Investigation into missed drug tests led to withdrawal from World Championships
Decathlete Scantling began serving provisional suspension on Thursday
The reason for decathlete Garrett Scantling’s withdrawal from the World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Oregon, became public on Thursday when the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency announced he had agreed to begin serving a provisional suspension for a possible “Whereabouts and Tampering Anti-Doping Rule Violation.”
According to the USADA statement, Scantling agreed to the release of the above information.
The 29-year-old Scantling, who totaled a yearly world-leading score of 8,867 points in the decathlon in May, was not on the list of entrants for the World Championships that was released by World Athletics on July 8.
Susan Hazzard, the director of public relations for USA Track & Field, wrote in an email on July 12 that Scantling “voluntarily withdrew” from the World Championships that began at the University of Oregon’s Hayward Field on July 15 and will conclude on Sunday. She added that any additional questions should be addressed to his agent, Paul Doyle.
Doyle, the president of Doyle Management Group, confirmed on July 13 that Scantling had withdrawn from the meet voluntarily, and that he was “not ready to comment on it at this time.”
Scantling did address the situation through social media on Thursday when he posted a statement that said he had been “provisionally suspended by USADA for the accumulation of three whereabouts violations.”
The statement also said he was taking “full responsibility for my actions, as it could have been completely avoided.”
Under anti-doping rules, athletes must provide authorities with their whereabouts each day during certain time windows in order to be available for out of competition performance enhancing drug tests. An athlete missing three testing appointments during a 12-month window can be suspended for up to two years.
Scantling won last year’s U.S. Olympic Trials with a then-personal best of 8,647 points before finishing fourth in the Olympic Games in Tokyo with total of 8,611 points.
He added 220 points to his best earlier this year when he came from behind to win the decathlon in the USA Track & Field Combined Events Championships at the University of Arkansas from May 6-7.
Scantling’s 8,867-point score moved him to seventh on the all-time world performer list and made him the third-highest scoring American in history behind Ashton Eaton (9,045 in 2015) and Dan O’Brien (8,891 in 1992).
Eaton and O’Brien won a combined three Olympic and five World titles in the decathlon, and also set three world records in the event.
Scantling was expected to contend for a gold medal in the World Championships while battling Olympic champion Damian Warner of Canada, as well as world-record-holder and Olympic silver medalist Kevin Mayer of France.
The decathlon competition will be contested on Saturday and Sunday, the final two days of the 10-day meet.