto Contador if the two-time Tour de France winner becomes available after the potential breakup of his team, Garmin-Slipstream sporting director Jonathan Vaughters said Sunday.

Vaughters spoke from Paris two hours after Contador won his second Tour in three years. He is signed through 2010, but his Team Astana’s status remains in question. Seven-time winner Lance Armstrong, Astana’s third-place finisher who helped Contador win this Tour, announced he is leaving to join RadioShack’s new team.

Joining him likely will be Astana’s Levi Leipheimer, a potential Tour winner, and Astana director Johan Bruyneel, who directed Armstrong’s seven wins. Astana missed paychecks during the Giro d’Italia in May, nearly voiding Contador’s contract until he was paid in June.

“The game starts now,” Vaughters said.

Signing the Spaniard would be massive for the Boulder-based cycling team, which placed two cyclists in the top eight of only its second Tour de France. Contador, 26, has proved he is the top cyclist in the world with two Tour wins and last year’s victories in the Vuelta a España and the Giro.

It was widely reportedly before the Tour that Contador wanted out of Astana. He wasn’t happy with the missed paychecks or a perceived favoritism toward Armstrong.

Is his contract voided if Bruyneel leaves? What happens if Armstrong attracts current teammates to RadioShack and Astana folds? Does Contador become a free agent?

“We’d be interested,” Vaughters said. “But there are so many variables. We’ll have a better idea in 10 days or two weeks.”

Contador and Vaughters are on good terms. Vaughters, whose team has a training base in Spain, speaks Spanish and frequently talks to Contador. The Tour champion’s price will be expensive — and it went up after Sunday — but Vaughters thinks he can sell him on Garmin-Slipstream, which has proved better than any Spanish team in the Tour.

Christian Vande Velde finished fourth last year and despite a crash in the Giro, he still finished eighth and helped Bradley Wiggins to fourth.

“I like Alberto a lot,” Vaughters said. “He wants to win the Tour de France. He’d rather take a winning team over a big paycheck. Our team is capable of propelling him to win the Tour de France.”

As for his team’s performance in France, Vaughters was overjoyed even though it failed in its goal to win a stage for sprinter Tyler Farrar, who couldn’t overcome Mark Cavendish’s six stage wins.

“I’m extremely satisfied,” Vaughters said. “Now it’s onward. We have to win the thing. It’s just that Cavendish is the best sprinter the sport’s seen in a long time. He’s the best sprinter I’ve ever seen.”

John Henderson: 303-954-1299 or jhenderson@denverpost.com