(If the OAC wants to be taken seriously, it can’t expect promotions to self-regulate.)

If you recall, we reported after UFC 129 that the Ontario Athletic Commission had passed the buck in terms of post-fight drug testing to Zuffa for the April 30 event held in Toronto and that the UFC had hired an unnamed independent laboratory to look after testing the fighters on the historic card.

According to UFC Vice President of Government and Regulatory Affairs, Marc Ratner, who responded to a request from CagePotato.com today for test results from the event, all of the samples came back clean two weeks ago “for both [performance enhancing drugs] and illegal street drugs.”

(All natural, bro, all natural. Pic: GoodmenProject)

We told you last weekend there seemed to be some confusion about who was doing the drug testing at UFC 129, after the Ontario Athletic Commission admitted it didn’t oversee any prefight screening and the UFC had to reportedly take matters in hand by hiring an independent lab to do the work. For a variety of reasons – financial and otherwise — it’s obviously problematic when the only drug testing done at a major sporting event is overseen by the promotion itself. Especially when the president of said promotion consistently tells the media his organization is powerless against “the government” in nearly all PED-related issues.

Now, here’s a new reason to raise our eyebrows, as just prior to UFC 129 the head of the renowned US Anti-Doping Agency went on record to call drug testing in MMA “horrific” and say it’s “a joke” that promoters “claim they are trying to protect their sport with WADA (compliant) policies.” That’s World Anti-Doping Agency, for those of you keeping score, pretty much the gold standard in the drug-testing world. USADA chief Travis Tygart told Reuters recently that his organization — which oversees America’s Olympic-level testing — has no involvement in the UFC’s drug policies and called the current system employed by promoters and government athletic commissions “woefully inadequate.”

His quotes, scathing as they are, are after the jump …

(“Why is this cup empty?”)

CagePotato.com has learned that the Ontario Athletic Commission did not oversee pre and post-fight drug testing for last night’s UFC 129 event in Toronto, contrary to its current set of MMA rules which state that the commission will “[test] competitors for performance enhancing and illegal drugs, where it is required in the contract between the promoter and the competitors.”

According to former Nevada State Athletic Commission executive director and current UFC Vice President of Government and Regulatory Affairs, Marc Ratner, testing for performance enhancing substances and for drugs of abuse were administered by an unnamed independent laboratory hired by the UFC.

(Lucky for Foster, the OAC is dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s.)

With as much rhetoric opponents of mixed martial arts spew about how unsafe and barbaric the sport is, you would think that the number of fighters dying from MMA-related injuries would vastly outweigh the number of fighters who have been saved from potentially tragic circumstances by the sport.

Well, you can chalk another one up for the good guys.

According to MMAJunkie, an Ontario Athletic Commission-mandated MRI has revealed a dangerous brain abnormality in UFC welterweight Brian Foster that has forced him out of his upcoming UFC 129 bout with Sean Pierson, but more importantly may have saved his life.

(Now that MMA is legal in Ontario, the bandwagon will undoubtedly carry in a glut of Dana White wannabes. Let’s hope the OAC knows how to weed out the legit promoters from the scumbags.)

It looks like the UFC might get beaten to the proverbial punch when it comes to holding the inaugural sanctioned MMA event in Ontario.

CagePotato.com has learned from a source close to the situation that several promotions, including San Jose-based Strikeforce and Edmonton’s Maximum Fighting Championship have applied for promoter’s licenses in Ontario and pending approval by the Ontario Athletic Commission, at least three shows have been penciled in ahead of the UFC’s April 29 show in Toronto.

Although none of the shows have been given the go-ahead by the province as of time of writing, a number of venues have been tentatively reserved — some by first-time promoters — across the province in such locales as Toronto, Ottawa, Hamilton and Orillia. 

(When will Ontario see its first event?)

It wasn’t the fact that the province’s Liberal majority government finally decided that MMA was on par safety-wise and skill-wise with other sports that are legally contested in Ontario, making it a no-brainer to legalize that threw so many people off; it was the fact that the announcement came without much warning or fanfare.

The then-Minister of Consumer Services (she was shuffled to a different cabinet position four days after the announcement) Sophia Aggelonitis tweeted the news early on the morning of Saturday, August 14. Within an hour of sending out her brief message, that simply stated “Ontario will move to allow mixed martial arts,” Aggelonitis’ office posted a press release regarding the decision pointing to “competitor safety and boosting local economies” as its main reasons behind its landmark decision.