Tennis: Lepchenko Blameless Over Meldonium Use

LONDON, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News -21st Sept,2016) - American tennis player Varvara Lepchenko was on Tuesday exonerated of any wrongdoing despite testing positive for meldonium, the International Tennis Federation (ITF) said.

The 30-year-old Uzbek-born player tested positive for the banned substance four times during 2016 but the ITF said that while she had "been found to have committed an anti-doping rule violation" she "bore no fault or negligence for the violation".

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) told the ITF that decreasing amounts of meldonium in Lepchenko's samples -- from January 7, February 1, March 1 and April 7 -- was "consistent with her account" that she only used the medication prior to it being added to WADA's banned list at the turn of the year.

It means Lepchenko, who had already had her provisional ban lifted after WADA admitted that positive tests for meldonium could be caused by using the substance prior to 2016, is free to continue playing.

Meldonium takes time to leave a person's system meaning many of the athletes across numerous sporting disciplines to have been provisionally suspended over its use are likely to escape without bans unless it can be proved they took the medication during 2016.

Lepchenko, the world number 79, was in action at the Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo on Monday but was thrashed 6-0, 6-3 by Olympic champion Monicas Puig from Puerto Rico.