Former top-20 tennis player and U.S. Olympian Varvara Lepchenko’s doping suspension for use of a banned stimulant was reduced from four years to 21 months as part of an agreement with the International Tennis Federation.
The agreeement was reached after Lepchenko appealed her suspention to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, AP reports.
The settlement was signed in October, approved by CAS on Tuesday and made public by the ITF on Friday. The World Anti-Doping Agency signed off on it, too.
Lepchenko’s urine sample after a first-round loss at the Hungarian Grand Prix in July 2021 contained the stimulant. She then competed at three other events — including winning a title in Charleston, South Carolina — before being provisionally banned for four years, backdated to August 2021.
Her appeal to CAS was based on her later finding, in a travel bag, a bottle of capsules that was determined to contain the substance for which she tested positive — an ingredient that was not listed on the bottle label.
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