Former world No. 1 Simona Halep banned for 4 years for doping

london –

Two-time Grand Slam champion Simona Halep has been banned for four years for violating anti-doping rules.

Tennis Integrity confirmed the penalty against the 31-year-old Romanian on Tuesday.

The former world No. 1 has been accused of two separate anti-doping violations: a positive test she received during the 2022 U.S. Open, according to the ITIA, the organization’s abbreviation for the organization. There are irregularities in athletes’ biological passports.

Halep plans to appeal the ruling and has been temporarily suspended from October 2022. The four-year suspension will last until October 6, 2026.

She topped the women’s rankings in 2017. In 2019, she defeated 23-time Grand Slam champion Serena Williams in the final to win the Wimbledon title, just a year after winning the French Open.

Halep, who attributed the positive result to consuming a contaminated nutritional supplement, will appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS, by its French abbreviation).

“I will continue to train and do everything I can to clear myself of the false accusations and get back on track,” Halep said in a statement.

The Romanian also said, “I will resort to all legal resources against the above-mentioned supplement companies.”

The ITIA jury heard testimony from Halep and her scientific experts but determined the player “willfully violated anti-doping rules”.

ITIA said: “The court accepted Halep’s argument that she had taken a contaminated supplement but held that the amount ingested by the player could not have resulted in the concentration of roxadustat found in the positive sample.”

Allegations regarding biological passports were also confirmed after a review by an expert panel. These passports are used to determine the properties and variables of substances in an athlete’s blood.

The court said the irregularities in Halep’s profile “could be due to doping”.

Halep is the most banned tennis player since five-time Grand Slam champion Maria Sharapova tested positive for a substance recently included on the banned drugs list at the 2016 Australian Open.

Sharapova appealed the two-year ban to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), which reduced the punishment by ruling that the Russian player had no “significant fault” in the case and did not intentionally dope.

Halep, who will turn 35 when her suspension ends, said she has adjusted her nutritional supplements ahead of the 2022 hard court season.

“I take the rules of sport seriously and am proud that I have never knowingly or knowingly consumed a banned substance,” he said in a statement. “I refuse to accept his four-year ban.”