Substances of abuse: 3 months for a drug that does nothing

Nobody takes cocaine to punch harder. The people who wrote the Code know that, which is why four substances were pulled out of the ordinary sanctioning structure and given their own.

Two cases in 2026 put the same substance through that structure and produced very different pictures. Worth walking through both, because the difference is not the drug.

The category

Article 4.2.3 of the 2021 Code created a separate class. Four substances are designated Substances of Abuse, on the basis that they are frequently used in society outside any sporting context.

• Cocaine
• Diamorphine, better known as heroin
• MDMA
• THC

All four are prohibited in competition only. Out of competition they are not prohibited under the Code, which surprises people and is worth stating clearly.

The sanction, and why it is short

An intentional violation of the presence or use rules carries up to 4 years. For a substance of abuse the arithmetic changes completely.

Note what the athlete has to establish: that the use happened away from competition and had nothing to do with performance. Whether he took it is already settled.

The old numbers show how much this changed things. A British boxer received 4 years in 2018 for benzoylecgonine, a cocaine metabolite. A tennis player served 12 months for cocaine in 2017.

Under the current structure a rugby league player received 3 months in 2024 for cocaine and MDMA.

Case one: a positive test from someone else's habit

Joseph Parker provided a sample around his 25 October 2025 bout with Fabio Wardley in London. The laboratory found benzoylecgonine. He was provisionally suspended from late November and faced a possible 2 years.

In March 2026 he submitted an explanation. According to UK Anti-Doping's published statement, Parker claimed the finding resulted from exposure to cocaine used by the nutritionist he had employed for the camp. The nutritionist provided a written statement saying he was a regular user and had used cocaine daily in the week before the bout.

In June an independent scientific expert concluded that any ingestion had occurred out of competition. UKAD then imposed 3 months, deemed already served, and Parker accepted the ruling in July.

Case two: a case still running

On 19 August 2026 the International Tennis Integrity Agency announced that Nick Kyrgios had been provisionally suspended. He provided a sample at an ATP 250 event in Mallorca on 22 June, and on 17 July a WADA-accredited laboratory confirmed benzoylecgonine.

The provisional suspension is mandatory for this substance and has run since 4 August. He has not appealed. He accepted responsibility publicly and described it as a mistake.

No final sanction has been determined. The ITIA has not addressed publicly when the substance was used, and that single question is what the whole case turns on: in competition, or out of it.

The agency noted that support is available to him under the programme. That sentence is in the rules for a reason, and it is the part of this category people forget exists.

Why a nutritionist is writing about this

Because of the first case, and I would rather address it than let it sit unspoken.

A member of an athlete's support team used a drug in his own private life, and the athlete carried the consequence.

Whatever the merits of that particular explanation, the scenario it describes is real and it belongs to my profession.

People in this job are in kitchens, in hotel rooms, handling food, handling supplements, in physical proximity to fighters during the exact week that matters. Under strict liability, the athlete owns whatever ends up in his sample.

He does not get to own the private conduct of the people around him, and he cannot audit it.

The only protections that exist are ordinary ones. Know who is in the camp. Know who handles what. Keep records of who supplied what and when.

And apply the same standard to the people you hire that the system applies to you.

What a fighter should take from both cases

Out of competition is not the same as never. The reduced sanction depends on establishing when use happened, and establishing it is your job, not the agency's. Without evidence you are arguing from an assertion.

The in-competition window is wider than you think. It generally opens at 11:59 p.m. the day before you compete. Something taken the previous weekend is out of competition; something taken the night before is not.

The provisional suspension arrives before any finding of fault. Both men were out of their sport for months while the process ran. That is not the punishment, it is what happens before the punishment is decided, and it costs the same in lost time either way.

Treatment is a formal route, not an admission of weakness. Completing an approved programme cuts 3 months to one, and the rules were written that way deliberately.

The part I find hardest to write

These are not doping cases in any sense a fighter would recognise. Nobody gained anything. One man lost the biggest fight of his career and then 9 months of it; another is out of a sport he has been trying to return to through years of injury.

The Code treats this category more gently than it treats cheating, and it should. But a 3-month ban still removes a camp, a purse and a place in a ranking, and the reputational part lasts a great deal longer than 3 months.

The useful advice is unglamorous. Know the window. Know who is around you. And if the problem is bigger than a bad decision on a Saturday, the programme has a door for that, and using it costs less than the alternative.

All of the figures above are the 2021 Code. From 1 January 2027 the structure changes: 2 months out of competition, 6 months to 2 years in competition, and the rehabilitation requirement gone for a first violation.

The detail is in what the 2027 Code changes.