Earlier this week it was brought to light that there’s a loophole in the USADA testing procedures, that may allow select fighters to skip dru testing. Now, the names of seven athletes who are registered with USADA, but have not yet been tested in 2017 have been revealed.
In the original MMAImports write up on the subject, our own Gregory Smith broke it down:
Back in 2015, the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) picked up a new anti-doping program. This time around, the world’s most famous mixed martial arts promotion joined forces with the United Stated Ant-Doping Agency (USADA). That being said, it would appear that there may be a loophole in the system used by the agency to test fighters. As a result, it is possible some fighters are able to cheat the system and avoid drug tests.
As reported by Bloody Elbow, when a fighter returns from retirement, by WADA rules, the fighter must first undergo drug testing for six months. However, the UFC’s anti-doping policy often dictates that a waiver is given to the fighter. Where things get strange is that it is impossible to know which fighters are retired and which ones are returning from retirement at any time. The registered testing pool of fighters is not provided by USADA or the UFC, making it impossible to know which fighters are truly under anti-doping scrutiny. As a result, a fighter could perhaps theoretically retire and then unretire when they have a fight coming up. The process would allow the fighter to circumvent months of drug testing before their next match up.
While it is not clear if this is happening in the UFC, the practice seems theoretically possible under the current procedures of the promotion and the anti-doping organization.
Now, in a follow up to that original BloodyElbow report, the names of these selected UFC fighters have been revealed.
Check it out:
Ok. everyone keeps asking me who the fighters are who havnt been tested in 2017.
The seven are:
Alberto Mina
Josh Barnett (suspended)
Maximo Blanco
Nick Diaz (suspended)
Ronda Rousey
Ruslan Magomedov (suspended)
Zubaira Tukhugov (suspended)1/??
— Dave/Dim (@dimspace) December 14, 2017