Shayna Jack details ‘traumatic’ phone call in exclusive interview

Australian sport was rocked by swimmer Shayna Jack’s positive drug test. Now she has spoken about the moment her world crumbled.

Australian winner Shayna Jack made international headlines for all the wrong reasons when she was found to have tested positive to a banned substance ahead of the World Championships in South Korea.

Jack was notified she had returned a positive test on June 26 for the substance Ligandrol before her B sample also returned positive on July 19.

The 21-year-old notified her followers she had to withdraw from the competition “due to personal reasons” on July 14 before the second test was returned.

Jack was then notified at the end of July she will receive the maximum four-year ban for her failed drug test unless she can prove her innocence.

The fallout to the scandal rocked the sporting landscape in Australia and across the globe as those closest to Jack feared for the swim star’s wellbeing.

Now in an exclusive interview on The Sunday Project, set to air on Network 10 at 6:30pm (AEDT) tonight, Jack has spoken out about the moment she found out and continuing the fight to clear her name.

READ: What is Ligandrol?

Jack’s positive test caused major backlash across the globe after Mack Horton’s podium protest against Chinese swimmer Sun Yang at the world titles on July 21.

Horton sparked debate over drugs in swimming at the world titles with his protest and later said he was “disappointed” a teammate had tested positive to a banned substance.

Jack was notified she wouldn’t be competing at the World Championships during an Australian swim camp in Japan just days out from the competition. The phone call turned her entire world on its head.

“I haven’t really thought about that day since, it was very traumatic,” Jack said on The Sunday Project.

“Something prohibited had been found in my sample.

“Not only am I young but it’s something that is so far fetched from what I’d ever think would happen to me and when I got that phone call my whole world did change.”

Shayna Jack speaks exclusively. Credit: The Sunday Project, 6.30pm tonight on Network 10.

Jack’s stance remains just as strong as she doubled down on not knowing how the banned substance came to be in her system.

“I did not know that I had taken a substance, I did not know that I had come into contact with this substance and I don’t even know where to find this substance,” Jack said on The Sunday Project.

She will use a “cocaine kiss defence” as her defence over how the banned substance Ligandrol ended up being in her system.

“I had a lot of people come forward and say they were taking this drug. People who go to the gym. Some people were using it as a recovery ... they took it as a drop,” Jack said.

“There was a case in the past called the ‘kiss cocaine case’ where someone had taken cocaine and then the partner who was an athlete, kissed that person and they were contaminated because they had contact with something someone else had taken.

“I was told that anything I had come in contact with during that period could have been the risk of contamination.”

The case in question relations to Canadian pole-vaulter Shawn Barber who avoided a ban despite a positive cocaine test back in 2016 after claiming he ingested the drug via kissing.

Jack will need to provide concrete evidence that the substance entered her system via a contaminated substance that she took every reasonable precaution to avoid in order to escape a long-term doping ban.