Spanish athlete Mohamed Katir has admitted an anti-doping rule violation (ADRV) and has been sanctioned by the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) with a two-year suspension. This follows three Whereabouts Failures in 12 months. 

Last Tuesday (13 February), the 25-year-old middle-distance runner submitted a signed Admission of Anti-Doping Rule Violation and Acceptance of Consequences form admitting that he had violated Rule 2.4 (Whereabouts Failures by an Athlete in a Registered Testing Pool) of the World Anti-Doping Code. Katir admitted to three Whereabouts Failures during a 12-month period commencing on 28 February 2023, as follows.

1. Filing Failure on 28 February 2023. 

2. Missed Test/Filing Failure on 3 April 2023. 

3. Missed Test/Filing Failure on 10 October 2023.

His two-year period of Ineligibility will commence on the date of his Provisional Suspension and will therefore run from 7 February 2024 to 6 February 2026. All of Katir's results and related prizes since 10 October 2023 will be disqualified. Following Katir's sanction, AIU Chief Executive Brett Clothier reiterated the importance of whereabouts in No Advance Notice Testing. 

He said: "This is a critical requirement that all RTP athletes must comply with. Without accurate Whereabouts information, Anti-Doping Organisations cannot properly conduct Out-of-Competition Testing. Out-of-Competition Testing is the key to catching anyone who is doping and trying to gain an unfair advantage," said Clothier.

"In preparation for Paris 2024, the AIU will undertake a comprehensive and intelligence-led programme of out-of-competition testing of elite athletes around the world to ensure a level playing field. Whereabouts compliance will be an essential element of this. 

Elite athletes on the AIU's RTP are fully aware of the importance of whereabouts requirements and receive extensive training to help them understand them. There is no excuse for committing three Whereabouts Failures in a 12 month period.

Statement from Mo Katir

The sanction comes at the height of Katir's sporting career. He was one of the favourites to win Olympic medals at Paris 2024. The athlete himself released a statement explaining the decision to accept the sanction. "I am sorry. I want to apologise to all those who have supported me throughout my life, from my family, my sponsors, my companies, my coach, my agent," he said. 

The sanction "is not related to the use of prohibited substances or methods, nor to the evasion of anti-doping controls," the athlete said in his statement. "It is a sanction for inaccurately updating my whereabouts... These cases can and do occasionally happen to athletes who are part of the anti-doping control programme," Katir admitted. 

Katir points out that what happened in his case was that "the platform was not working properly, so I was limited to sending an email to the manager of WADA's ADAMS system to let him know where I was at the time and where I would be on subsequent dates. 

However, out of ignorance and thinking that ADAMS and AIU were the same, I did not inform AIU of this. I later learned that I was required to do so". Katir adds: "I was not aware that updating the location data in such cases had to be done as soon as possible, as I was initially under the impression that a simple email to the platform manager would suffice."

In his statement, he reiterates that he was tested after these failures. He said. "It is important to remember that even a few hours after committing some of these site failures, I was subjected to out-of-competition doping tests. The results were always negative."

Katir admits that he is "a very absent-minded person". He regrets that "these oversights or errors in updating location data in ADAMS end up being a lack of diligence". Despite all this, Katir concludes by admitting that accepting the sanction is the best decision. 

"Taking into account all of the above, and calmly analysing the long processes that the various resources that I could present could take and which could lead to excessively long waiting periods (even until well after the Olympics), I am forced to accept the sanction proposed by the AIU and thus be able to start fulfilling it as soon as possible."

He concludes by using his case as an example to warn other athletes of the importance of keeping their whereabouts up to date. "I will be satisfied if it serves as an example". Finally, he reiterated that all the results he had achieved before the sanction "were achieved without the use of any kind of doping."