Álvarez trainer advertised sale of growth hormone

A trainer who is working with Canelo Álvarez advertised performance-enhancing drugs for sale, including human growth hormone, before he joined the super-middleweight boxer's team, the Guardian can reveal.

- Edmund Willison

Rulas Arreola, also known as Raul Arreola Dosal, has travelled to Las Vegas with Canelo to prepare for a "super fight" with the undefeated American Terence Crawford tomorrow. It is a contest marketed as a "once-in-a-lifetime event that marks the beginning of a bold new era in boxing".

Arreola says he has never recommended, provided or sold any banned substance to any athlete or anybody who was subject to any antidoping rules.

But the persistent involvement of performance-enhancing drugs in boxing is threatening to cast a shadow over the fight that is to be streamed live by Netflix.

Travis Tygart, the chief executive of the US Anti-Doping Agency (Usada), said the advertising of the substances by Arreola via social media are "significant flags that ought to be looked into".

Arreola is a physical trainer who has worked with Álvarez in two stints, first from August 2017 to December 2018, and for a second time since the spring of 2023. He carried one of Álvarez's title belts to the ring in his most recent world championship fight, against William Scull in May.

A former bodybuilder, Arreola runs the Radical Nutrition gym in Guadalajara, Mexico, and offers clients personalised training plans.

In 2016 and up to February 2017, before he began working with Álvarez, he advertised performance-enhancing drugs, prohibited for use by athletes, on his personal and business Facebook accounts. He marketed some of the drugs for improving "athletic performance".

Arreola refers to his business page, Radical Nutrition, as "my official page" and is pictured in the profile photo. The phone number he provided in several of the posts is still listed on his Facebook page.

All of the posts were live on his accounts until this month. They disappeared after Arreola was contacted for comment.