Ryan Garcia turned heads during the build-up of his fight against the WBC super lightweight champion, Devin Haney. Then, he shocked the world with a shutout performance against the champ. Now, Garcia has yet again dropped a shocker, testing positive for a banned substance. According to the latest reports, the 25-year-old tested positive for Ostarine. But how did that happen? Dana White‘s drug testing team member Jeff Novitzky had an explanation for this issue back in 2020, when many UFC athletes were getting caught for the same substance.

Featherweight fighter Cub Swanson decided to go on social media to ask the query about why athletes were found using Ostarine. He tagged Jeff Novitzky in a tweet. The Senior Vice President of Athlete Health and Performance for the UFC stated that a lot of supplementary products contain at least trace amounts of Ostarine. The UFC official used the term ‘contaminant’ to refer to the substance. To avoid getting caught up with this substance, Novitzky suggested that UFC fighters use the products that the promotion has approved.

“I believe we are seeing so many cases [of ostarine use] because it is one of the most common contaminants we are seeing in supplements. It appears to be all over the place in the supplement world in very small quantity,” stated Jeff Novitzky. Ostarine inclusion in one’s body seems to be a common problem for Dana White’s promotion. Several UFC stars have fallen prey to tainted supplements over the years. Most of them ended up getting suspended by athletic commissions, and this list includes Garcia’s newfound nemesis, Sean O’Malley.

Ostarine is a Selective Androgen Receptor Modulator (SARM), and UFC bantamweight champion Sean O’Malley tested positive for this SARM twice – once in 2018 and once in 2019. On both occasions, he was slapped with a six-month suspension, which seems to be the go-to repercussion for this violation.

At the time, O’Malley said that the science was not yet clear on the subject. The UFC star was of the opinion that the amounts found in his blood would not have been enough to make any difference. He hoped that down the line, the science would be able to distinguish between intentional use and tainted supplement usage.

Other UFC stars who have popped for Ostarine include O’Malley’s teammate Kyler Phillips and Darius Flowers who tested positive in early 2023 and Daniel Rodriguez who popped for the same in September 2023. All three of them were suspended for, yep, you guessed it, six months. Meanwhile, despite getting caught for PEDs, Ryan Gracia has maintained his stance on denying that he ever used any such PEDs.

‘KingRy’ denies allegations of using PEDs

Ostarine’s primary use case involves the building of muscle mass and if we look at what transpired during the weigh-ins of the Garcia vs. Haney fight, with Ryan Garcia missing weight, it seems to be an alarming coincidence. Regardless, the Los Alamitos native strongly denied that he ever cheated to gain an edge in a boxing match. “Everybody knows that I don’t cheat… I don’t even know where to get steroids… I barely take supplements,” stated Garcia in a video on X.

Ryan Garcia also pointed out how he defeated Devin Haney and claimed that all these accusations were just false claims from his haters. “Big lies, I beat his a**. F*** outta here,” the 25-year-old added. There is a provision for Garcia to place a request asking to test his ‘B sample’, but we don’t know what his next move regarding these accusations of PED use could be.

So far, the failed drug test has not been confirmed, but if it does, it could affect Ryan Garcia’s boxing record. The win over Devin Haney could get overturned and add a no-contest to his record. We will have to wait and see how this story develops in the coming days.