https://www.foxnews.com/sports/ufc-r...fight-canceled
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I've never liked weight cutting.Quote:
Originally Posted by almostgone
In some instances, like jon jones for example, being able to make 205 enables what frame wise is a big heavyweight at 6ft 4in with an 85 inch reach, to compete against much smaller men averaging 5 10 ro 6ft 2 with 72 to 76in common reaches and heights.
This gives him a huge advantage. And is largely responsible for his success.
Every individual is different when it comes to being able to cut weight.
I've always felt like it gets taken too far. The lengths some people go through to get that advantage can be very unhealthy. And some people are just not capable of cutting alot of weight.
I especially don't like to see young high school athletes dieting and cutting weight. As a coach I used to preach against it very much.
In the UFC, if a fighter misses weight they give him a 2-hour mulligan for an intense sweat session with doctor's supervision. If they still don't make weight, the opponent has the option whether to cancel the fight or let it take place as scheduled, in return for which he gets (IIRC) 20% of his opponent's purse, regardless of the outcome of the fight. Max Holloway missed weight once and went to start his two-hour mega-sweat, but a UFC official arbitrarily DQ'd him an hour in because he didn't like the way Max looked.
Before the UFC got in bed with USADA and banned rehydration by IVs, Renan Barao used to walk around at a minimum of 165 and fought at 135. Some times as much as 175 but even at 165 he was cutting 18% of his body weight. But he moved up in weight because of the USADA ban (couldn't rehydrate as fast the 'natural' way) and after he passed out in a hot bath trying to make weight before his return match against TJ Dillishaw in 2015.
R3 famously sweated off 17 lbs in 20 hours just to humiliate a guy on her team during the filming of TUF 18, but that's only 11%. Not that 11% is trivial but it's getting close to being unavoidably dangerous.
Rumble Johnson walked around at 225 when he fought at 185. Spider Silva was about the same.
Obviously I don't begrudge dieting down in the run-up to an event, but sweating off anything more than the weight of a big spaghetti dinner in the hours right before the weigh-in is just plain legalized cheating. If it's a 185-lb fight, it should be two 185-lb fighters getting into the cage. As is, it's not uncommon in the UFC to see one fighter who clearly weighs 10-20 lbs more than his opponent, it's just that one of them tolerates the last-minute weight cutting better. That's "bait and switch." The promotion is deceiving the fans and does a disservice to their fighters. And the system rewards the fighters that can cheat the best.
When you dehydrate, one of the fluid levels in your body that drops is the cerebral fluid. If you're low on cerebral fluid and your head gets knocked around, there's nothing left to cushion your brain from slamming into the inside of your brain vault except air. You're more likely to get knocked the fuck out. And according to USADA, when you come off a dehydrating weight cut, it can take 72 hours for the fluid level in your brain case to come back to normal. So that's how long you've got an increased susceptibility to getting knocked out.
Not to mention too much dehydrating can cause your kidneys or heart to shut down. After DADA 5000 fought Kimbo Slice in 2016 (Bellator 149), DADA's heart stopped TWICE before they could get him to the ER. Not because of myocardial infarction but because of electrolyte imbalance. And his kidneys shut down. He's still alive and kicking, which is more than I can say for Kimbo, who died less than four months later from cardiac failure.
I don't think it's possible because the fighters will never be forthcoming about their weight-cutting routine but I would be interested to see a comprehensive study of fighters and their susceptibility to being KOed according to how much weight they were cutting the the final week before a fight.
The UFC moving weigh-ins to the day before the fight was full-retard stupid because it gives the fighters to know they can cheat a little more because they've got an extra 24 hours to rehydrate before the fight. I think what they need to do is weigh them twice, once the day before (as is now the practice) and again right before they get into the ring. They couldn't afford to stay dehydrated for 24 hours, or to get into the ring dehydrated, so this would force them to fight at something closer to their natural weight. And stop lying to the fans.
I know the sweating thing has a long history in combat sports, especially in wrestling (not to be confused with " wrasslin' "), but it never was a sporting thing and always was a "may the best cheater win" thing, and all those sports would be better off without it. It just makes sense that you're going to see a better level of competition if all of the competitors are both are well-rested and well-hydrated.
In 2015, a 21-year-old One Championship title contender by name of Yang Jian Bing died from cardiopulmonary failure stemming from his weight cut while preparing for a fight in da Pilipines. Which highlights another problem with weight cutting. Men in this age group still tend to think they're 90% immortal.
EDIT:
Chris Cyborg tweeted this pic in 2015, three days after competing at 145 in Invicta:
https://i.imgur.com/dzGCmnQ.png
And you know damn and and well that she hadn't put on 30 lbs in three days from pizza and Brazilian beef. She was at least 160-165 after she rehydrated for that fight.
I have a feeling Benoit was at a very bad place @ weigh in. You know his BUN and creatinine probably looked like 10 miles of bad highway. His eGFR probably followed suit temporarily.
At the weigh-in, it would be nice if they had a way of checking your total water mass, and if they invalidated the weigh-in if your water was too low. That might help with people dehydrating past a certain point.
Chris cyborg looked like she chopped her dick off to make weight.Quote:
Originally Posted by Beetlegeuse
I bet her testosterone levels are higher than any of ours.