GSP has been quasi-retired for a matter of weeks now without much in the way of explanation, but it did seem like an amicable ordeal between the UFC and himself. Now that we have a few weeks behind us things are looking a little bit different as GSP has spoken out about some of the reasons as to why he felt like he needed to step away from the UFC, one of which was their lack of support on drug testing and cleaning up the sport.
While the lead-up to the fight between GSP and Johny Hendricks featured the usual hype, there was a lot of talk about drug testing and how GSP wanted to use a bit more stringent testing, which made Hendricks clash with St-Pierre, citing the organization he selected as biased towards him. All that Dana White really had to say about it was that they both looked “stupid” for arguing about it and he seemed comfortable with the drug testing that was in place. This apparently made GSP feel uncomfortable. [source]
“I tried to do something to change the sport,” he said. “Unfortunately, there were other people, for different reasons, maybe for money, in fear of losing money, because if you canceled the fight because someone tested positive there are millions of dollars [lost]. Also, the sport’s image … If you start testing everyone, how many will get caught? I don’t want to say in public because I don’t want to accuse anyone, but the sport’s image will be hurt.
“Don’t forget, I have internal information. I’m an athlete. I know what goes on, so that disappointed me greatly.”