Nirmala Sheoran returns after dope ban; blames lack of sports science knowledge for her plight

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Nirmala Sheoran had everyone's attention at the Inter-State Athletics Championships in Bhubaneswar when the 400m runner appeared at the Indian domestic circuit after a dope ban of four years. The Haryana quartermiler was banned by World Anti-Doping Agency back in 2019 after steroids drostanolone and metenolone in her samples at a competition in 2018.

Making a return at the Asian Games 2023 qualification event after the four-year hiatus, the now 28-year-old athlete clocked 55.07 seconds in the preliminary heats of the 400m and was content with her performance as she qualified for the semifinal heats and remains in the run for the Asian Games qualification, whose standard is set at 52.96 seconds.

"After what happened in 2018, I was determined on making a comeback," Nirmala Sheoran told Mykhel. "I always wanted to win an Asian Games medal, it's something I couldn't reach last time. That's why I am here to take another shot at it.

"It was not a bad performance to restart my career. The trials for Asian Games happened earlier than I expected. If I had a month or two to train, I could have done better."

Interestingly, her return to the competitive fold came at the Kalinga Stadium, where she won her Asian Athletics Championships individual and relay gold medals back in 2017. She was ultimately stripped of the medals following the suspension. Her return also comes at a time when India is second in most dope test-positive cases among athletes.

Prior to her ban, Nirmala Sheoran was a controversial figure in Indian athletics as her whereabouts were often in question. It reached a point where the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) said it was unable to trace her location as dates for the Asian Games 2018 qualification neared.

She often kept mum about her training base as well to the media, leaving more questions over her impressive and now-omitted timing of 51.28 seconds at the 2017 Federation Cup. Nirmala Sheoran refused to take many questions on her troubled past but added that the lack of sports science knowledge in the country was the reason for her ban.

"I don't want to talk about what happened back then but I can tell you this that many athletes, who come from rural areas like me, don't have the sports science knowledge. We don't know which supplements to take or which ones have the banned substance and to be avoided. There are many fake products in the market as well," said Sheoran, who also revealed that she underwent two knee meniscus surgeries during her suspension period.