Stiffer Penalties For Failed Drug Tests

There has been quite a string of failed drug tests in the past year in MMA. Chris Leben was suspended and fined last year after tests showed illegal steroids in his drug test after his loss to Michael Bisping and Karo Parisyan was also found to have painkillers in his system at UFC 94. Most recently MMA and UFC veteran Ken Shamrock tested positive for three different types of steroids after his win over Ross Clifton and was suspended by the California State Athletics commission.

Despite knowing of consequences of use of banned substances, fighters are still coming up dirty and the sport of MMA is starting to look like Major League Baseball. Why do fighters continue to use the banned substances? Sometimes it’s difficult to move up or stay in a weight class when you’re training and sometimes they use for speedy recovery and to build lean muscle mass. They also know that it’s possible that other fighters like their opponents are using drugs too, so they want that edge. It;s just like any other sport and athlete that’s using performance enhancing drugs.

The penalties are fairly stiff with suspensions and fines to the fighters. If a fighters gets suspended, he’s going to lose money from missed fights and if he’s out of the game for too long he may even lose his endorsements. These are only the short term effects of steroids on fighters. The long term health effects are the ones they should be sincerely worried about.

MMAJunkie.com reported that the Nevada State Athletics Commission has vowed for stiffer penalties for fighters that come up positive for banned substances. Some of the possible punishments is forfeiture of win bonuses and fight results being overturned. They recently fined Karo Parisyan $32,000 for his positive test for banned substances and overturned his win at UFC 94. Even though the banned substances may not have been steroids, they feel that the substances gave him a winning edge over his opponent.

So what is it going to take for Fighters to stop using performance enhancing drugs? Same thing it’s going to take to get any other athletes to stop using. Penalties so stiff that they’ll be afraid to use.

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