Tennis

American tennis pro Varvara Lepchenko successfully reduces drugs ban as resolution offered


American tennis pro Varvara Lepchenko was issued with a “consent award” almost two years after testing positive for a banned substance during a routine drugs test. The former world No 19 was initially banned for four years but successfully appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport after finding a bottle of pills that did not label the banned substance on the bottle and will now have her period of ineligibility reduced to 21 months, to be lifted in May this year.

Lepchenko returned a positive test containing metabolites of adrafinil and/or modafinil – non-Specified Substances prohibited by the World Anti Doping Agency and the Tennis Anti-Doping Programme – after providing a urine sample on 12 July 2021, in association with her participation in the WTA Hungarian Grand Prix held in Budapest, Hungary, from 12-18 July 2021. As a result, it was ruled last year that she would be banned for four years, back-dated to start from 19 August of that year.

But the 36-year-old has now been issued with a “consent award” by the CAS after successfully appealing the decision to make her ineligible to compete for four years. According to the International Tennis Federation, Her appeal came on the basis that, after the hearing before the Independent Tribunal, she returned home and found, in the lining of a travel bag that had been stored away, a bottle of bemetil capsules that she had purchased in Ukraine in October 2020 and from which she had consumed capsules in the days prior to the event in Hungary.

The ITF also confirmed that those capsules, and an unopened bottle independently sourced by the ITF, were sent for testing at a WADA-accredited laboratory, both of which were found to contain modafinil, which was not listed on the bottle label. As a result, all parties agreed that her period of ineligibility has been reduced to 21 months – still backdated to 19 August 2021 – which means she will be allowed to play from midnight on 18 May this year.

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