Georges St-Pierre gives UFC official retirement notice, leaves USADA drug-testing pool

Georges St-Pierre has now made his retirement completely official.

The former UFC welterweight and middleweight champion has provided the promotion written notice that he is retired, MMA Fighting confirmed Tuesday with UFC vice president of athlete health and performance Jeff Novitzky. ESPN was the first to report the news.

That formal retirement is significant with regards to the UFC’s anti-doping policy. With his retirement, St-Pierre will remove himself from the USADA drug-testing pool. That means that if he were to return, GSP would have to spend at least six months back in the pool before competing again, per policy.

“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.”

St-Pierre, 37, announced his retirement in a press conference Feb. 21 in Montreal. He took a sabbatical from the UFC previously from 2013 to 2017, vacating his welterweight title. Before returning in November 2017, GSP entered into the USADA drug-testing pool in August 2016.

In that comeback fight, St-Pierre defeated Michael Bisping to win the UFC middleweight title at UFC 217. He vacated the title about a month later after being diagnosed with ulcerative colitis and has not fought since.

St-Pierre (26-2) is recognized as one of the top stars and best fighters in UFC history. The Canadian idol won his last 13 career fights. He stated during the press conference that it was his desire to go out on top.

Before deciding to hang up the gloves, GSP was eyeing a potential fight later this year with UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov. Nurmagomedov was interested in the bout as well, but the UFC wanted to go in a different direction.

At the press conference, St-Pierre did leave the door open for a potential return to the cage in the future.

“I don’t know where I will be, mentally, the state of mind, in my life, in a few months,” St-Pierre said. “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.”