Joseph Parker missed a drugs test when he was on holiday ©Getty Images

New Zealand's heavyweight champion Joseph Parker missed a drugs test earlier this year after failing to tell testers that he was on holiday, it has emerged.

Parker, the current World Boxing Organization (WBO) champion, missed a test operated by the World Boxing Council (WBC) as part of their World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA)-operated Clean Boxing Programme. 

It followed a successful title defence over Romania's Razvan Cojanu on May 6.

A spokesperson for Duco Events, Parker's promoter, claimed this was an oversight as he forgot to change his location on the online system.

He will receive no punishment unless he misses another test.

"Joseph extended his holiday following the Cojanu bout on May 6 and didn’t update the WADA system of his change of plans," the spokesperson told Stuff New Zealand.

"A couple of weeks ago drug testers went to his residence in Las Vegas and he had said he was going to be in camp there but he had changed his plans and was in Samoa at the time.

"There is no hiding, it’s an oversight.

"A missed test doesn’t mean you’ve been doping, it just means you’ve been careless.

"In this case it’s just that Joseph didn’t update the WADA system and he was on holiday at the time."

The WBC have released a report from their clean testing programme ©WBC
The WBC have released a report from their clean testing programme ©WBC

Britain's Beijing Olympic 400 metres champion Christine Ohuruogu is among athletes to have served a one-year ban for missing three out-of-competition tests in 2005 and 2006.

Parker is one of five fighters to have missed tests through the WBC programme.

The others are Haitian-Canadian former WBC heavyweight champion Bermane Stiverne, Japanese heavyweight Kyotara Fujimoto and two Americans in super-middleweight J'Leon Love and super-featherweight Tevin Farmer.

All are currently in the process of "results management protocol".

Five ongoing adverse analytical finding cases have also been recorded.

These involve Polish heavyweight Andrej Wawrzyk, who failed for banned anabolic steroid stanozolol, and American super-lightweight Cletus Seldin, who failed for high testosterone levels as well as stanozolol.

The remaining two relate to Danish featherweight and London 2012 Olympian Dennys Ceylan, who failed for cocaine, and Thailand's bantamweight Suriyan Khaikanha, who failed for amphetamine and methamphetamine.