Jack set to learn fate

Verdict on doping imminent

SHAYNA Jack’s fate will be revealed within days after the Australian swimmer’s drawn- out appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport ( CAS) was heard in secret seven weeks ago.

While the details of the hearing remain confidential, it can be revealed that Jack appeared via video link from Brisbane before a sole arbitrator in late September — more than 14 months after she was first notified that she had tested positive to the banned anabolic agent Ligandrol and sent home from a Japanese training camp just before the world championships.

Suspended for four years by the Australian Sports Anti- Doping Authority ( ASADA), Jack lodged an appeal with the CAS, maintaining she is innocent and has no idea how the banned substances got into her body.

Witnesses at her two- day hearing included her coach Dean Boxall, who has stood by the rising freestyle sprinter, as well as leading swimmers who provided character references.

Jack’s family were also in attendance, but only in a supporting role, so were not called on to testify.

Jack is understood to have spoken at length on both days to finally give her side of the story after she did not speak at the initial hearing with ASADA, now Sport Integrity Australia.

The hefty ban she has already received has no bearing on her appeal because CAS cases are regarded as fresh hearings but the verdict is imminent.

It was previously revealed that the level of traces found in her sample were minutely small, substantiating her claims that she did not deliberately break the rules and the only way the banned substance could have got into her system was by contamination.

But the now 22- year- old needs to convince the CAS that she did not knowingly take the substance.