5-time Grand Slam champion Iga Swiatek accepted a one-month suspension after testing constructive for the banned substance trimetazidine, a coronary heart treatment generally known as TMZ, the Worldwide Tennis Integrity Company introduced Thursday.
Swiatek failed an out-of-competition drug check in August, and the ITIA accepted her clarification that the consequence was unintentional and was attributable to the contamination of a nonprescription treatment, melatonin, that Swiatek was taking for points with jet lag and sleeping.
It was decided her stage of fault was “on the lowest finish of the vary for no important fault or negligence,” the ITIA mentioned.
That is the second latest high-profile doping case in tennis: The highest-ranked man, Jannik Sinner, failed two assessments for a steroid in March and was cleared in August, proper earlier than the beginning of the U.S. Open, which he went on to win for his second Grand Slam title of the season.
Swiatek is a 23-year-old from Poland who was ranked No. 1 many of the previous two seasons however is now at No. 2. She gained the French Open in June for her fifth main championship and took dwelling a bronze medal on the Paris Olympics in early August.
Christophe Ena / AP
TMZ is the drug on the middle of the case involving 23 Chinese language swimmers who remained eligible regardless of testing constructive for efficiency enhancers in 2021.
Swiatek formally admitted the anti-doping rule violation on Wednesday and accepted her penalty.
She already was provisionally suspended from Sept. 22 to Oct. 4, lacking three tournaments through the post-U.S. Open hard-court swing in Asia – the Korea Open, the China Open and the Wuhan Open.
That provisional ban was ended after her attraction confirmed that her check consequence got here inadvertently from contaminated melatonin.
As a result of the last word settlement was for a month suspension, she is going to serve the remaining eight days now, whereas there isn’t any competitors, and be cleared to return to play as of Dec. 4.
Swiatek additionally was fined the prize cash of $158,944 that she earned for her semifinal run on the Cincinnati Open in August, the occasion instantly following the constructive check.
“As soon as the supply of the TMZ had been established, it turned clear that this was a extremely uncommon occasion of a contaminated product, which in Poland is a regulated drugs. Nevertheless, the product doesn’t have the identical designation globally, and the truth that a product is a regulated treatment in a single nation can not of itself be adequate to keep away from any stage of fault,” ITIA CEO Karen Moorhouse mentioned.
“Bearing in mind the character of the treatment, and all of the circumstances, it does place that fault on the lowest finish of the size,” Moorhouse mentioned. “This case is a crucial reminder for tennis gamers of the strict legal responsibility nature of the World Anti-Doping Code and the significance of gamers rigorously contemplating using dietary supplements and medicines.”
