Had it happened a few years ago, it would have been seen as the cycling equivalent of leaving the New York Yankees to play for the Boston Red Sox, or transferring from Ohio State to Michigan.

George Hincapie left Lance Armstrong’s team to race for — gasp! — T-Mobile?

But given the upheaval in professional cycling since Armstrong’s retirement following the 2006 Tour de France, Hincapie’s offseason move to the team he and Armstrong once considered their biggest rival isn’t seen as a big deal.

And Hincapie is embracing his role as the elder statesman of his new team, which now races as Team Columbia.

“We definitely have a lot of young, really talented guys — some of the best young guys in the peleton,” Hincapie said. “My role is just to pass my experience on to them.”

And there’s plenty to pass along.

Hincapie, who turned 35 today, played a vital role in all seven of Armstrong’s Tour de France victories with the U.S. Postal Service/Discovery team. When Armstrong retired following the 2006 Tour, Hincapie stayed with the team and played a leading role in Alberto Contador’s breakthrough victory in the Tour last year — making Hincapie perhaps the sport’s ultimate good luck charm.

But the team disbanded last year after it couldn’t find a sponsor to replace Discovery, leaving Hincapie to look for a new team.

Instead of following longtime team director Johan Bruyneel when he took over the disgraced Astana team, as former teammates Contador and Levi Leipheimer did, Hincapie signed with the team formerly known as T-Mobile.

But much has changed since Armstrong and Hincapie were trying to leave T-Mobile’s German star, Jan Ullrich, in the dust in the Alps and the Pyrenees.

The team fired Ullrich after he was linked to a doping scandal in 2006, and he has since retired. T-Mobile pulled its sponsorship, and the team then relocated its business headquarters to the U.S. earlier this year and raced for several months as Team High Road before signing a sponsorship deal with the Columbia sportswear company.

Now Hincapie, the most recognizable American in this year’s peleton, will be racing in the Tour with his new team while the former teammates who followed Bruyneel to Astana will be watching the race from home.

Astana was not invited to this year’s Tour, a punishment from race organizers after star rider Alexander Vinokourov was caught blood-doping during the 2007 race.

“They’re disappointed,” Hincapie said. “They’ve clearly got one of the best teams in terms of overall contenders.”

Hincapie has spoken to his former teammates and feels for them, but says he can see both sides of the issue.

True, Astana has cleaned house since its doping scandals. But many, event organizers included, believed it had to pay some penalty for past sins.

“It’s a totally different team now — different managers, different riders,” Hincapie said. “I guess that doesn’t matter.”

With Astana sitting on the sidelines, Hincapie says there is plenty of room on the Team Columbia bandwagon for former Armstrong fans seeking a rooting interest in this year’s Tour.

“I think that fans can have faith in our Team Columbia — I’ve got to practice that,” Hincapie said, pausing to pat himself on the back for remembering to call his new team by its even newer corporate name. “We’ve also won more than any other team this year.”

The faith Hincapie mentions is a reference to the team’s aggressive independent drug-testing program.

Columbia and another American team competing in the Tour, Garmin-Chipotle, use the California-based Agency for Cycling Ethics to conduct blood and urine screenings beyond the regular tests riders must pass to compete in races.

Hincapie says that’s on top of his regular tests by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, the World Anti-Doping Agency and the French cycling federation.

“I’m probably leaving one out,” he chuckled.

Hincapie says riders don’t enjoy being presented with so many cups and needles, but he understands that tougher drug testing is the only way to save the sport.

“It’s absolutely not pleasant,” Hincapie said. “It’s a pain in the butt. But from what cycling’s gone through, it’s necessary.”

And while Hincapie said no testing program can guarantee it will catch every cheater — “There’s always going to be somebody out there in cycling, in other sports — in life,” he said — he believes the majority of riders in this year’s Tour de France will be riding clean.

Would he have said that before this year?

“Probably not,” he said.

Hincapie likes Team Columbia’s chances in this year’s Tour after it collected several big victories earlier this season, including his win in the final stage of the Tour of California.

Columbia won four stages at the Giro d’Italia, and Luxembourg native Kim Kirchen is emerging as a potential contender for the overall victory in the Tour de France after winning a mountaintop finish at the Tour de Suisse.

Hincapie says Team Columbia is out to win as many races as it can throughout the year, instead of focusing solely on winning the Tour de France — the biggest philosophical difference between his current team and his days at Discovery.

“It’s just different,” Hincapie said. “I wouldn’t say that I like it better, or worse.”

Tour de France

When: Starts Saturday, July 5 and continues through Sunday, July 27.

T.V.: Versus network. First of 21 stages begins at 5:30 a.m. on July 5.