Romanian tennis star Simona Halep has been banned from competition for four years. Halep plans to appeal the decision.
Two-time Grand Slam winner Simona Halep has been banned for four years for two separate doping violations. ITIA, the body that oversees the ethics of tennis, reports on the matter.
The former tennis world number one player has been temporarily banned from competition since October 2022. During the US Open, a substance called roxadustat was found in his sample.
The substance increases red blood cells and at the same time the flow of oxygen to the muscles, which practically improves the athlete’s endurance properties.
Halep has strongly denied that she knowingly took a banned substance. The Romanian also stated that he has evidence to show that small amounts of a banned substance from an impure but licensed supplement ended up in his system.
“The court accepted Halep’s argument that she had taken an impure supplement, but ruled that the amount the player ingested could not have caused the concentration of roxadustat found in the positive sample,” ITIA wrote.
The second violation related to irregularities in Halep’s biological passport. Major changes in an athlete’s profile can reveal that he is using doping.
According to ITIA, three independent experts agreed that probably doping explained the ambiguities in Halep’s biological passport.
Simona Halep says she plans to appeal the decision to the International Court of Appeal for Sport, CAS.