A top local distance runner has been banned for eight years after testing positive for EPO and then trying to persuade the doping officer to cancel the test.
Louisa Leballo‚ 39‚ was tested out of competition on March 20‚ the SA Institute for Drug-Free Sport said in a statement on Wednesday.
Before an adverse result was returned‚ she represented South Africa at the world cross-country championships in Kampala five days later.
Leballo won the Spar Ladies 10km in Cape Town on April 2 in a 32min 55sec personal best and 13 days after that she came third in the Two Oceans half-marathon‚ also in a career best time.
She achieved two more bests on the track this season‚ in the 5‚000m in February and 10‚000m in March.
SAIDS said she had been banned for eight years.
“An analysis of the urine sample by the Doping Control Laboratory in Ghent‚ Belgium‚ returned an adverse analytical finding‚ revealing the presence of the Peptide Hormone‚ Erythropoietin (EPO).
“It was also alleged that the Pretoria athlete had tried to persuade SAIDS’s doping control officer to cancel the test.
“The athlete was charged with an anti-doping rule violation and attempting to subvert the doping control process. Leballo conducted her own defence at the July 19 hearing.
“She was given the maximum four-year sanction for each offence and the panel ruled that they should run consecutively – an eight- year ban.”
SAIDS CEO Khalid Galant said the finding on Leballo’s attempt to subvert the process “should serve as a warning to athletes that attempting to coerce or intimidate a doping control officer was itself a prosecutable offence”.
He pointed to the case where Manchester United player Phil Jones was suspended for two matches for being verbally abusive towards a doping control officer after winning the Europa League final.
“Jones’s teammate Daley Blind was fined €5 000 for a similar offence on the same night.
“Jones and Blind had apparently objected to being asked to attend drug-control while the teammates celebrated after the match.” - TimesLIVE
Top local distance runner banned for eight years after testing positive for EPO
A top local distance runner has been banned for eight years after testing positive for EPO and then trying to persuade the doping officer to cancel the test.
Louisa Leballo‚ 39‚ was tested out of competition on March 20‚ the SA Institute for Drug-Free Sport said in a statement on Wednesday.
Before an adverse result was returned‚ she represented South Africa at the world cross-country championships in Kampala five days later.
Leballo won the Spar Ladies 10km in Cape Town on April 2 in a 32min 55sec personal best and 13 days after that she came third in the Two Oceans half-marathon‚ also in a career best time.
She achieved two more bests on the track this season‚ in the 5‚000m in February and 10‚000m in March.
SAIDS said she had been banned for eight years.
“An analysis of the urine sample by the Doping Control Laboratory in Ghent‚ Belgium‚ returned an adverse analytical finding‚ revealing the presence of the Peptide Hormone‚ Erythropoietin (EPO).
“It was also alleged that the Pretoria athlete had tried to persuade SAIDS’s doping control officer to cancel the test.
“The athlete was charged with an anti-doping rule violation and attempting to subvert the doping control process. Leballo conducted her own defence at the July 19 hearing.
“She was given the maximum four-year sanction for each offence and the panel ruled that they should run consecutively – an eight- year ban.”
SAIDS CEO Khalid Galant said the finding on Leballo’s attempt to subvert the process “should serve as a warning to athletes that attempting to coerce or intimidate a doping control officer was itself a prosecutable offence”.
He pointed to the case where Manchester United player Phil Jones was suspended for two matches for being verbally abusive towards a doping control officer after winning the Europa League final.
“Jones’s teammate Daley Blind was fined €5 000 for a similar offence on the same night.
“Jones and Blind had apparently objected to being asked to attend drug-control while the teammates celebrated after the match.” - TimesLIVE
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