British Para-Cycling World Champion Daphne Schrager has been handed a two-year ban from competition following a lengthy anti-doping investigation that concluded she inadvertently ingested a banned substance and did not gain a performance advantage from it.
In a lengthy Instagram post published earlier today, Schrager wrote that she tested positive for Ligandrol, an anabolic agent, in June 2025, resulting in an immediate suspension from competition.
“Since then I have worked tirelessly alongside my team to investigate how this positive test occurred, and I have presented my full defence to an independent panel.
“I am glad that the Panel recognised that I have never cheated and never doped, and accepted my credibility without reservation – stating that I am a “credible individual, who had honest explanations.” That is the truth, and it is important to me that it is understood clearly and unequivocally.”
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Detailing her defence, and the “considerable personal expense” of attempting to prove her innocence, the 26-year-old said anti-doping rules still required her to serve a two year ban – backdated to the date of her positive test – because she could not identify the source of her contamination. That’s despite the UK Anti-Doping Agency (UKAD) finding the ingestion and environmental contamination were both inadvertent, and that the ingestion was not performance-enhancing or worthy of stripping results.
Schrager’s case echoes that of former pro Lizzy Banks, a two-time Giro d’Italia stage winner who retired following a lengthy legal battle after a positive test for a higher concentration of formoterol, an asthma drug, and chlortalidone, a diuretic.
After the UKAD found in Banks’ favour that the drug was detected due to inadvertent contamination, and waived her two-year ban, the World Anti-Doping Agency appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, which retroactively re-imposed Banks’ suspension.
In Schrager’s case, she wrote, “By the time an athlete is informed of their positive test, too much time has passed to identify the exact source of contamination with the certainty that the rules demand.
“That is not a failure of honesty or effort, it is simply too much of a burden to be met in every case.”
Schrager, who has cerebral palsy, was inspired by the London 2012 Paralympics and initially competed in athletics as a sprinter, representing England at the 2018 Commonwealth Games. She joined British Cycling’s elite Paralympic programme the following year.
She won her first major medal at the 2021 Para-Cycling Road World Championships, when she won bronze in the C3 road race. The following year, she became world champion on the track in the C3 individual pursuit, a title she claimed for a second time two years later. She has also claimed five silver medals at major championships, including in the individual pursuit at the Paris 2024 Paralympics.
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Announcing her intention to return to competition following the expiry of her ban next summer, Schrager said, “This has been one of the most difficult periods of my life. Losing my contract, my team, and thee structure that had long shaped my purpose and identity left me facing a level of uncertainty I had never known.
“I’m deeply grateful to my family, my fiancé and my friends for their love, patience and belief in me. Their support carried me through, and I’m now able to move forward with gratitude.
“Over the past year I have lost a great deal. But I have not lost myself.”
