diff --git a/run_tests.sh b/run_tests.sh
index ae6e365bbf5..726ff438a07 100755
--- a/run_tests.sh
+++ b/run_tests.sh
@@ -109,12 +109,6 @@ if [ $no_site_packages -eq 1 ]; then
   installvenvopts="--no-site-packages"
 fi
 
-function init_testr {
-  if [ ! -d .testrepository ]; then
-    ${wrapper} testr init
-  fi
-}
-
 function run_tests {
   # Cleanup *pyc
   ${wrapper} find . -type f -name "*.pyc" -delete
@@ -235,7 +229,6 @@ if [ $recreate_db -eq 1 ]; then
     rm -f tests.sqlite
 fi
 
-init_testr
 run_tests
 
 # NOTE(sirp): we only want to run pep8 when we're running the full-test suite,