[1] Leipold won the German Junior Championships in freestyle wrestling in 1985, 1986, 1988 and 1989, and was runner-up in 1987.

[3][4] At the 2000 Summer Olympics, he won the freestyle tournament, winning the final 4–0 against Brandon Slay.

Leipold then tested positive for norandrosterone and noretiocholanolone, which are used to prove the presence of the steroid nandrolone,[5] and the gold medal was awarded to Slay.

[6] Prince Alexandre de Merode, the chairman of the IOC medical commission, was quoted as saying that Leipold's sample showed 20 nanograms of nandrolone per milliliter of urine, whereas the limit was 2 nanograms per milliliter.

[3] Another freestyle wrestler, the Mongolian Oyunbileg Purevbaata, also failed a doping test at the same Olympics.