Fighters Only

Issue 087

April 2012

'KING MO’ TESTS POSITIVE FOR STEROIDS, OVER-COUNTER SUPPLEMENT BLAMED

Strikeforce light heavyweight Muhammed ‘King Mo’ Lawal has tested positive for a banned steroid following a January stoppage victory over Lorenz Larkin. The former Olympic wrestling alternate’s sample showed the anabolic steroid drostanolone in his system for the January 7th bout in Las Vegas. The AKA wrestler, however, maintains he did not take any performance enhancing substances, telling MMA Junkie: “I’m a competitor. Cheating is not in me. It’s all about skill and gameplan, and that’s what I’m about.”

Lawal and his management were concerned an injection of a legal anti-inflammatory, taken weeks prior to the bout, could have been responsible for the positive test, but now point the blame toward an over-the-counter muscle-building supplement. Lawal claims he bought the product in April 2010 from a supplement store, although it has now been removed from shelves revealed his team.

Lawal told The MMA Hour he didn’t expect anything bought over the counter would contain illegal substances. He said: “I guess that’s the mistake I made. When I looked at the bottle, it just had a bunch of numbers on it. It had the ingredients. I didn’t see anything that looked illegal on the bottle, to be honest with you.” The currently 9-1 205lb’er emphasized he has passed stringent Olympic-style drug testing during his years as an amateur wrestler.

Lawal and his management said they would not appeal the Nevada State Athletic Commission’s ruling, instead they would present their findings to the government body.

Lawal’s January victory has now been overturned by the NSAC to a no contest.

UFC WELTERWEIGHT CHAMPION GEORGES ST PIERRE ‘IS AFRAID OF HEIGHTS’

UFC featherweight Leonard Garcia has revealed welterweight champion Georges St Pierre has a crippling fear of heights. In an interview with FightHub, Garcia told how he discovered GSP’s phobia during a mountain run while they were training with award-winning coach Greg Jackson in New Mexico. “Nobody knows this, but he’s like a girl when it comes to heights,” recalled Garcia. “Part of the run takes us on the edge of the mountain where you can safely run but right off the edge is a drop. He’s behind me and he’s running and he’s calling my name. I was like, ‘Why’s he calling me?’ And he’s like, ‘Hey, man, can I grab the back of your shirt when we run?’ I was like, ‘Why do you want to grab the back of my shirt?’ He was trying to tell me, ‘The height!’ I said, ‘The height? You’re afraid of heights?’ And he was like, ‘Yeah!’… We finish the run and he’s like, ‘Don’t tell nobody about this.’” St Pierre is recovering from surgery to repair an injured anterior cruciate ligament.

23m

Roughly 23 million Brazilians tuned in to watch UFC 142 live on TV

1,500

MMA figurine company Round 5 will release a limited run of 1,500 WEC edition Ben Henderson dolls in April, complete with WEC lightweight belt

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