Kayla Harrison’s head coach responds to Julianna Peña’s steroid accusations ahead of UFC 316
Kayla Harrison is as physically impressive as any fighter in the UFC, which might irk rival Julianna Peña, but that doesn’t mean the two-time Olympic gold medalist got there by cheating.
That’s according to Harrison’s longtime head coach Mike Brown from American Top Team, who responded to Peña accusing Harrison, MMA Fighting’s No. 1 bantamweight, attaining her ranking in part thanks to abusing steroids. While it’s not the first time Harrison has heard that line, Peña claimed her UFC 316 title challenger was “on steroids and hopefully she cycles off of them before June 7” when they meet in the co-main event.
Despite Harrison having never failed a single drug test, Peña still lobbed the accusations and Brown was quick to shut her down.
“I mean I get it, she doesn’t look normal but that’s how the world is,” Brown told MMA Fighting. “There are people who are not normal. They do not look normal. There are freaks out there, and those freaks, they rise to the top of sports.
“There are people that have abnormal builds in every direction. There are people that are super strong, super fast, super quick, super endurance and just because you’re not like that, doesn’t mean somebody else cannot be.”
While Peña had no proof to back up her allegations, she said Harrison “looked like a girl” and she was “very feminine” during her march to two Olympic gold medals but since coming to MMA she looks “super juicy and cut up.”
Peña failed to mention Harrison captured championships at the Olympics while competing at 78 kilograms - nearly 172 pounds - and those athletes have to endure same-day weigh-ins unlike MMA fighters. Since transitioning to fighting full-time, Harrison first competed at 155 pounds before shedding even more weight to move to the UFC where she now fights at 135 pounds.
In other words, Harrison is walking around and fighting at a much lower weight than she did in the Olympics, which would explain the change in her physique and appearance. If Peña wants to go by the eye test, Brown concedes that’s also an easy indicator to figure out when an athlete is taking performance-enhancing drugs, but he doesn’t feel Harrison qualifies by those standards.
“The biggest indicator for me as somebody who’s clean is somebody who is stable,” Brown explained. “Their body looks the same over prolonged periods of time. [Kayla] is always the same. She doesn’t change. Of course, when you’re cutting weight it’s going to change but like somebody who’s taking illegal substances, you can see. Their body changes in a week. You’ll see ups and downs in people taking testosterone or something like this.
“No, she is 100 percent a clean athlete. Always has been, always will be. Doesn’t need it. She’s a freak among freaks. Not a normal athlete by any means. A special athlete.”
Because Harrison is such a rare breed, Brown knows it’s going to be hard for some to fathom that the 34-year-old Ohio native achieved her chiseled-from-stone physique by all-natural means. Brown promises he sees the hard work Harrison puts in every single day and that she doesn’t take any shortcuts along the way.
Peña may not want to believe it, but Brown knows she’s just not built like Harrison and that’s a tough pill to swallow.
“They’re out there,” Brown said about specimens like Harrison. “People just think because they look at themselves and how they’re built and how they were brought up. That’s not the top of the food chain. There are people out there that are not normal.
“Just like in basketball, there are athletes that are [7-foot-6, 7-foot-7], there are athletes that are unbelievably muscular or athletes that have unbelievable conditioning that seems unworldly. Just because you can’t do it, doesn’t mean somebody else can’t.”