Toon Aerts found guilty of doping violation, banned for two years

Belgian cyclo-cross rider Toon Aerts has been found guilty of an anti-doping rule violation and handed a two-year ban after an investigation by the UCI Anti-Doping Tribunal into his positive test for letrozole last year.

An out-of-competition test, collected on 19 January 2022 just before the Cyclo-cross World Championships, detected the banned substance - an aromatase inhibitor that can increase testosterone levels - and the UCI investigation found that Aerts had "failed to establish how [it] entered his body".

He is now banned from racing for two years, backdated to 16 February 2022, when he was notified of the positive result, meaning his suspension will be up on 16 February 2024.

He has been placed on ‘inactive’ status by his Baloise-Trek cyclo-cross team since February 2022.

News of the positive test and risk of suspension for Aerts came out in December 2022, and what followed was a lengthy process to establish whether he was guilty of a doping offence. Throughout the process, Aerts has maintained his innocence, asserting he tested positive due to contamination. This could have seen his ban brought down to a year.

“I have never had the intention to use doping and I have never voluntarily taken doping products to improve my performance,” he said during a press conference on the matter in December 2022.

Part of the Tribunal process can involve riders attempting to prove that the substance in question entered their body in an accidental manner, but the UCI found that Aerts had failed to do this.

The UCI statement reads: “After a thorough examination of the case, including several expert reports submitted by the Belgian rider, the Tribunal considered that Toon Aerts had failed to establish how the prohibited substance entered his body and imposed the standard sanction under the UCI Anti-Doping Rules (ADR) and the World Anti-Doping Code for the presence of letrozole.”

On top of his two-year ban, Aerts’ results achieved between the date of the sample and the notification of the result, which included sixth place at the 2022 UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships, have also been nullified.

He has the right to appeal the decision before the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) within one month.

Aerts’ compatriot Shari Bossuyt (Canyon-SRAM), with whom he shares an agent, also tested positive for letrozole in March of this year during the Tour de Normandie, and is currently going through a similar investigation. The 22-year-old also maintains her innocence and that it is a matter of contamination.

Aerts posted a message of support for Bossuyt after the news was revealed in June.