ITF 2017 Per Player Testing Statistics (Update)

The official player-by-player testing summary for 2017 has been released: 2017 per player testing summary

Here’s a summary of who was tested 7+ times both in and out of competition: 2017 per player testing summary, 7+ tests

As already known, the number of IC tests far outweighs the number of OOC tests (see here).

Some notable points:

1. Novak Djokovic has been tested 4-6 times IC and 7+ times OOC despite missing large parts of the 2017 season.
2. Serena Williams has been tested 1-3 times both IC and OOC despite only playing two tournaments and one exhibition match.
3. There are some odd cases where players were tested 7+ times either exclusively IC or exclusively OOC.

This gives rise to further questions:

1. What’s the criteria upon which increased testing of a given player is based? Is it merely based on the number of matches played or are other factors taken into consideration as well (e.g. oddities shown in urine tests or the Athlete Biological Passport)? (see the points 1 and 2 above and players such as Errani or Ferrer)
2. What’s the criteria upon which the decision to test a given player more frequently either IC or OOC is based? (see point 3 above and a player such as Sharapova)
3. If we’d know the then-current minimum testing rates for EPO and HGH as imposed by the WADA and also know that the TADP at least confirms to those, we could roughly estimate how often a given player may have been tested for those substances in 2017 (given that we also know the share of blood tests in the overall sample quantity).

I’ve contacted the WADA about the third question and will contact the ITF about the first two questions. I’ll keep you updated about any findings.

Update 05/03/2018: Two weeks have passed since I contacted the WADA and I’ve yet to receive an answer. The ITF replied almost immediately with their usual ‘confidential’ line. Apparently everything that isn’t already publicised on the TADP site is deemed confidential by the ITF. You’d only want to keep those details away from the public if it’d make the ITF appear in a bad light.