Chael Sonnen explains downside of TRT ban, says his 'life is better' due to usage

Other fighters had quietly been issued therapeutic use exemptions (TUEs) for testosterone replacement therapy (TRT) long before Chael Sonnen made them household acronyms in the UFC.

Sonnen's TRT case is the most widely known, and in some ways, misunderstood, of all those exemptions given.

Last week, the Nevada Athletic Commission voted 4-0 to end all exemptions for TRT. A day later, the commission in Brazil followed suit.

The reasoning for the ban was sound: Less than one percent of all men need testosterone replacement without having previously abused steroids. Essentially, approval of TUEs for TRT amounted to state-sponsored cheating. So Nevada did the right thing and pulled the plug on them.

That won't stop illicit use of testosterone, or other anabolic steroids and performance-enhancing drugs, of course, but it's unseemly when a regulatory body OKs the use of a steroid because a person has used steroids in the past.

One of the primary causes of low testosterone in men under 40 is prior steroid abuse. Steroid usage suppresses the body's ability to produce testosterone and, as a result, the numbers are low and testosterone replacement is needed to boost the levels into the normal range.

There are numerous fighters who swore under oath before a state commission that they needed TRT in order to live healthy lives and that they had a medical condition which demanded it.

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Sonnen famously told the Los Angeles Times, "I don't have an option. I either take this medicine or die."

In 2008, Sonnen was diagnosed with hypogonadism by his physician, Mark Czarnecki. At a licensing hearing in 2012, Dr. Timothy Trainor of the Nevada Athletic Commission testified that he believed Sonnen had hypogonadism and needed TRT.

The commission licensed him shortly thereafter.

Yahoo Sports spoke with Sonnen recently after Nevada's decision to end all TUEs for it. Sonnen conceded he'll be in a quandary if he is forced to compete without his medication.

"It puts me in a spot, because medically, I do need testosterone," Sonnen said. "I have to look at this carefully, but they made no bones about it: It's out. We all have to deal with that, whether we like it or not."

Sonnen did not directly address how he would handle his upcoming fight against Wanderlei Silva in Brazil.

Sonnen's TRT usage first came to light in California in 2010 after UFC 117, when he came within minutes of defeating Anderson Silva for the middleweight title. After the fight, the California commission announced that Sonnen's testosterone-to-epitestosterone ratio was 16.9:1, more than four times its legal limit of 4:1.

Sonnen's suspension in California ultimately wasn't because of his elevated T:E ratio, but rather for a failure to properly disclose his usage of testosterone replacement therapy.

In some states, an elevated T:E ratio alone is enough to be considered a violation. In Nevada, among other jurisdictions, an elevated T:E ratio would be a flag that would cause the commission to run a carbon isotope ratio (CIR) test that could conclusively determine whether the person tested had synthetic testosterone in their system.



[Also: Chael Sonnen on TRT ban: 'Quit complaining; testosterone is out']





The use of synthetic testosterone without a TUE is a violation in all states.

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