World Number 2 Tennis Player Calls Ban ‘Worst Experience of My Life’

Iga Świątek, a Polish tennis player ranked second in the world in women’s singles, has opened up about her one-month ban from the sport.

“I want to be transparent with you and I want you to understand,” she said in an Instagram reel. “So I instantly want to share with you something that became the worst experience of my life.”

According to Swiatek, the proceedings by the International Tennis Integrity Agency “confirmed my innocence.” She says in the post that she had “never heard about” the banned drug before testing positive for it.

“The only positive doping test in my career, showing unbelievably low level of a banned substance I’ve never heard about before, put everything I’ve worked so hard for my entire life into question,” Świątek wrote, adding that she and her team faced “tremendous stress and anxiety.”

The International Tennis Integrity Agency announced in a November 28 statement that Świątek, a 23-year-old tennis player from Poland, “has accepted a one-month suspension under the Tennis Anti-Doping Programme, after testing positive for the prohibited substance trimetazidine (TMZ) in an out-of-competition sample in August 2024.”

However, the ITIA does not believe that Swiatek intentionally ingested the drug.

The ITIA Believes the Positive Test Was the Result of Contaminated Medication Sold in Poland

The ITIA “accepted that the positive test was caused by the contamination of a regulated non-prescription medication (melatonin), manufactured and sold in Poland that the player had been taking for jet lag and sleep issues, and that the violation was therefore not intentional,” the Agency’s statement says. “This followed interviews with the player and their entourage, investigations, and analysis from two WADA-accredited laboratories.”

“In relation to the Player’s level of fault, as the contaminated product was a regulated non-prescription medication in the player’s country of origin and purchase and considering all the circumstances of its use (and other contaminated product cases under the World Anti-Doping Code), the player’s level of fault was considered to be at the lowest end of the range for ‘No Significant Fault or Negligence,’” the Agency note in the statement.

“The ITIA therefore offered a one-month suspension to Świątek and on 27 November 2024, the player, currently ranked number two in women’s singles, formally admitted the ADRV and accepted the sanction,” it notes. “The player was provisionally suspended from 12 September until 4 October, missing three tournaments, which counts towards the sanction, leaving eight days remaining. In addition, the player also forfeits prize money from the Cincinnati Open, the tournament directly following the test.”

Iga Swiatek Received a Positive Urine Test in August 2024

The statement adds, “The player provided an out-of-competition urine sample on 12 August 2024, which returned a positive test for TMZ at low levels.”

“TMZ is a non-Specified substance, and Świątek did not possess a valid TUE for the substance. Findings for non-Specified substances carry a mandatory provisional suspension, which was imposed on 12 September 2024,” the statement continues.

Her “period of ineligibility will end on 4 December 2024,” the statement notes.

ITIA CEO, Karen Moorhouse, said in the statement: “Once the source of the TMZ had been established, it became clear that this was a highly unusual instance of a contaminated product, which in Poland is a regulated medicine.”

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