Athletics: Men’s 100-meter world champion Christian Coleman was suspended for two years for missing doping tests, to miss the Tokyo Olympics

Men’s 100-meter world champion Christian Coleman has been suspended for two years after missing doping tests and will miss the Tokyo Olympics next year.

Coleman received a provisional suspension in June for not being home when drug examiners showed up last year. The disciplinary court of the Athletics Integrity Unit today upheld a two-year ban.

Coleman, the reigning 100-meter world champion, said his outbreak with the anti-doping system was due to a lack of communication that could have easily been resolved with a phone call from the doping control officer who arrived at his home on December 9. past. year. It was his third whereabouts violation in a 12-month span.

In a post on Twitter in June he refuted the missing proof.

“Don’t tell me I ‘missed’ an exam if you sneak up on my door (you parked outside the door and walked in … there’s no record of anyone coming to my house) without my knowledge. I called while I was shopping five minutes to the mall (I have receipts and bank statements) and I didn’t even bother to call or try to reach me, “he said.

“I was more than ready and available for the test if I had received a phone call I could have taken the drug test and continued my night.”

Coleman’s argument is being undermined, in part, by the fact that he was well acquainted with the ins and outs of the “whereabouts rule” from a case against him that was dropped last year, prior to this latest incident.

“I think I can be more mature about it,” Coleman said last year when discussing his difficult decision.

The Athletics Integrity Unit, which handles anti-doping cases for World Athletics, said the phone calls are not part of its screening protocol because it can make it easier for athletes to manipulate the screening process.

“Any advance notice of testing, in the form of a phone call or otherwise, provides athletes the opportunity to engage in manipulation or avoidance or other inappropriate conduct that may limit the effectiveness of testing,” the AIU said in a statement. emailed in June. .

Last season, Coleman was caught up in a doping drama after news of his failure to whereabouts leaked to the media. The United States Anti-Doping Agency ended up dropping the case on a technicality in a very confusing rulebook. He then won 100 meters of gold at the world championships in Doha, Qatar, last September.

Regardless, Coleman, 24, suffered some damage in the court of public opinion. There were those who were willing to include him on a list of other big-name Americans like Tim Montgomery, Marion Jones, Justin Gatlin and Tyson Gay who have been arrested for doping over the years.

“At the end of the day, I didn’t do anything wrong,” Coleman said after his Doha run.

Elite athletes from around the world are required to complete a “location form” so that anti-doping authorities can conduct surprise tests outside of competition. A violation means that an athlete did not fill out forms that told authorities where they could be found, or that they were not where they said they would be when the evaluators arrived.

Three missed tests in a 12-month period can be considered an anti-doping violation.

Coleman noted in a lengthy blog he posted in June that his whereabouts failure on Dec. 9 occurred when drug testers showed up at his residence while he was Christmas shopping. An exam was also missed on January 16, 2019 and another on April 26, 2019 due to a presentation failure.

He said there was no record of anyone coming to his house and that if he had been called he was five minutes away in a shopping center.

Coleman asked in his post why he didn’t get a phone call when testers couldn’t find him, saying he had received calls “at any other time” the test was done. He said he has been appealing the latest missed test with the AIU for six months.

In June, on Twitter, Coleman had an exchange with reigning Olympic pole vault champion, Katerina Stefanidi, after she wrote: “To be clear … raters DO NOT call you when they can’t find you. I’ve only heard that This happened to American athletes (many different athletes and occasions). Unless USADA has different rules than WADA, the evaluators don’t call. Either you are where you said you will be or you are not. “

Coleman responded: “What was your purpose in commenting? You are wrong, many DCOs (drug collection officers) told me that the protocol is to call the last 10 minutes of the hour. And why would we have to enter our contact information if This is not the case? If you have nothing positive to say, why say anything? “

Some of Coleman’s earlier missed tests were not with the AIU but with the USADA, whose own manual for athletes says that phone calls are generally reserved for only the last five minutes of a time slot and “to confirm athlete unavailability. , not to locate an athlete for the test. “

In a statement, USADA said: “We can confirm the latest proceeding involving Mr. Coleman and we are collaborating with AIU on the matter.”

The AIU filed a similar charge this month against the women’s 400 meter world champion Salwa Eid Naser of Bahrain. He was already under investigation when he won gold in Doha last year in the fastest time since 1985.

Before the missing test in December, Coleman mentioned being more attentive to updating his whereabouts.

“Sometimes you just go to different places and do different things and that’s not what you care about updating the app on every single thing you’re doing,” Coleman said. “Looking ahead, I’m just trying to do a better job to be more diligent about it.”