Banned Aussie Swimmer Shayna Jack Makes Long Awaited Return To Racing At Queensland State Champs

by Ian Hanson - Oceania Correspondent

03 December 2021, 04:27pm

Banned Aussie Swimmer Shayna Jack Makes Long Awaited Return To Racing At Queensland State Championships

After an agonising nightmare that lasted some two years and five months, Shayna Jack will finally make her long awaited return to competition at next week’s McDonald’s Queensland State Swimming Championships (Sunday, December 12).

The 23-year-old served a two-year suspension for returning a positive test for the banned substance Ligandrol on the eve of the 2019 Fina World Championships in Gwangju.

GET SET: For a Shayna Jack return. The former star looks ready to rip. Photo Courtesy: FINIS.

Her first of five events at the Brisbane Aquatic centre at Chandler will be in the 100 metres freestyle as she eyes off a return to the Australian team for next year’s Fina World Championships and the Birmingham Commonwealth Games.

Jack became free to return to training in September after an appeal lodged by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and Sport Integrity Australia (SIA), for Jack to serve the full four-year suspension, was dismissed by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).

It was the end of a painful chapter and a drawn out saga that saw Jack tossed around like a pawn in a now-questionable doping system that would cost her an Olympic berth in Tokyo.

Tracey Holmes, the respected ABC sports journalist, who followed the Jack case closer than most wrote: “The decision marks a significant shift in the CAS’s handling of such cases which until now has been reluctant to show any leniency requiring athletes to prove their innocence by showing how banned substances entered their system.

“Some anti-doping experts have argued for some time that innocent athletes are being caught in the anti-doping net as the technology used in testing has improved at a much faster rate than the ability to ensure against contamination in the production of supplements and pharmaceuticals that should otherwise not contain banned substances.

“Foods, meats and drinks have also been found to contain banned substances through contamination making it virtually impossible for an athlete to produce the evidence that would clear them of guilt.”

HI FIVES: Australia’s premier relay team with Shayna Jack (left) celebrate Commonwealth Games gold. Photo Courtesy: Delly Carr/Swimming Australia Ltd.

Jack, her supportive coach Dean Boxall and her St Peters Western teammates in Brisbane have been in her corner all along and will herald her return.

She invited all, through her Instagram account with “Who’s coming out to Queensland States this year?” Generating enormous interest for her return.

When the news broke that she was back, Jack herself responded to the decision on Instagram, describing herself as ‘overwhelmed with joy.”

“After a two-year-and-three-month battle, I have finally received my final decision that my appeal case has been dismissed by the Court of Arbitration,” she posted.

“I am now free to do what I love with no restrictions and am so overwhelmed with joy. I am now going to take some time to cherish this moment and reflect on what I have endured. The nightmare is over.”

Jack has entered five events – with the 100m freestyle next Sunday, December 12, marking her official return to competitive swimming at Queensland’s premier meet beginning on Saturday December 11, concluding on December 17.

She will also contest the 50 metres freestyle, backstroke and butterfly and the 1500m freestyle.

Here is your guide to the QLD STATE CHAMPIONSHIPS:

QLD STATE CHAMPIONSHIPS – ENTRY LIST BY TEAM

PROGRAM OF EVENTS

LIVE STREAMING

Jack will be joined in the women’s open 100m freestyle heats by Tokyo Olympic golden girls and St Peters Western team mates, Ariarne Titmus (her 2019 room mate) and Mollie O’Callaghan, former team mate and another Olympic gold medallist Meg Harris who has transferred from St Peters to Marion in SA and Kiah Melverton, who has moved from TSS Aquatic to St Peters.

Also listed will be Rio and Tokyo dual Olympians Brianna Throssell and Tamsin Cook, who will make their debuts for new Queensland club the USC Spartans under coach Mick Palfrey who brings his former WA charges for his return to Queensland.

In Jack’s absence it was Harris and O’Callaghan who took full advantage of “one door closing and another door opening”, snatching places in Australia’s premier 4x100m freestyle relay team that won Tokyo gold in world record time.

SHARING THE SPIRIT ON THE GOLD COAST IN 2018: Shayna Jack (left) with Bronte Campbell, Emma McKeon and Cate Campbell. Photo Courtesy: Delly Carr/Swimming Australia Ltd.

The team that Jack had been a part of from silver at the 2017 Worlds through to gold at the 2018 Pan Pacs and Commonwealth Games – breaking the world record alongside Cate and Bronte Campbell and Emma McKeon.

Titmus, O’Callaghan and Melverton all have full programs with “Mollie O” down to contest 13 events, Melverton 10 and Titmus six.

Titmus and Melverton have both entered every freestyle event from 50 to 1500m freestyle as the majority of Australia’s Olympians prepare for a competitive return to racing as they all target next year’s Fina World Championships and Commonwealth Games.

Among other notables will be swimmers who just missed Tokyo – luckless distance  freestyle prodigy Sam Short (Rackley); Australian 200m butterfly champion Bowen Gough (who has joined Michael Bohl‘s Griffith University squad from Nunawading) and 2019 World Championship star Clyde Lewis (who is now also with Bohl).

Subscribe

Login

Notify of

new follow-up comments new replies to my comments

Label

{} [+]

Name*

Email*

Welcome to our community. We invite you to join our discussion. Our community guidelines are simple: be respectful and constructive, keep on topic, and support your fellow commenters. Commenting signifies that you agree to our Terms of Use

Label

{} [+]

Name*

Email*

Welcome to our community. We invite you to join our discussion. Our community guidelines are simple: be respectful and constructive, keep on topic, and support your fellow commenters. Commenting signifies that you agree to our Terms of Use

0 Comments

Inline Feedbacks

View all comments