Simona Halep, the former world number one tennis champion and two-time Grand Slam winner, has had her four-year doping suspension reduced to nine months by the court of arbitration for sport (Cas). The ruling concluded that Halep was not intentionally involved in the act of doping. Therefore, she is now entitled to re-engage with her profession and return to the tennis court.
Halep was originally handed the ban last September after a positive test for the blood-boosting drug, roxadustat. This ruling was seen as one of the most impactful doping suspensions in tennis history. It was also the first anti-doping rule violation through the Athlete Biological Passport (ABP) scheme. Considering her age of 32, this four-year suspension was likely to end Halep’s career.
The independent tribunal gave Halep two individual anti-doping rule violations. One was for the presence of roxadustat in a test conducted following her loss in the inaugural round of the US Open on August 29th, 2022; the other was for unevenness in her athlete biological passport. These charges were contested by Halep in an appeal to the Cas.
The Cas panel, after hearing Halep’s case from February 7th-9th in Lausanne, unanimously decided to curtail her disqualification period to nine months.
Halep, consistent with her original stance, maintained that her doping violation was unintentional. She maintained that the roxadustat had entered her system through the ingestion of a contaminated supplement, Keto MCT.
Even though the initial decision found that the Keto MCT sample couldn’t completely justify the roxadustat levels in her bloodstream, the Cas panel decided that Halep showed inadequate caution with the Keto MCT supplement. However, they concluded that her violations weren’t premeditated and she bore no significant fault.
Unlike the initial tribunal in proceedings regarding the Athlete Biological Passport (ABP) charge, the Cas panel accepted Halep’s blood sample from September 9, 2022, due to unrelated surgery. They also noted her public declaration of opting not to compete for the remainder of 2022 post the surgery, which the panel believed “influenced the credibility of the doping circumstances the ITF Independent Tribunal relied on”.
The ABP charge was rejected by the Cas panel who ultimately decided that they couldn’t satisfactorily conclude an anti-doping rule violation occurred relating to inconsistencies in Halep’s blood profiles.
Halep expressed through a statement how the distressing allegations launched at her challenged her conviction in the process and the seemingly endless resources mobilised to oppose her. She shows eagerness to get back on the tour. The CEO of the International Tennis Integrity Agency, Karen Moorhouse, commented that a player’s right to challenge rulings and the Agency’s respect for both their appeal and the conclusion are fundamental aspects of the anti-doping proceedings. The ITIA will patiently anticipate the comprehensive reasoned verdict and conduct a detailed analysis in due time.