Bulgarian tennis player Sesil Karatantcheva plans to appeal her two-year doping ban to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
The International Tennis Federation barred the 16-year-old from the courts Wednesday after she tested positive for the performance-enhancing steroid nandralone at last year's French Open and again in an out-of-competition test.
The Bulgarian reached the French Open quarterfinals, but her results, ranking points, prize money, and any money she earned since the test could be taken away.
Karatantcheva has three weeks to appeal the suspension. The Bulgarian teenager said the high levels of nandralone in her test were due to a previously unknown pregnancy that ended in a miscarriage last year.
The CAS, based in Lausanne, Switzerland, has the final word in doping cases. Karatantcheva is the first female tennis player to test positive for a banned substance since Spain's Lourdes Dominguez Lino, who was banned for three months in 2002 after testing positive for cocaine.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP and AP .