Tye Ruotolo doesn’t mince words. At just 22 years old, the One Championship grappling titleholder already has the kind of clarity on PEDs that veterans often dance around. Speaking on the *Mighty* podcast, he dismissed the idea that these substances could ever be eliminated from Brazilian jiu-jitsu.
“Not in the next century. Not anytime soon,”
Ruotolo said flatly when asked if grappling would ever see the end of PEDs.
His bluntness cut through the usual politicking around testing, delivering a rare, unfiltered assessment of the sport’s biggest open secret.
Ruotolo likened the cultural role of these PEDs in jiu-jitsu to beverages in the United States: normalized, socially acceptable and rarely questioned. In Brazil, where jiu-jitsu was born and still draws much of its talent, these PEDs are inexpensive, accessible and shrugged off as part of the landscape.
“It’s very socially acceptable, you know, in Brazil, it’s kind of like alc0hol is in the States, you know, like nobody really cares,”
Ruotolo explained.
This normalization has created a paradox in the sport: athletes know PED use is rampant, organizations don’t test for it, yet the conversation around it remains taboo—unless someone like Ruotolo forces it into the open.
Ruotolo‘s words aren’t abstract speculation. He’s competed against athletes later caught using PEDs including Mica Galvão at the 2022 IBJJF World Championships. Galvão defeated Ruotolo in the finals, only to fail a test afterward. Ruotolo was awarded the title retroactively but made it clear the medal felt hollow.
“It didn’t feel like a real… it wasn’t a gold medal,”
he admitted.
What stung most wasn’t just the result but the experience of competing against someone with what he described as
“unnatural strength.”
As teenagers, Ruotolo recalled feeling something was off:
“I just never felt strength like that before in my whole life.”
While frustrated, Ruotolo didn’t stop at condemnation. He pointed out the harsh economics many athletes face. In Brazil and elsewhere, food and supplements are luxuries.
“Protein costs $60, but the ster*id that works ten times better is half the price,”
he said.
It’s an uncomfortable truth: for athletes from poor backgrounds, PEDs can feel like the only path to leveling the playing field. Ruotolo contrasted this with his own privileged upbringing, openly acknowledging,
“I always had the support that I needed and I had a beautiful upbringing. I’m blessed with my parents.”
The elephant in the room is testing—or more accurately, the lack of it. Officially, One Championship partners with DFSI, the firm the UFC switched to after leaving USADA. In practice, testing in grappling is almost nonexistent. UFC BJJ has floated the idea of testing champions sometime next year, but few insiders believe it will actually happen.
The UFC’s own BJJ executive, Claudia Gadelha, has even gone on record saying Gordon Ryan wouldn’t be signed because he’s both openly on PEDs and openly defiant about it. Other promotions haven’t even entertained the conversation. The incentive simply isn’t there—fans aren’t demanding clean competition, and promoters benefit from bigger, stronger, faster athletes putting on shows.
Ruotolo makes his MMA debut September 5th against Adrian Lee.
