Curler Harris will appeal suspension after missing Scotties due to doping violation
Briane Harris's absence from Canada's national women's curling championship has officially been explained.
The 31-year-old from Winnipeg was declared ineligible to compete in the Scotties Tournament of Hearts in Calgary hours before her team skipped by Kerri Einarson played its opening game Feb. 16. The Einarson rink, Harris's lawyer, Curling Canada, and the World Curling all issued separate statements on Tuesday confirming that she had been banned due to a doping violation.
"Curling Canada was deeply disappointed to receive the news of Briane Harris's adverse analytical finding on the opening day of the Tournament of Hearts," reads a statement from Curling Canada. "Our organization is committed to the values of clean and safe sport, as outlined by both the World Anti-Doping Agency and the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport.
"We respect the integrity of the testing process and accept the results of the test, as well as Briane's right to appeal the findings."
-
Download our app to get local alerts on your device
-
Get the latest local updates right to your inbox
Harris tested positive for trace amounts of Ligandrol in an out-of-competition doping control test conducted on Jan. 24. She got her positive results on the evening of Feb. 15 and informed Curling Canada of the violation the following morning as she headed to practice.
She asked the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sports, the body that conducts doping testing both in competition and outside of competition, to open her B sample and re-test, but again it was found to be positive.
Curling Canada CEO Nolan Thiessen said that at this point in the process, the sport's national governing body is a bystander and will abide by any legal ruling on the issue.
"She has her right to due process and the right to appeal," said Thiessen in a video news conference. "We totally support all of our athletes in any of these situations."
Ligandrol is on the World Anti-Doping Agency's list of prohibited substances. It is used to increase energy and muscle growth. According to the United States Doping Agency, there is no medical use for LGD-4033, the developmental code name for Ligandrol.
"As best as can be determined at this time, Ms. Harris was unknowingly exposed to the banned substance through bodily contact," said Harris's lawyer Amanda Fowler in a statement. "In the circumstances, Ms. Harris is therefore keen to clear her name and will seek to expedite any process of mechanism to facilitate such vindication."
Harris could face a two-year suspension under CCES regulations, although there is the flexibility to decrease or increase a sanction depending on the facts of a case and the results of tests.
The Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne, Switzerland, will hear Harris's appeal.
There is precedent for overturning a suspension like Harris's.
Laurence Vincent Lapointe or Trois-Rivieres, Que., who represented Canada at the Tokyo Olympics in canoe sprint, successfully overturned her doping suspension in January 2020. Like Harris, Vincent Lapointe had tested positive for trace amounts of Ligandrol but argued that she had unknowingly taken the substance through third-party contamination.
Curling Canada has both a medical doctor and a health and doping control consultant on staff. Athletes taking medications for medical reasons can apply for an exemption.
"I think this will naturally put fear in probably a lot of athletes," said Thiessen, a retired curler who has won three Canadian men's championships and a world championship. "If I was an athlete playing right now I would start saying how do I go about my day-to-day business and make sure that I stay on-side? That's all we can ask of everybody."
Rower Silken Laumann is another prominent Canadian athlete who tested positive for a banned substance. The stimulant pseudoephedrine was found in her samples at the 1995 Pan American Games in Mar del Plata, Argentina.
Canadian officials said the element came from a dose of Benadryl that Laumann took as an antihistamine. She and her teammates were stripped of their quadruple sculls gold medal, but Laumann was allowed to keep her gold in single sculls.
Doping cases in curling are rare, although the Russian husband and wife mixed doubles team of Alexander Krushelnitsky and Anastasia Bryzgalova was stripped of Olympic bronze medals in 2018 after Krushelnitsky tested positive for meldonium.
Ontario curler Joe Frans was suspended two years in 2005 after he tested positive for a cocaine metabolite at the national men's championship in Edmonton.
Canadian wheelchair curler Jim Armstrong had an 18-month suspension reduced to six after testing positive for Tamoxifen, a breast-cancer drug that also counters the side-effects of steroids, in 2012. He said his late wife's medication was mistakenly mixed with his medications.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 12, 2024.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
BREAKING Donald Trump picks former U.S. congressman Pete Hoekstra as ambassador to Canada
U.S. president-elect Donald Trump has nominated former diplomat and U.S. congressman Pete Hoekstra to be the American ambassador to Canada.
Genetic evidence backs up COVID-19 origin theory that pandemic started in seafood market
A group of researchers say they have more evidence to suggest the COVID-19 pandemic started in a Chinese seafood market where it spread from infected animals to humans. The evidence is laid out in a recent study published in Cell, a scientific journal, nearly five years after the first known COVID-19 outbreak.
This is how much money you need to make to buy a house in Canada's largest cities
The average salary needed to buy a home keeps inching down in cities across Canada, according to the latest data.
'My two daughters were sleeping': London Ont. family in shock after their home riddled with gunfire
A London father and son they’re shocked and confused after their home was riddled with bullets while young children were sleeping inside.
Smuggler arrested with 300 tarantulas strapped to his body
Police in Peru have arrested a man caught trying to leave the country with 320 tarantulas, 110 centipedes and nine bullet ants strapped to his body.
Boissonnault out of cabinet to 'focus on clearing the allegations,' Trudeau announces
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has announced embattled minister Randy Boissonnault is out of cabinet.
Baby dies after being reported missing in midtown Toronto: police
A four-month-old baby is dead after what Toronto police are calling a “suspicious incident” at a Toronto Community Housing building in the city’s midtown area on Wednesday afternoon.
Sask. woman who refused to provide breath sample did not break the law, court finds
A Saskatchewan woman who refused to provide a breath sample after being stopped by police in Regina did not break the law – as the officer's request was deemed not lawful given the circumstances.
Parole board reverses decision and will allow families of Paul Bernardo's victims to attend upcoming parole hearing in person
The families of the victims of Paul Bernardo will be allowed to attend the serial killer’s upcoming parole hearing in person, the Parole Board of Canada (PBC) says.