Sheila Gaff pulls out of Cage Warriors title match

Andre Balschmieter, Sheila Gaff

On Friday, Sheila Gaff dropped out of next week's Cage Warriors match against Rosi Sexton due to illness. It didn't take long for accusations to start flying. You may have heard that both fighters agreed to VADA drug testing which ain't cheap. On Friday, Rosi said "Here's my bottom line. Female MMA has a drug problem. I'm not interested in taking steroids. Until something changes, I'm out." The obvious question is why would a fighter agree to VADA testing if the fighter is juicing? No fighter would do that. The other thing is that in women's MMA history, there have been a total of three positive drug tests, two for steroids. But I've noticed that any time a female fighter shows any kind of muscle definition, the steroid whispers begin. In the case of Sheila Gaff, she fought at a heavier weight when I first saw her a couple of years ago. So she has actually dropped a lot of weight and seems to be in better shape than when I first saw her. She still has the same punching power. To be fair, there is no drug testing for MMA anywhere but North America. When the UFC does testing in foreign countries, they do it themselves. I would like to see drug testing standards raised everywhere. But to make assumptions with no evidence is irresponsible. I didn't write about this on Friday because I wanted to see if Sheila Gaff would respond. Today in an interview with Mark Bergmann and Jan Grossoehmigen of Ground and Pound in The Netherlands, Sheila's trainer Andre Balschmieter responded. He said that Sheila got the flu last month and she couldn't seem to shake it. She underwent tests and the doctors don't know why the flu wouldn't go away but it wouldn't. So he decided it wasn't in her best interest for her to fight. Balschmieter didn't think much of Rosi's accusations. "Sheila is against the use of PEDs. She may look strong but it's because of genetics. Sheila doesn't want to take anything that isn't natural and I have to plead with her to take her protein shakes. We are very angry about these classless accusations. Sheila wanted to fight and we wouldn't let her." He also said this fight was supposed to happen a few months ago and Rosi got hurt. It was actually July 2011. He said nothing. He thinks Rosi should have said nothing too. Will Rosi Sexton retire? You may recall that I reported that she would retire after this fight regardless. I don't know now. Nothing would surprise me.