Canada's Alysha Newman competes during the women's pole vault event at the Diamond League athletics meet at the Qatar Sports Club stadium in Doha, Friday, May 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Sayed)
February 05, 2026 - 1:53 PM
Alysha Newman says it's a first and that she has always been and always will be a clean athlete.
The 2024 Olympic bronze medallist in women's pole vault was provisionally suspended by the Athletic Integrity Unit for whereabouts failures on Wednesday. In order to be suspended for that reason, an athlete must miss three doping tests within 12 months.
In an Instagram post, the 31-year-old from London, Ont., said she has been getting drug tested since she was 16 and that this was the first such occurrence.
Newman said she found out when "you guys found out" and that she couldn't talk about everything as the process was still ongoing.
"I've never taken any enhanced drugs, I've never taken steroids," she said in the video, mentioning she was heading into training and explaining how rigorous the whereabouts process is. "... I fell short this year (with missing three tests), we're in the process, we're gonna figure it out and I will see you guys back on the track.
"I will continue to be a clean athlete in this sport and I'm honoured to be Canadian and to have represented Canada at the highest level."
Every athlete in the testing pool is required to update their location through a mobile app and provide a 60-minute time window each day for anti-doping testing. Although athletes usually list their overnight location, even the slightest mistake or late update can count as filing failures.
"This is an unfortunate situation and Athletics Canada hopes to see Alysha Newman back as part of our National Team Program when she is eligible," Athletics Canada said in a statement.
Newman hasn't competed since May 2025.
She reached the summit of her career when she surprised many with her bronze at the Paris Olympics. She set a national record of 4.85 metres in her third appearance at the Games to claim Canada's first-ever women's pole vault Olympic medal.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 5, 2026.
News from © The Canadian Press, 2026