Armitstead insists she is a clean athlete
Print Edition
BRITISH cyclist Lizzie Armitstead insisted in a two-page statement yesterday that she is a clean athlete and that three missed anti-doping tests in a 12-month period amounted to honest oversights.
She released the statement one day after UK Anti-Doping confirmed the world road race champion had successfully appealed her case to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. Armitstead faced a provisional suspension and two-year ban that could have kept her out of the Rio Olympics.
The reigning silver medalist will lead Britain’s squad in Sunday’s road race.
“I love the sport and the values it represents. It hurts me to consider anybody questioning my performances,” Armitstead wrote. “I hate dopers and what they have done to sport.”
The 27-year-old Armitstead outlined the circumstances for each missed test, though she only argued the first miss before a World Cup race in Sweden last August should be thrown out. Armitstead said anti-doping officials had not followed proper procedure and CAS ultimately agreed.
Armitstead explained that she was at the hotel she stayed when anti-doping officials arrived, but that her phone was on silent and hotel staff refused to give the tester her room number.
She was tested the following day and the test was negative.
Armitstead said she contested the missed test with a written explanation after learning of it, but that the letter was not accepted before she traveled to the United States for last year’s world championships.
Armitstead acknowledged fault in the other two missed tests. She called the October 2015 case a “filing failure” after anti-doping officials found an inconsistency in her overnight accommodations and her time slot during a routine spot check, and that her June 2016 missed test came after a last-minute change of plans following an unspecified family emergency.
Last December, Armitstead met with UKAD and British Cycling officials to develop a support plan to avoid another missed test. But a British Cycling official who was supposed to help Armitstead update her whereabouts plan had departed the organization without her knowing about it. If that “failsafe” was in place, Armitstead said, her third missed test could have been avoided.
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