Swiss Federal Supreme Court Judgment of 4 August 2025, A. v. USADA
Motion to set aside CAS Award CAS 2024/A/10291 of 21 June 2024
An American elite swimmer (the Athlete) whose Athlete Biological Passport (ABP) showed abnormalities in two blood samples (and for which a panel of three ABP experts concluded that blood manipulation was highly likely) was cleared of the charges in first instance and the case was brought to CAS in appeal. After a hearing in May–June 2024, the CAS Panel found an anti-doping rule violation, imposed a four-year suspension (crediting the provisional period), and disqualified results from 20 July to 31 December 2022.
The motion to the SFT invoked solely a violation of the Athlete’s right to be heard under Art. 190 para. 2 (d) PILA, arguing that the panel had failed to consider a key defence: that the observed hematological anomalies could be attributed to “detraining,” i.e., a steep reduction of training load between mid-May and mid-July 2022, partly due to a Covid-19 infection. He maintained that he had presented scientific literature and expert testimony supporting this explanation but that the Panel had overlooked or failed to address it.
The SFT dismissed this grievance by reiterating that the arbitral tribunal must examine issues that are pertinent to the resolution of the dispute, but not to address each argument explicitly. In this respect, the CAS had considered the detraining argument and noted that the first-instance arbitrator had deemed it plausible, but rejected it implicitly. More specifically, the panel’s reasoning was that such detraining could even speak in favour of the blood doping scenario, implicitly discarding the arguments raised by the Athlete.
Overall, this is just another affirmation of the limits of the SFT review of the right to be heard grievance under Art. 190 para. 2 (d) PILA, which cannot be used to revisit evidentiary assessments, and implicit reasoning by a CAS Panel suffices when the point was considered but deemed unconvincing.
