By Luis Sandoval
It appears the fight between Lamont Peterson and Lucas Matthysse will not have random style drug testing leading into this Saturday night at the Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City. Random style drug testing has become a normal procedure for most fights and Peterson was under the impression that random style drug testing would be taking place for this bout. Up until last Tuesday when Peterson was on BoxingScene Radio, he revealed no testing had been conducted.
“I thought [there] was going to be random drug testing because we had to fill out papers. The same procedure that VADA does before random drug testing. We did all of those things like sending the stuff in that you’ve took over the last year, physicals and things like that but maybe I misunderstood because nothing happened after that. Maybe they’re just going to do the drug testing for the fight and not random drug testing. They’ll do the blood and the urine test before and after the fight. I think that’s what probably is going to happen. I think it was USADA who’s going to handle that” informed Peterson.
BoxingScene reached out and spoke to USADA who informed they were never contracted or contacted by the event organizers or the fighters to have drug testing administered for this fight.
In a recent article ran on BoxingScene, Paulie Malignaggi seemed to be faced with a similar situation as he requested VADA testing but instead was told USADA would be handling. With six weeks left to go until his June 22nd fight with Adrien Broner, Malignaggi said no tests had been administered by USADA.
It should be noted that Peterson, who was under scrutiny last year for testing positive for synthetic testosterone while under doctors orders, was on board to have testing done for this fight. When Peterson fought Kendall Holt this past February, he participated in random style drug testing and tested negative for any banned substances.
Editor's Note: Peterson's trainer, Barry Hunter, advised BoxingScene.com that his fighter is randomly tested as a precautionary measure to avoid any potential issues or misinformation from being reported. Even when a fight is not scheduled on the calendar, Peterson's team has him randomly tested.
To listen to Lamont Peterson’s interview in its entirety you can listen to the BoxingScene Radio podcast: http://tobtr.com/s/4666825
You can follow Luis Sandoval on Twitter @Truewest007. You can also tune in to BoxingScene Radio, Boxingscene’s official audio show every Tuesday from 6-8PM PST with hosts Ernest Gabion, Luis Sandoval, and Ryan Burton.
