Romania's Olympic MTB medal hope Vlad Dascalu suspended by UCI for missing doping tests

The mountain bike competition at the 2024 Olympic Games has lost one more medal candidate after Mathieu van der Poel's announcement to focus on road race instead. The UCI has suspended Vlad Dascalu. The 26-year-old Romanian champion of Trek Factory Racing-Pirelli is number twelve in the world. He missed an unannounced doping test three times in the past year.

Dascalu finished ninth and tenth in the first two World Cups of this season in Brazil. He finished fifth at the World Championships in Glasgow last August. Dascalu also became European champion last year, but he was unable to successfully defend that title in his own country last weekend, finishing 14th.

The UCI published a statement about the Romanian on Tuesday afternoon. The reason for this is the missing of three unannounced doping controls within a year. During those checks, Dascalu was not present in the whereabouts he provided in WADA's ADAMS system. You can indicate time slots with locations for unannounced doping controls. The UCI makes no further comment in this case.

The UCI Anti-Doping Tribunal has suspended the Romanian for seventeen months. This will take effect immediately and run through October 20, 2025. Dascalu can appeal against this decision within one month to the CAS.