Former UFC welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre has made his retirement statement official with the UFC. After nearly two decades in the sport and an impressive 13-fight win streak, St-Pierre announced his retirement on February 21st, during a specially held media conference by the UFC in Montreal. ESPN was first to report this news, followed by an official confirmation by MMA Fighting with the UFC’s vice president of athlete health and performance, Jeff Novitzky.
As part of the formalities that came with his official statement, GSP would be required to pull himself out of the USADA’s drug testing pool. According to reports by MMA Junkie, if ‘Rush’ were to return to the sport a second time, a full six-month period must be spent by him, once again, in the USADA’s drug testing pool.
“He is out (of the pool),” Novitzky said. “He gave me written notice he’s retired and out of the USADA registered testing pool (RTP). If he were to ever return, he’d have to be back in for six months before competing.”
Georges St-Pierre previously competed in the Octagon against the then-reigning champion, Michael Bisping, in a big pay-per-view championship matchup at UFC 217 in November of 2017. After an elongated four-year hiatus from mixed martial arts, St-Pierre made his return with a win against Bisping for the UFC middleweight title of the world. But soon after his win in November, St-Pierre would once again enter a temporary lay-off due to a severe case of ulcerative colitis.
After vacating the title just a month after being pronounced champion, St-Pierre’s comeback to the sport was once again deemed questionable at best in the minds of fans and critics. A potential mega-fight against Khabib Nurmagomedov seemed to be in the making at an all-new 165-pound division, but Dana White and the UFC were quick to deny these reports. Finally, following a dominant reign as UFC champion, in his final statement as Georges “Rush” St-Pierre, the legend recited:
“I don’t know where I will be, mentally, the state of mind, in my life, in a few months. I don’t know. For me, it’s retirement now. I don’t want those other guys to call me out, because I’m out. If something happens and Dana calls me back with something interesting, we’ll see. Like a movie scenario, ‘Oh! He’s coming back!’ We’ll see, but right now I’m not thinking about it.”
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