The repercussions of Shayna Jack’s failed drug test are beginning to be felt after the International Swimming League issued a ban to the Australian swimmer for its coming inaugural series.
Jack, who was slated to feature for the Cali Condors team in the new, lucrative competition starting in October, tested positive for the banned substance Ligandrol and was forced to pull out of the recent world championships in South Korea.
The 20-year-old, who faces a standard four-year ban from competition, is preparing to face Australia’s anti-doping body, Asada, in Canberra on Friday when she will begin the fight to clear her name. But pending the outcome of her case she will not be allowed to compete in the ISL.
Jack’s teammates said her right to a fair doping hearing has been impinged by the leaking of her positive drug test, and the Dolphins’ leadership group also rejected claims of a cover-up regarding the case.
The leadership group of Cate Campbell and her sister Bronte, Mitch Larkin, Jess Hansen and Alex Graham said on Tuesday they support Swimming Australia’s handling of the case.
“Swimming Australia kept our team informed when they were allowed, under the legislation, to do so,” they said in a statement. “We also strongly believe in an athlete’s right to privacy and fair process under the Asada code while a full investigation takes place and due to a leak of this information in the early stages of this process these rights have been infringed.
“We stand very strongly in our commitment to clean and drug-free sport and this won’t change. But we also are strongly committed to following the procedures set out in legislation.”
The non-Fina sanctioned ISL is a breakaway competition designed by the Ukrainian billionaire and swimming fan Konstantin Grigorishin, and is aimed at “putting power back into the hands of athletes”.
Billed as “the champions league of swimming”, the ISL’s budget for the first season comes in at US$20m, with US$7m of that going to athletes and teams in prize money.
The competition holds a firm line on doping and the ISL’s managing director, Andrea di Nino, says Jack’s selection has been revoked for the meets to be held in Europe and the United States from October.
“No doping control rules violation will be overlooked,” Di Nino said in a statement on the ISL’s website. “This is another case that serves to reiterate our stance on banned substances and breaking doping control rules. No such behaviour will ever be condoned.
“From the outset, the ISL has been an advocate for transparency and clean sport. Any athletes with doping control or ethical violation records will be considered ineligible, with no recourse.”
Jack’s teammates Cate Campbell and Kyle Chalmers will feature in the competition, alongside other stars such as Katinka Hosszú, Federica Pellegrini, Katie Ledecky, Adam Peaty and Nathan Adrian.
But due to the hardline stance on doping, like Jack, the Chinese swimmer Sun Yang will also miss out.
Yang served a three-month doping suspension in 2014 and was at the centre of controversy when he was cleared to race at the recent world championships, while awaiting a court of arbitration for sport ruling on accusations of wrongdoing during a drug test last September.
Yang, who has a history of hostility with Mack Horton, clashed again with Jack’s teammate in Gwangju after the Australian led protests against the Chinese, sparking an international incident in which Horton was accused of “disrespecting” China.
Given the tensions, the revelations over Jack’s failed doping test were met with inevitably huge interest in China, where the hashtag “Australian female swimmer drug test positive” on Weibo, China’s version of Facebook, prompted 390m reads, with 35,000 users talking about the topic.
A People’s Daily article attracted just over 15,000 comments and close to 750,000 likes, and other articles were widely shared across other Chinese news platforms.
Jack has denied knowingly taking any banned substance but her manager, Philip Stoneman, said she would not contest the presence of the banned drug in her system.
“I don’t think this is a question of Shayna denying there is something in her body,” Stoneman said on Monday. “What she is doing is fighting her innocence because it shouldn’t be in there and she doesn’t know how it got in there.”
