Ryan Garcia‘s positive tests for banned substance Ostarine for his fight against Devin Haney have now been confirmed by the B-samples and one time former-foe, Gervonta Davis, has reacted to the news.
Garcia produced one of the biggest upsets of the year when he knocked Haney down three times on his way to a majority decision victory.
The jubilation of that win was short lived when VADA announced that the 25-year-old had failed two drugs tests, one the day before and one the day after his fight against ‘The Dream’.
Garcia has continuously pleaded innocence and insisted the B-samples be tested. Those results have now confirmed the initial findings.
One man who has somewhat unexpectedly backed his former opponent before the B-sample results was Davis. ‘Tank’, when speaking to ES News, had previously sent supportive messages to Garcia:
“Stay up kid. Continue to be you. We’ll see each other in the future. I don’t believe he’s a cheater.”
Many expected Davis’ attitude to change after the confirmation that a performance enhancing drug was in Garcia’s system, but instead he took to twitter to double down on his support.
“He didn’t cheat..”
Davis’ backing didn’t go unnoticed by the man he stopped just over a year ago.
“Shoutout Gervonta Davis. Bro really my brother.”
Garcia’s legal team has since issued a statement claiming hair and nail samples were taken after the positive result and that these findings show he gained no advantage and that the likely cause was a contaminated supplement.
“Soon after being notified of his positive test, Ryan voluntarily had his hair collected and shipped to Dr. Pascal Kintz, the foremost expert in toxicology and hair-sample analysis. The results of Ryan’s hair sample came back negative. This is consistent with contamination and demonstrably proves that Ryan had not ingested Ostarine over a period of time the only way he would have had any advantage whatsoever in the ring.”
Garcia will now have a hearing with the New York State Athletic Commission to determine what happens next.
