Professional Fighter Weight Cutting: How?

[Cherry Brigand]

Sorry if this is a dupe thread. Could not find.

So Conor was supposed to face RDA at 155 in 2 weeks. The day RDA announced he was out, reports said that Conor was walking around at 174 or 177, I forget. My assumption is that when he fights at 145, he'd probably be 10 lbs lighter so let's say 164.

In any case: how is it possible for an elite athlete to cut 20 lbs in two weeks. Clearly they don't have much in the way of fat to lose and I can't fathom that there's 20 lbs of water to lose and rehydrate.

In cases like Johny, he balloons up, but conor is nearly always fit and other fighters typically look pretty healthy too.

So where does that weight come from? And how do they lose it?

 

[Badger67]

The body is 67-72% water, there's plenty to cut. Factor in glycogen stores which is a good lb and a bit, decrease in food stuffs etc. Normally they start trimming off other bits of fat 4 weeks out but in this case its a harder cut but still doable. I drop 10-15 in a week usually and i compete at 140 for bjj. The larger you are, the more water weight.

 

[Badger67]

This is quite drastic and for INFO PURPOSES ONLY; do not attempt. But things like this work.
http://fourhourworkweek.com/2013/05/06/how-to-cut-weight-ufc/

 

[BOWHUNTER]

Its very hard on smaller guys, I used to cut for boxing and bjj, and dropping from 155-147 was not that bad, 170 to 155 sucked balls 185 to 164 was hell. I wont ever do it again.

 

[Brendon Katz]

I drop around 13lbs in a week (and about 6 on the morning of the weigh in) and I'm one of the smaller featherweights, so I'm considering dropping to BW. 10% of your body weight in the last week, easy.