British cyclist Lizzie Armitstead wins appeal after missing drug tests

British cyclist Lizzie Armitstead has won an appeal against an anti-doping violation and is free to compete at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.

Armitstead, one of the favourites to win the women's road race, missed three doping tests in a 12-month period, leading to a charge by U.K. Anti-Doping (UKAD) and a provisional suspension.

She appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), and a statement released Monday on Armitstead's behalf said the first missed test — from August 2015 — was declared void by CAS because UKAD's doping control officer had failed to follow procedure.

On Tuesday, UKAD confirmed the CAS ruling.

"We respect the outcome of the CAS hearing," said UKAD chief executive Nicole Sapstead, who added that the body was awaiting the written decision on why the violation was not upheld.

Armitstead said she has "always been and will always be a clean athlete and have been vocal in my anti-doping stance throughout my career."

"I am pleased that CAS has accepted my position, having provided detailed information demonstrating the situation around my strikes," she said in her statement.

Not all failures disputed

Armitstead's first missed test came at a world cup event in Sweden. The second was an administrative failure on Oct. 5, 2015, and the third was a missed test on June 9 following "an emergency change of plans due to a serious illness within her family."

She was charged by UKAD with three whereabouts failures on July 11 and did not dispute the last two faults at CAS.

Sapstead said Armitstead "chose not to challenge the first and second whereabouts failures at the time they were asserted against her."

"At the CAS hearing, Ms. Armitstead raised a defence in relation to the first whereabouts failure, which was accepted by the panel," Sapstead said.

UKAD has a policy of not publicly disclosing provisional suspensions, or details of cases, until an anti-doping rule violation has deemed to have been committed.