Canadian swim star Penny Oleksiak denies drug use, says she'll keep training despite 2-year suspension

A two-year suspension from competitive swimming has forced Penny Oleksiak to answer questions about drug use, train by herself in public pools and defend her legacy as Canada’s most decorated female Olympian.

It’s a legacy she is determined to continue at the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics despite the penalty she must serve.

In an exclusive interview with CBC Sports, the 25-year-old Toronto athlete, now based in Los Angeles, denied she has ever used performance-enhancing drugs, and said that the suspension handed down on Nov. 25 was merely the result of scheduling oversights.

“It's never been me to do performance-enhancing drugs or even think about doing performance-enhancing drugs,” she said.

But she does accept full responsibility for the predicament she finds herself in.

”First and foremost, I'm sorry that this happened. It wasn't something I ever wanted to happen. It wasn't something I ever expected to happen. I did do something wrong at the end of the day, and it's something that I do have regret around,” she said. 

Oleksiak was suspended in late November by World Aquatics for what the organization terms “whereabouts” violations — essentially Oleksiak was not where she said she would be for her daily 60-minute availability window for testing.

She said despite those missed tests, she gets tested often throughout the season. 

“They show up at your house to do bloodwork and urine tests and everything. And in between those three tests that I missed, I was being tested on various occasions, whether at meets or at home,” Oleksiak added. 

Oleksiak said she wasn’t even sure if she had one or two strikes against her when the third missed test came into play. 

“After I had missed my second test, I hadn’t been given a concrete answer on if it was a missed test or not until after I had missed my third one,” Oleksiak said. “At that point, it was kind of like getting both of [the violation notifications] at the same time.

“There is a bit of a waiting period from when you have the test to when you have to report about it and tell them what happened. It is kind of a waiting game.”

Sitting inside a boutique gym just off Melrose Avenue in downtown L.A. on a warm Wednesday afternoon, the seven-time Olympic medallist said her failure to update her whereabouts was simply a series of mistakes — and not because she was trying to avoid being tested.

“The picture is kind of painted that way because a whereabouts violation, which is what happened to me, gets automatically put under an anti-doping violation,” she said. “I guess it's not as exciting as people would want it to be or expect it to be. You have one year where you can make three mistakes, and that's kind of a long period of three schedule changes.”