One of the UFC’s longest tenured fighters has been nabbed by USADA’s out of competition drug testing program, with the UFC announcing on Friday that Gleison Tibau has been provisionally suspended due to a potential violation.
Tibau, 32, picked up his 17 win inside the Octagon just last month at UFC Fight Night 77 in a controversial non-submission submission win over Abel Trujillo, a result that was already being appealed in Brazil. His violation, of which there are no further details at the time, was out of competition, and may or may not result in that victory being overturned.
Here’s what the UFC had to say on Friday:
“The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) has notified both Gleison Tibau and UFC that he has been provisionally suspended due to a potential Anti-Doping Policy violation stemming from an out-of-competition test.
“USADA, the independent administrator of the UFC Anti-Doping Policy, will handle the results management and appropriate adjudication of this case involving Gleison Tibau. Additional information will be provided at the appropriate time in the process.”
Tibau’s UFC run began in 2006, with just one 2007 fight outside of the organization since then. He’s gone 17-9 through 26 UFC bouts.
Penick’s Analysis: We don’t have any further information as to the nature of the violation at this time, so it’s hard to speculate on how long he’ll be out, but if it was PEDs of any kind it could effectively end his career. At 32-years-old, a potential two year suspension could force him out entirely, but we’ll know more once they release further details. He still has a process to go through with USADA, and has a right to an appeal should he deem that necessary. This is just the second provisional suspension handed out by USADA since taking over the UFC’s drug testing efforts in July, the first being Mirko Cro Cop.
[Photo (c) Jason Silva via USA Today Sports]
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