According to Julianna Pena, there was some shady business going on at American Top Team (ATT) back in the day.
Pena is set to challenge Amanda Nunes for the women’s bantamweight title at UFC 270 which takes place January 22 at the Honda Center in Anaheim, California.
They were originally supposed to collide at UFC 265 back in August only for a case of COVID-19 to rule Nunes out. Why was the fight pushed back so much?
Pena — who felt Nunes should have been stripped multiple times — tried to find out from ATT owner Dan Lambert only to not get a straight answer. Nunes notably trains at ATT.
“He gave the shrug and starts looking around, but the reality is this guy is in Dana White’s back pocket, and they’re close friends, and so they’re going to make happen whatever’s best for them,” Pena said on The MMA Hour. “They’re very smart and methodical about how they do these things. I think that that’s what it was – whatever works best for them.
“And Dana’s told me, when you’ve done as much for the division as Amanda has, you get away with a lot more and you have leeway in the company, and she has been showing that hand over fist.”
Pena: Coach Told Me Girls Were Shooting Butts With Steroids
Pena would go further and detail an experience she had when she trained at ATT for a week back in 2013 after she won The Ultimate Fighter.
In her very first welcome, a coach who would be unnamed let her in on the fact that the female fighters in the gym were shooting their butts with steroids.
She did add, however, that this was pre-USADA and that she didn’t remember seeing Nunes training at the gym during her brief stint.
“They were welcoming me into the gym, and he was like, ‘The girls shoot themselves in the ass in the bathroom – they do it to each other,’ and I’m like, ‘No, they don’t,’” Pena said. “And he was like, ‘I swear to god, they’re all on steroids.’ I literally didn’t believe him, and he was literally like shaking me in the head, [saying], ‘I promise, they’re doing it.’
“That was my experience training at American Top Team. But that was pre-[U.S. Anti-Doping Agency].”
Whether this is to imply that ATT and Lambert are still shady or that Nunes is using steroids is unknown. However, it’s certainly not something you’d want to hear about your gym.
Lambert doesn’t seem to be taking Pena’s claims too seriously as he responded with a “LOL” when asked to comment by MMA Fighting.
