The World Anti-Doping Agency refused to accept that figure skater Russian Kamila Valiyeva bore “no fault or negligence” for her Christmas 2021 positive drug test and appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, seeking a four-year ban and stripping her 2022 Olympic results.
WADA appealed a Russian Anti-Doping Agency verdict from January that largely cleared Valiyeva. RUSADA stripped Valiyeva of her national title, won on the date of the test, but did not suspend her.
Valiyeva’s Olympic results, helping Russia to the top score in the team event (medals have not been awarded yet pending the result of her case) and placing fourth individually, have not been affected yet.
WADA said it carefully reviewed Valiyeva’s case after the RUSADA verdict and deemed the decision “wrong under the terms of the World Anti-Doping Code,” without detailing specifics.
The appeal was expected given that, in November, WADA’s president said it had already taken the case to CAS, citing no progress in RUSADA coming to a decision at that time. CAS also said then that WADA sought to strip Valiyeva’s Olympic results and a four-year ban, which could rule her out of the next Winter Olympics in 2026.
CAS verdicts are usually final and binding with the exception of the right to appeal to the Swiss Federal Tribunal within 30 days on very limited procedural grounds. Doping cases that go to CAS can take months or years before a resolution.
Valiyeva, then 15, was the favorite going into last February’s Olympics. After helping a team of Russian skaters win the team event, news surfaced of the positive test. The medal ceremony for the team event was postponed indefinitely.
The medals still have not been awarded and will not be until Valiyeva’s case is adjudicated. The U.S. originally placed second and could be upgraded to gold if Valiyeva’s Olympic results are disqualified.
After the positive test surfaced, Valiyeva was allowed to compete in the individual event after a RUSADA disciplinary committee lifted her suspension upon appeal by the skater.
The committee cited, among other reasons, a “low” amount of the banned substance in Valiyeva’s sample, that she tested negative before and after the positive test and that, as an athlete under the age of 16, she had less of a burden of proof.
Anti-doping rules have a provision that athletes under the age of 16 may face lesser punishments for doping violations than those 16 and over, including a reprimand rather than a suspension.
The International Olympic Committee, WADA and the International Skating Union then appealed RUSADA’s lifting of the suspension to CAS, which then ruled that Valiyeva could compete in the Olympics while her case was still being adjudicated.
Valiyeva topped the Olympic short program, then struggled in the free skate and finished fourth overall.
The CAS panel largely based last February’s decision on an “untenable delay” in Valiyeva’s sample test results being processed through a Stockholm lab, which led to a short time frame to rule on her Olympic eligibility during the Games. “This case was not about the underlying alleged anti-doping rule violation and the panel takes no position on that,” it stated last February.
All Russian figure skaters have been banned from international competition since last February due to the nation’s invasion of Ukraine.
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