Artyom Antropov has been provisionally suspended after testing positive for SARMS-23 at last month's Asian Weightlifting Championships in Jinju ©Asian Weightlifting Federation

A weightlifter from Kazakhstan has been provisionally suspended after testing positive for a banned substance at the Asian Championships in Korea last month.

Artyom Antropov, a silver medallist at 109 kilograms in Jinju, is the second former youth world champion from Kazakhstan to be suspended recently.

Igor Son, who won a bronze medal at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, was banned for eight years in February after his National Anti-Doping Organisation found him positive for an unspecified substance in an out-of-competition test.

Son had been suspended for two years in 2015, when he tested positive for methandienone after winning gold - which he later forfeited - at the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) World Youth Championships.

Antropov, 23, was youth world champion at 85kg in 2017, since when he has competed at 96kg, 102kg and once, in Jinju, at 109kg.

Artyom Antropov, left, shakes hands with gold medallist Ruslan Nurudinov on the podium for the men's 109kg category at the Asian Weightlifting Championships ©Brian Oliver
Artyom Antropov, left, shakes hands with gold medallist Ruslan Nurudinov on the podium for the men's 109kg category at the Asian Weightlifting Championships ©Brian Oliver

The International Testing Agency (ITA), which carries out all anti-doping procedures for the IWF, announced today that Antropov had tested positive for SARMS-23.

He is the sixth weightlifter to be provisionally suspended for a positive test this year, according to the ITA list of doping violations – and the fifth since September 2021 whose sample showed evidence of Selective Androgen Receptor Modulators (SARMS) use.

SARMS have similar properties to anabolic steroids and can help with bone and muscle growth.

Antropov is the third weightlifter to test positive at an Olympic qualifying event this year. Two Turkish lifters tested positive at the European Championships in Armenia in April.

Kazakhstan and Turkey have bad historical doping records which led to both nations losing some of their athlete quotas for the delayed Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.

Because Son's violation was a national matter rather than international - it was detected and punished by Kazakhstan authorities - it will not count towards any potential loss of places at Paris 2024 if Kazakhstan has further doping problems.