By Keith Idec

LAS VEGAS – The WBC announced Wednesday that bantamweight champion Luis Nery submitted an adverse sample during a pre-fight test for performance-enhancing drugs before his technical knockout victory over Shinsuke Yamanaka last week.

The WBC’s statement explained that it has been notified by the Voluntary Anti-Doping Association that traces of Zilpaterol were found in Nery’s system. The substance is very similar to Clembuterol and is used to increase the size of cattle.

VADA does testing as part of the WBC Clean Boxing Program. WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman told BoxingScene.com on Wednesday that the Mexico City-based sanctioning organization will follow its Clean Boxing Program’s protocol and decide thereafter on Nery’s status.

“What we do is we treat every case separately,” Sulaiman said. “There’s a protocol that we follow. There’s an opening of the ‘B’ sample. And also, we have to analyze the specific substance – what it is, how it is, which amounts, how it happened. We do a thorough investigation and then go from there.”

The result of the Nery-Yamanaka match could be changed to a no-contest, but that still might not result in Nery being stripped of the WBC’s 118-pound championship.

“What I have gathered now is that it is a very similar substance to Clembuterol,” Sulaiman said. “It is something that cattle is fed in the meat. There have been many cases, especially in Mexico, of athletes coming up with Clembuterol in their system. And this specific substance is in cattle in the United States. So maybe [Nery] being close to the United States in Tijuana – I don’t know. I don’t want to reach any decision. We’ll let it play out. Let’s see what happened. We’ll have a meeting with him and get to the bottom of it.”

The 22-year-old Nary (24-0, 18 KOs) tore through the long-reigning, previously unbeaten Yamanaka (27-1-2, 19 KOs) in their scheduled 12-round title fight August 15 in Kyoto, Japan. Mexico’s Nary stopped Japan’s Yamanaka, 34, in the fourth round.

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.