American player Varvara Lepchenko has been cleared of wrongdoing by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) after testing positive for Meldonium earlier this year.
The world No.79 tested positive for the substance in four different tests conducted between January and April. Of those four tests, one was conducted during a tournament (the Brisbane International in January) and the other three were out-of-competition samples.
The 30-year-old received a provisional suspension from the sport on March 12th, but successfully overturned her conviction in an appeal to the independent tribunal. Lepchenko argued that she consumed Meldonium in December 2015, a month before it officially became a banned substance. The World Anti-Doping Agency recognized earlier this year that Meldonium could take ‘several months’ to leave a person’s body and allowed exceptions to made for athletes who samples contained less than 1 microgram of Meldonium.
“It was accepted by the ITF that Ms. Lepchenko bore no fault or negligence for the violation, and that any period of ineligibility that may otherwise have been imposed is eliminated entirely under Programme Article 10.4.” The ITF concluded.
During her initial appeal, the ITF agreed that Lepchenko’s positive samples were consistent with her account of use prior to January 1.
The decision comes as Lepchenko repeatedly dodged speculation about her failed test earlier in the season. In May physiotherapist Anatoly Glebov conformed to Russian website Sport Express that the American tested positive for the drug after talking with her father. Lepchenko was asked about the incident during her French Open campaign, but refrained from speaking about the topic.
Regardless of her innocent verdict, Lepchenko has been forced to forfeit all her prize money and points won during the Brisbane International, the only tournament where she tested positive during a in-competition test.
Lepchenko’s case comes as Maria Sharapova currently serves a four-year ban for consuming the same drug. The former world No.1 was unable to qualify for the exemption rule because her samples exceeded the limit deemed reasonable by the WADA. Sharapova has launched an appeal against her suspension to the Court of Arbitration for Sport and will receive a decision in the first week of October.
