MILAN — An international sports tribunal on Monday ruled it lacks jurisdiction to intervene in Katie Uhlaender’s case, effectively ending her bid to compete at the Milan-Cortina 2026 Olympics.
The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) said the dispute fell outside the time window during which it can decide Olympic-related qualification matters and left all qualification results unchanged. The CAS ruling dooms Uhlaender’s fight after she accused actions by Canada’s team of costing her a sixth Winter Games berth.
Uhlaender, a five-time Olympian, says the controversy began at a Jan. 11 World Cup race in Lake Placid, N.Y., her final chance to earn enough points to qualify. She told NPR she received a text from Canada’s skeleton head coach, Joe Cecchini, then recorded a subsequent phone call in which Cecchini appears to outline a plan to manipulate the points system: “We’ve had some crazy races that have not gone our way this year,” he says on the recording. “And I’m like, I can just eliminate any possibilities here.”
Under the sport’s scoring rules, points awarded drop when fewer athletes start an event. Uhlaender alleges that, just before the race, Cecchini withdrew four of Canada’s six female sledders, a move that reduced the field and dramatically lowered the points she would receive despite a dominant run.
Bobsleigh Canada Skeleton declined to make Cecchini available and issued statements calling his decisions “appropriate, transparent, and aligned with both athlete welfare and the integrity of the sport.”
An investigation by the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation (IBSF) found that Cecchini “became concerned that Canada might lose an overall Olympic quota spot if non-Canadian athletes in Lake Placid performed well” and that he benched his sledders in a manner “intentional and directed to reducing the points available to athletes.” The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee also told the International Olympic Committee that Uhlaender had been denied the Games due to “unfair actions taken at Lake Placid.”
Despite these findings, no international sports body has imposed sanctions on Canada. With CAS’s procedural decision, Uhlaender said she is “disappointed that nothing is being done again” and that she is exploring options, while insisting she is “fighting for the right thing, as this action hurt a whole field of athletes.” Her path to Milan-Cortina now appears closed.