Out of competition testing begins in the UFC
“We have nothing to do with the testing other than they send us a bill to pay for it,” said Lorenzo Fertitta. “That’s it. It’s all done third party, all done the right way.”
Several days ago both Jon Jones and Glover Teixeira had their blood and urine surprise tested for PEDs and other prohibited drugs by the Maryland State Athletic Commission.
Previous surprise tests had previously been administered to fighters suspected of using PEDs. There is no such suspicion of Jones, and he requested it. These tests ahead of the Jones vs. Teixeira fight on April 26 at UFC 172 may be seen as the start of a new era in the sport.
This is the beginning of out of competition testing.
SI’s Jeff Wagenheim recently sat down with ZUFFA CEO Lorenzo Fertitta to discuss the advent of random testing in MMA. Fertitta is a central to the effort, as it is prohibitively expensive for state athletic commissions, so he is paying for it.
“I think it’s going to be something that continues to happen on a pretty regular basis going forward,” said Fertitta.
“We’ve always tried to do whatever we can to embrace and encourage the commissions to test as much as they possibly can. Unfortunately for most commissions, they’re restrained from a budgetary standpoint. They just don’t have the resources to handle random testing because there’s a lot more that goes into how it’s done. In order for the program to be successful, it truly needs to be random and it needs to be pretty in-depth.”
“We have nothing to do with the testing other than they send us a bill to pay for it. That’s it. It’s all done third party, all done the right way. They get the results sent directly to them and then they deal with the situation, the fighter. It’s out of our hands.”
“We’re trying to work with various commissions now to figure out how we can put systems in place to ensure that all of these guys are tested. Tested randomly, tested out of competition, in competition, every which way they can be.”
“Sometimes these things take a little time to actually get put in place where you can effectively manage it. Sometimes the media just wants everything to happen yesterday. We’re doing it. It’s all starting to happen now.”