Strikeforce: Rousey vs Kaufman Drug Tests came back ‘Invalid’ says Ratner

Drug testing for the August 18 Strikeforce: Rousey vs. Kaufman event in San Diego has been classified as “invalid,” the California state athletic commission (CSAC) told media members on Monday afternoon.

The commission would not comment any further, with a spokesperson saying, “we have no additional information” when asked for further details. An “invalid” test is one in which a laboratory is prevented from obtaining a valid result due to any number of circumstances surrounding it.

UFC vice president of regulatory affairs Marc Ratner on Monday told MMA Fighting that the issue was caused by a problem with either the chain of custody or the way the test was collected by CSAC’s inspectors.

Ratner said he learned of the result just prior to the information being released to the media.

“It was something wrong with the collection method,” he said. “Our fighters in good conscience gave their specimens. That’s all I know.”

Asked if he’d ever experienced such an issue in the past, Ratner said no.

“In all my years in the Nevada commission, we had some test that was out of range with the temperature or something, but that was one out of thousands, so it’s very, very rare,” he said.

UPDATE: CSAC now claim that drug tests are valid

Following the initial release, California State Athletic Commission Interim Executive Director Kathi Burns sent out a second notification clarifying the situation, and stated that the tests were good and results will be valid.

“The results of the drug testing for the August 18, 2012 Strikeforce event will be provided later this week or early next week. I spoke with the lab just a few moments ago and found that a delay in processing the results has occurred due to a simple, but correctable clerical error,” Burns wrote in an email.

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