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Julianna Peña believes her upcoming title opponent Kayla Harrison used steroids at some point during her athletic career.
In the first of two title fights at UFC 316, Peña (11-5 MMA, 8-3 UFC) will be putting her women's bantamweight title on the line for the first time since reclaiming it in a split decision win over Raquel Pennington in October. Standing across the octagon will be Harrison (18-1 MMA, 2-0 UFC), who earned a title shot after just two appearances in the promotion.
Harrison is one of the most decorated athletes in the UFC today. She's a two-time Olympic gold medalist judoka, a two-time PFL champion, and is on the verge of potentially adding more gold to her trophy case. Peña, however, isn't shying away from the narrative that Harrison may have used PEDs at some point in her career based on her muscular appearance.
The UFC anti-doping policy aims to be "the best anti-doping program in all of professional sport," but that hasn't stopped Peña from raising questions about the validity of the testing. On "The Ariel Helwani Show," Peña was asked if she believes Harrison will be a clean competitor at UFC 316.
"I wouldn't know how to navigate that, because at this point, this drug testing is like the wild wild west," Peña said. "It's like pee in a plastic cup that has absolutely no security on it, and do what you gotta do. Even in the Olympics with the Russians being able to tamper with those USADA unbreakable type of bottles, and being able to switch the pees in them. Eventually, everything you do in the dark comes to the light."
According to the UFC's anti-doping online test history, Harrison has been tested twice thus far in 2025, following 13 tests in 2024 without issue. Despite the results, Peña remains skeptical based on what she perceives as a difference in Harrison's appearance since she was an Olympic gold medalist at the 2012 and 2016 Games.
"I cannot confirm 110 percent whether she is or is not on PEDs, but I will say that back then in the Olympics, she looked like a girl, very feminine, and now she looks super juicy and cut up," Peña said. "Like, somebody give that girl a Band-Aid because she's cut. It doesn't just happen overnight just because you touched the weights a little bit.
"So, I want to say what everybody's thinking on their minds, which is that, of course, she at some point was on steroids and hopefully she cycles off of them before June 7, makes the weight, and pisses clean – because that's what I'm going to be doing and I want this fight to be as fair a fight as possible, minus her being a weight bully and cutting the 50 pounds in order to make the weight class."
