Maldonado plans to use DHEA for Fedor fight
Fabio Maldonado: “It’s good for your skin and your hormones. It wasn’t even a PED. I’m not taking any yet, but I believe I’ll start next week.”?
Brazilian fighter Fabio Maldonado spoke recently with AGFight, ahead of his fight with FedorEmelianenko in the main event of Fight Nights on June 17, in St. Petersburg, Russia. Maldonado was released by the UFC late in 2015, after going 1-3 in his last four. He then won two fights in professional boxing, and then signed to fight the greatest MMA heavyweight of all time.
In an unusually candid interview, Maldonado said that as event promoter Kamil had said there will be no PED testing in Russia, he will be taking the WADA prohibited performance enhancing drug DHEA during preparation for the fight with Fedor.
“It’s me against him,” said Maldonado as translated by Lucas Rezende for BE. “Everybody understands these things, right? I’m not trying to make myself look like a victim here. Everybody understands and knows what I will take and what I won’t take. What I can say is that I don’t take those things, but for example, when I was in my final UFC stretch and they had random tests, I was using DHEA, because the doctor told me it’s good for men past 32, it’s good for your skin and your hormones. It wasn’t even a PED. I’m not taking any yet, but I believe I’ll start next week.”?
DHEA is the same drug that led to Lyoto Machida being removed from the fight with Dan Henderson at UFC on FOX 19. Maldonado said being released by the UFC was good, not because he can fight without drug testing, but because the fight with Fedor will be the biggest of his career.
Note: Maldonado has since said he was joking.
“I’ve doing a lot of interviews about my next fights lately and one of questions I got was whether or not I would take steroids to fight Fedor,” he said to Lucas Rezende for MMA Fighting. “I answered I was going to be all juiced up, but I thought it was more of a joke with the reporter, I didn’t know it was going to be taken seriously. I also said I was going to be careful not to take some substance that is might get to fail a doping test. If I disappointed any fans, I apologize. I’ve been tested since 2003 when I debuted at boxing and I’m always open to exams, like I have been all my life.”
