South Africa women’s 100m record holder Carina Horn has been slapped with a six-year drugs ban after testing positive for the steroid clenbuterol.
The ban was upheld by World Athletics’ Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU), after the Basque Public Authorities had initially imposed it as well as disqualifying Horn’s results from a race she ran at the VI Gran Premio Ordizia – Jose Antonio Pena International Meeting on 18 June last year.
Horn, who has around 20 days to appeal the decision at the Court for Arbitration for Sport (CAS), had appealed the ban – which was handed out on 13 March – but the Basque authorities have dismissed it.
HAVE YOU ALSO READ?: Semenya wins appeal at European Court of Human Rights
The six-year ban is because this was a second offence for Horn, who became the first and only South African woman to dip under the 11-second mark with a time of 10.98sec. While it was unclear from the correspondence about the ban why she had been given a six-year ban, she would have been given an eight-year suspension had she tested positive in South Africa for being a repeat offender, as per the South African Institute of Drug Free Sport’s protocols.
A big part for Horn contesting the Basque Public Authorities’ ruling was whether their protocols were in line with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) protocols, given that they are not signatories due to their politics with Spain. After a delay while they established this, the AIU concluded that the protocols were consistent with WADA’s.
Horn had vehemently denied her culpability, other than suggesting she inadvertently ingested contaminated supplements, in her previous dope ban, and her appeal of the Basque Public Authorities’ findings suggests she feels the same way again.
Should she opt to appeal and fail, Horn will be 40 by the time the ban is over.