GENEVA, Aug. 6 (Xinhua) -- Spanish cyclist Ibai Salas Zorrozua has been handed a four-year ban after the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ruled he committed an anti-doping rule violation based on the abnormalities in his Athlete Biological Passport (ABP).
The case stemmed from six blood samples provided by Salas between January 25 and August 3 in 2017, which were analyzed by the World Anti-Doping Agency's (WADA) accredited laboratory in Barcelona.
A panel concluded on February 28, 2018, that Salas' ABP revealed multiple abnormalities, with the cyclist given a four-year ban by the Spanish Doping Agency on October 3, and fined 3,500 US dollars.
The sanction was, however, lifted by the Administrative Court of Sport in Spain on February 8, 2019, which reportedly ruled that the ABP was not sufficient to prove an infringement.
The WADA then brought the case to CAS, which deemed that "the values detected in the athlete's ABP were highly abnormal and indicated a high probability of doping" and said that no contradictory evidence existed.
Salas was not able to provide credible reasons to explain the abnormality in the values, it was ruled.
His four-year sanction began from August 4, as Salas was free to compete pending the outcome of the case.
Results achieved by Salas from January 25, 2017 to the start of the ban have also been disqualified. Enditem
