The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) on Tuesday (March 5) reduced the suspension imposed on Romanian tennis champion Simona Halep for two violations of anti-doping regulations, reducing her from four years to nine months, which she has served since July last.
After three days of hearing at the beginning of February, the sports court ruled that the positive test of the former world number 1 came from a “contaminated supplement”, and that the anomalies in her biological passport could be linked to a “contaminated supplement”. surgical operation,” according to a press release.
“I can’t wait to return to the circuit,” said the player in a press release, who had claimed since the start of the affair to have “never taken any prohibited product intentionally”. “I am and have always been an impeccable athlete,” continued the Romanian, deploring “the scandalous accusations” against her and “the apparently unlimited resources” used against her. “In the end, the truth prevailed, although it took much longer than I would have liked.”
Second case
The CAS therefore disavowed the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA), which had sanctioned Simona Halep on September 22, 2023, and demanded in this arbitration procedure “a period of suspension ranging from four to six years” against the two-time Grand Slam winner.
The Lausanne court promises to clarify “as soon as possible” the practical consequences of its decision, namely a suspension from October 7, 2022 to July 6, 2023 – already served even before Simona Halep appeals – and the annulment of all its results between August 29, 2022 and October 7, 2022.
Simona Halep's career has been on hold since October 7, 2022, the date of the start of her provisional suspension after a test conducted at the 2022 US Open tested positive for roxadustat, a molecule that stimulates the production of red blood cells and is classified among EPOs in the regulations of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).
The former world number 1 was then caught up in the spring of 2023 by a second affair, this time “irregularities” in the data of her biological passport, a long-term monitoring tool for high-level athletes.
“Contaminated dietary supplement”
Ruling at first instance, the ITIA had “admitted the argument of taking a contaminated food supplement put forward by Halep”, but “determined that the concentration of roxadustat found in the positive sample could not result from the quantity ingested by the player” – a reasoning invalidated on Tuesday by the CAS.
Concerning Halep's biological passport, the CAS integrated into its reasoning "the results of a private blood sample provided by Ms. Halep on September 9, 2022, in the context of a surgical operation" and although she had waived any competition for the rest of the year, judging that these elements made “the doping scenarios put forward by the ITIA” implausible.
