Johny Hendricks: If Georges St-Pierre needs drugs to beat me, I got beat by the drugs

LAS VEGAS – UFC welterweight contender Johny Hendricks added fresh fuel to a fiery controversy over drug testing in advance of his title fight against Georges St-Pierre at UFC 167.

During a pre-event press conference, Hendricks all but accused the welterweight champ of using performance-enhancing drugs in the past six years of his career.

“Have you seen him in the last two months? He shrank a little bit, hasn’t he?” Hendricks said of St-Pierre. “Realistically, I don’t know. I saw him on the press tour. The only thing I know is whenever I step into the octagon, do I still have a six-pack? Check out my pictures. I’m fat. But I love it. I’m a fat dude.

“I’m pretty shredded at 170. I look good right now at 184. I look pretty strong, pretty jacked. But whenever I step into that octagon, I was looking at a picture with (Carlos) Condit, I was like, ‘Dude, you’re fat.’ You can’t see the bottom two abs.

“You don’t gain 15, 20 pounds and still keep that form. Everybody bloats a little bit. You don’t put a little water in your system without bloating. You don’t put 20 pounds of water in your system without bloating.”

Hendricks also took offense to suggestions that he was doping because he declined to participate in an enhanced testing program completed by St-Pierre.

In a recent interview with MMAjunkie, the champion pointed out that he enrolled in a program conducted by the Voluntary Anti-Doping Agency, and Hendricks didn’t.

“It worked for me because I said I’m a man of my word,” St-Pierre said. “I said I was going to do it, and I did it. I’ve been tested, so far, three times randomly. They can come any time right now. But Hendricks didn’t do it.”

Hendricks fired back, “I’ve been clean my whole entire life. And all of a sudden, some dude doesn’t know me, (and) he’s been accused the last six years of being on something. He picks me and says I must be on something because I don’t want to follow the pony train to VADA. Get out of here.”

Hendricks pointed to his clean record in collegiate wrestling and said he had never been accused of using steroids or human growth hormone.

He also repeated earlier arguments against participating with VADA and said the Nevada State Athletic Commission had advised him against it.

“[St-Pierre's] face is all over the front page,” he said. “If me and you are going for a job interview, and this job is going to pay millions of dollars, and I say, ‘I’ve got somebody that’s going to drug test us,’ are you going to go to it?’ If you go to it, you’re a moron.

“The state athletic commission of Nevada said don’t do VADA. They said don’t do VADA. Are you going to trust your opponent, or are you going to trust the Nevada state commission, (who) doesn’t care?”

Two months ago, the camps of St-Pierre and Hendricks agreed to undergo enhanced testing through a World Anti-Doping Agency-accredited lab, but later scrapped the idea when St-Pierre’s camp suggested instead using VADA.

Although both programs aim to provide the same service, which often is called “Olympic-style” testing, Hendricks said they’re different.

“I’m not going to lay my life into his hands,” Hendricks said. “I said WADA. WADA is so much tougher to pass, and they don’t do just random drug tests where he randomly gives drug tests the first time cameras are around. No. WADA, you have to have your schedule for three to four months, and they know exactly where you’re at, and if you don’t show up within an hour of when they call you, you fail. Then, you’ve got to give them a three-day notice before any changes. So that’s so much harder to pass, and they test for stuff that VADA doesn’t.”

Echoing his manager, who cut off talks when the St-Pierre camp claimed to be endorsed by VADA, Hendricks said he doesn’t care what St-Pierre does or doesn’t use, only that he shows up on fight night.

“If he needs that to beat me, I got beat by the drug,” he said. “I don’t need drugs to win. I’ve proven that. If I can’t be champ without them, I’ll never revert to drugs to be champ.”

For more on UFC 167, stay tuned to the UFC Rumors section of the site.