Olympics-Athletics-Ukraine's Kovalenko loses CAS appeal for Tokyo Games spot

TOKYO (Reuters) - Ukrainian race walker Nazar Kovalenko will not be competing at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics after the Court of Arbitration for Sport on Wednesday dismissed his appeal to overturn a Games ban over missed doping tests.

Kovalenko, who had participated at the 2012 London Olympics but had been ruled ineligible for Tokyo by the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) after missing doping tests, had appealed to overturn the decision.

"The panel of arbitrators in charge of the matter has rejected the application filed by Ukrainian race walker Nazar Kovalenko on 1 August 2021 in relation to the AIU’s decision to declare him ineligible to compete in the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020," CAS said.

"The CAS panel denied the existence of "exceptional circumstances" that would justify an exemption."

Race walkers are in action on Thursday and Friday at the Tokyo Games.

(Reporting by Karolos Grohmann; Editing by Christian Radnedge)