Tennis: I'm no dope cheat - Wickmayer

Yanina Wickmayer practises at the ASB Tennis Centre in Auckland yesterday. Photo / Greg Bowker

Sport's battle against performance enhancing drugs has shifted into murky ground.

That much was evident when 20-year-old Belgian tennis star Yanina Wickmayer yesterday fronted the New Zealand press with her side of events that led to her being banned for failing to comply with the World Anti Doping Authority's (WADA) whereabouts rule.

Wickmayer, whose ban has been suspended pending multiple appeals, allowing her to accept a wildcard into next week's ASB Classic, steadfastly denies being a dope cheat.

She was, she insisted, tested regularly by the ITF and WTA during the period when she failed to notify Belgium's doping authority - Nado Flanders - of her whereabouts. She never dodged a test, never failed a test, and Nado Flanders officials were aware of her whereabouts at the time of the breaches as she was playing in a televised tournament in Australia.

And yet Wickmayer still managed to transgress doping rules seriously enough to cop a one-year ban.

"I know I didn't do anything wrong," Wickmayer said. "I worked my butt off for the last eight years to be where I am today.

"Some people just decide to take that all away [for] stupid papers that haven't been filled out."

It is where she is today - having bolted up the rankings from 71 to 16 in 2009 - that has also invited suspicion. Nothing says potential drugs cheat quite like a dramatic improvement in a short space of time.

Such rises are hardly uncommon in tennis, but it is a coincidence someone fighting to overcome the taint of a doping ban - even one stemming from a paperwork infringement - could do without.

"Maybe I didn't fill in my whereabouts in Belgium but I got tested every two or three weeks," Wickmayer said.

"I didn't fill in that I was in Australia but I was there and I got tested. I never tested positive and I never missed a doping test. I think that is the main thing that is important. That is why they made the system, to catch the ones who test positive and I never did."

Wickmayer insisted her breach was down to Nado Flanders' failure to properly communicate how the system worked and a further communication failure that saw breach letters posted to her uninhabited home address when she was away on tour.

Those letters were all returned unopened, leaving Wickmayer unaware she was in breach of the rules.

"They saw me play on TV in Australia and they kept on sending me letters when they knew I wasn't able to get them," she said. "By the time I had three strikes already I didn't even know I had to fill something out."

Wickmayer maintained she was a supporter of anti-doping measures, including the whereabouts rule.

"There has to be a system like that to keep away the cheaters.

"I am not against the system, I am against the communication. They don't communicate with us as human beings, they treat us a little bit like robots."

Wickmayer's lawyers are appealing to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, the European Commission in Brussels and the Strasbourg-based European Court of Human Rights, with the outcome having potentially far reaching consequences for WADA and its whereabouts rule.

The rule requires elite athletes to make themselves available for out-of-competition testing for one hour a day, 365 days a year. Athletes must give three months' notice of where and when they can be located for testing. The information is registered online and can be updated by email or text.

"The whole whereabouts rule is really under scrutiny," said ASB Classic director Brenda Perry.

"It is a very important rule, to have that surprise element of testing out of competition, but there does appear to have been some administrative issues that have to be sorted if it is to be practicable and fair."

The lifting of Wickmayer's ban means the Classic will have five of the world's top 20 players for the first time.

Wickmayer would have been seeded third behind world No 12 Flavia Pennetta and No 15 Li Na but, having missed the original acceptance list, the Belgian will now be a dangerous floater in the draw.

Her future may still be in the hands of lawyers but Wickmayer is determined to make the most of her time in Auckland before heading to the Australian Open, where the would-be 16th seed will instead enter the qualifying draw.

"I have no idea what is going to happen in the next couple of months but I am really glad being back playing again," she said.