UFC exec touts U.S. Anti-Doping Agency at Jockey Club conference
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – The official in charge of the drug-testing program for the Ultimate Fighting Championship praised the involvement of the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency in the mixed martial-arts league at The Jockey Club’s Round Table Conference on Matters Pertaining to Racing on Sunday in Saratoga Springs, providing fresh support for the club’s effort to involve the USADA in racing.
Jeff Novitzky, the UFC’s vice president of athlete health and performance, said that the UFC’s hiring of USADA, a private, non-profit company, to run its drug-testing program had brought credibility to the sport by devising protocols and drug-testing procedures independent of the sport’s governing structure.
The UFC, whose athletes have long been dogged by suspicions about doping, hired USADA in 2015; its drug-testing program was fully implemented this year, ensnaring several of the league’s most popular fighters.
“They are credible, they are just, and, to our experience, they take a fair, measured approach to a new program,” Novitzky said.
Novitzy appeared on the 2 1/2-hour Round Table program just prior to the keynote speaker and roughly one hour after presentations by two U.S. congressmen who have introduced a federal bill appointing USADA as racing’s drug-testing overseer. Novitzky was also the third speaker with USADA ties to be featured at a Round Table in the past four years, a weighty indication of the priority The Jockey Club has placed on its effort to bring USADA into the sport’s regulatory fold.
While Novitzky acknowledged that racing and the UFC have many differences in how the sports are both conducted and regulated, he said that USADA has focused on educating athletes and providing a deterrent for doping by demonstrating a commitment to cutting-edge testing, backed-up by the UFC’s penalty guidelines. Citing the UFC’s recent sale in a deal valued at $4 billion, Novitzky contended that despite the recent high-profile positive tests, the new drug-testing program would make the UFC more valuable.
“I think our experience has shown that a measured approach under the guidance of an organization like USADA, with a heavy, heavy early emphasis on education and a deterrent on the front end will not be apocalyptic to a sport,” Novitzky said. “In fact, it has great potential to add value to the sport, just like it added value to the UFC.”
The bill, supported by The Jockey Club and other racing organizations, has not yet been scheduled for a hearing, and the legislation is not expected to face a vote this year, in part because of election-year politics and in part because of strident opposition from other constituencies in the sport.
Many horsemen opposed to the deal have questioned whether the bill is a veiled attempt to ban the raceday use of the anti-bleeding medication furosemide, while officials representing state racing commissions have taken umbrage at characterizations by supporters of the bill that USADA would do a better job policing the sport than the commissions.
Opponents of the bill acknowledge that the sport’s racing commissions need to adopt uniform regulations governing drug-testing and penalties, and they have urged the racing industry to unite behind an ongoing state-by-state approach to align rules in all U.S. racing jurisdictions.
Rep. Andy Barr, a Republican from Kentucky who is one of the two congressmen to introduce the bill, called on the racing industry to instead hold collective discussions on how to improve the legislation, telling the Round Table audience that the racing industry “must continue an open and inclusive discussion on how to improve the legislation.
“Only with a consensus approach and an earnest willingness to compromise will we enact the legislation we need,” Barr said.
Rep. Paul Tonko, a Democrat from New York, told the Round Table that Sen. Kirstin Gillebrand had recently sent him a letter stating that she intended to introduce a companion bill in the Senate next year, an acknowledgement that the bill is unlikely to gain traction either before this year’s November elections or in the lame-duck session that will follow. Tonko had earlier said the bill was “a great opportunity to make a difference.”
The legislation is supported by The Jockey Club, Breeders’ Cup, the Water Hay Oats Alliance, the Humane Society of the U.S., Keeneland, and other organizations. Many of the boards of the supporting organizations share members.
Stuart Janney, the chairman of The Jockey Club, said in his concluding remarks that the involvement of USADA in racing would demonstrate that the sport is committed to addressing its public-perception problems, especially in comparison to other sports, even if the drug-testing programs of many major-league sports are widely considered by drug-testing insiders to have major deficiencies.
“If we are going to compete with them for the entertainment dollar,” Janney said, “then we need to measure up” to them.
-- Also at the Round Table, the Jockey Club announced that its Thoroughbred Safety Committee had endorsed two new proposals. The first would be the adoption of rules prohibiting jockeys from raising whips over their shoulders when striking a horse, and to restrict jockeys from striking a horse more than three times “until the horse has had an opportunity to respond.” Both rules are in place in Canada.
The second endorsement called for racing commissions to “better manage and mutually enforce” the rest periods that are mandatory for horses placed on the vet’s list, citing instances in the past several years in which a horse placed on the vet’s list in one state was allowed to start within the mandated rest period in another state. Jim Gagliano, the president and chief operating officer of The Jockey Club, said that the company’s technology subsidiary would improve its racing-office software to facilitate the implementation of the recommendation.