100% agree with Joe. Gotta get those hydration tests in there. No legal cheating and weight manipulation; fight that your *true* weight.

Imagine how different the mma world would be if these dudes weren't so scared to fight at their own weight

Watching Cris Cyborg crying in agony cutting weight in a 105 degree bath is horrifying

As Chael & GSP said - Weigh them one hour before the fight. It is a good solution

I remember in the 90's, my Highschool was a local wrestling powerhouse with a serious coach. A lot of our athletes continued on with the sport. I lived in the boonies so I was stuck at school for an extra hour at least, every day. I watched these 14-18yr old students jog around the halls/stairs wearing 3-7 extra layers of clothes and sweating their asses off in order to make weigh-in for an upcoming tournament. They also used to get together and have extended sauna sessions, sometimes riding a stationary bike in the sauna itself. They also used tricks like chewing gum or sunflower seeds and spitting to drop extra water weight. I am sure there are other things they did, I just cant recall, or never knew. If these 'kids' at the 'highschool' level (btw, not even in america, where they take sports alot more seriously) were using these tricks in the 90's to cut weight, imagine what a top level ufc athlete, today, does.

Look at darren till, he is huge for welterweight. He seems to be one of those people that cuts a ridiculous amount to make that weight class.

Weigh them on the day of the fight as well!

Start showing a fighter's actual fighting weight in their match-up stats.

I cut 18 pounds in a day and I felt like my stomach was eating itself and like I was going to die. It was just an amateur fight but, I felt like I was going to die in that steam room. I had my fight the next night and I was still exhausted. Lost a split decision.

Weigh in on fight night problem solved, if you wanna go into a fight dehydrated then it's your funeral

They should do the weigh in the night of the fight. Same thing for boxing and wrestling. Doing it a week beforehand encourages unhealthy practices AND it means that the weight classes mean nothing when the 147 pound champ is actually 155-160 sometimes.

The current weight in system is the equivalent of a professor keeping a close eye on his students as they walk into class, but then walking out the door the second he hands out the final exam, leading everyone to cheat, because you’d be stupid not to. It’s literally designed to be easily cheated

I think Joe hits the nail on its head. Weight cutting is lying. Period. MMA tries to reflect what actual fighting is about. Yet its idea to prepare for a fight is completely disconnected from any form of real fighting that ever existed.

I'm really! glad Jo mentioned the gap between 185 and 205 , I've been waiting for someone else other than myself to mention that.

here's an insane idea, weigh the figthers right before they step into the ring... *head explodes*

So tired of this discussion and debate. The solution is so simple if they really want to fix it. Stop weighing in the day before, weigh in the day of, shortly before the fight ('cause obviously if you weigh in in the morning and then fight in the evening people will still cut weight). Have people weigh in at their actual fighting weight like they do in jiu jitsu competitions. (it's probably done in other competitions but I only have experience with it in BJJ) It's absurd that this still goes on to me. I can only assume they like the spectacle and promotion of a weigh in and that's why they still do it, but then just say that's why they do it and stop acting like they really care about the fighters' health.

I want them to make it like it was in the good old days were a 150 man boy can fight a 400 pound gaint.

Weigh them seconds before the fight. It’s stupid to have weight classes but allow people the time after weigh ins to rehydrate where a normal weight can be in the next weight class.

One fighter who suffered the ultimate fate of the dangerous process was 18-year-old Muay Thai fighter, Jessica Lindsay. The Australian tragically lost her life after being rushed to hospital and placed into an induced coma just moments before a weigh-in for a fight in November 2017.

Wheres the hair in this video

Very insightful. Cheers for this

weigh-in 1 hour before the competition.. . fixes everything.

a weight class every 10 lbs would be easy you just add a 165 a 195 and change welter weight to 175, then idk maybe change heavy weight to 240 and have a super heavy weight belt with no limit

New weight classes: 125 135 145 155 165 - Guys who can't quite make 155 but are too small for 175 e.g Kevin Lee, Cerrone, Khabib (recently), Mike Perry 175 185 195 - Weidman, Rockhold, Romero, Bisping, Sonnen (in the past) 205 206-265 Heavyweight 265+ Super Heavyweight - Struve, Nelson, Lesnar etc

I feel they need to get rid of weight cutting pr weigh in the day of the fight. That way if you want to be healthy during the fight you come in shape or just get rid of weight classes and swing it out.

New weight classes would be great as part of a larger strategy but it can't work by itself. If you added a 165 (super lightweight) division, you'd get fighters currently in 170 cutting an extra 5 pounds to gain that little extra advantage and killing themselves in the process. Same with 195 - fighters at 205 would be cutting an extra 10 pounds. It doesn't solve anything without hydration tests.

So here is how I look at fighters Flyweight 125lbs weigh in In ring (135-155lbs) Bantamweight 135 lbs In ring (145- 170) Featherweight 145lbs In ring ( 160-190) Lightweight 155lbs In ring (170-200) Ex. Kevin Lee walks around at 190lbs Welterweight 170 lbs In ring( 180-210) Ex. Woodley walks around at 205 pounds Middleweight 185 lbs In ring (200-225) Ex Micheal bisping walk around at 215 Light heavyweight 205 lbs In ring (210-240) Ex. Jon Jones walks around at 230 lbs Heavyweight 265 lbs Ring in (235 lbs-300lbs) Ex. Brock lesnar walks around at 295 lbs

Weigh-in has to be moved to really close to fight time WITH hydration tests. Maybe a few hours, and maybe allow someone to lose a couple of pounds at most. And then everyone knows if they have to spend the last few hours before the fight cutting, they're gonna get killed. So, it completely changes the culture and people start fighting at true weights.

They could have a first time to make weight 24h-30h before the fight and a second weight in right before the fight with a cap of something like 108% of the weight class. So a fighter in a 170 lbs class could go up to 184(183.6) lbs right before the fight but not more than that. He would have time to adjust his weight between the first weight in and the second one to make sure to be eligible without having a monster difference. That way you reduce the weight cutting and their fighting weight is more similar.

when Thiago alverez fought gsp mad long ago he looked 200 plus. he was huge but weighed in at 170

I was a wrestler in jr high, high school, and college. You weigh in like 2hrs before you wrestle. i cut 2lbs in 10th grade and did about as good as i was supposed to wrestling seniors and felt ok. My junior year i cut from like 130 to 119 i was thirsty all the time i didn't feel unhealthy or anything but i lost to guys i had a chance with and when i lost i was mad af. My senior year i said f this and wrestled up a weight class to one of the most competitive weight classes. The online community and other folks that followed me said it would be a disaster and i should cut at least 7lbs. I felt great all year i wresled th toughest guys at practice exercises at home in addition to all 3 of the typical practices throughout the day, time that would typically be utilized cutting weight. I won state that year. That same year they did introduce hydration tests where they did math to decide how much weight you were allowed to cut until your next hydration test. This didn't affect me of course but when i came back to coach it was nice cuz NOBODY was killing themselves like i did in highschool to cut. Some people say cutting is part of the sport, it is but not to the extent some are doing it. It drags you down and f's with your head when just having a cocky im gonna beat everyone attitude(especially at practice) can be all you need to be successful. This is what id tell all my wimpy kids i coached. they'd all get clobbered early on but stayed healthy and if they stuck with the team for all 6 years they qualified for state.

Interesting topic. More videos need done

I congratulate Joe Rohan on his comments. Absolutely correct.

I want to fight in MMA so badly but I refuse to put my body through the dehydration. Once people are weighed in the day of the fight, I'm in.

Also if you wanna end weight cutting just make fight day weigh ins

Weigh in the day before and weigh in just before fight night. Have to be below the required weight in both to be able to fight

Joe Rogan was the highlight of the movie Bright lmfao

In the ufc there are big gaps between weight classes e.g 205 and 185 a fighter could be at 195

Do it just like D1 wrestling duals and have a 1 hour weigh in. Fighters can't suck big weight & still perform at the level required.

I’ve never understood cutting weight. Fighters dehydrate, significantly, weight I’m and then rehydrate, and fight hours later. So they aren’t actually the correct weight? Why not weight in immediate before a fight. I’ve always found cutting to be ridiculous. Seems so much more initiative to just fight at your natural weight.

Just beginning setting a 5% tolerance between weight in and fight night

Some of these weight cuts are ridiculous. When I wrestled, my walk around weight was pretty close to my fight weight. Same thing when I boxed. It appeared to me that most of the other guys also didn't try and fight in a weight class that was 20 or even 30 lbs lower than their actual weight. These mma fighters have doctors guide them through dehydration and such, then rehydrate, and many of them can sometimes be as much as 20 lbs heavier, during the actual bout, than at the weigh-in. It' bullshit. No wonder some don't 'make weight'. The class they're fighting in isn't even close enough to reach with the help of highly specialized doctors and trainers. And these are guys who, by and large, stay in fairly good shape even when they're not anticipating a fight. - If you walk around, relatively fit, at 180 lbs then you should be trying to 'Trick' the scales, and fight at 155. I say "fight at your realistic weight" not some smoke and mirror weight...

Weight them ringside as they enter. (Gloves, tape shoes, etc weighed beforehand.)

Also cutting weight dosent make any sense, maybe if did in the beginning where it actually gave you some sort of advantage but now everyone does it so you just have 170s fight at 155 while weighing 170

surely if took weight cutting out the sport it would level itself out anyway instead cutting to 145 you would fight at 155-170 but would be same for everyone so you would in most cases fight same guys there will be exceptions to the rule but surely it's worth doing for everyone's longevity and health

It’s beyond me why the whole weight in thing is a separate event, and not on fight day. Stepping on the scale should be like checking gloves and mouth piece before stepping in the cage.

I’m an ex nurse, not an expert but I can’t think that the hydration, electrolytes and glucose levels are easy to resolve in time for the fight. Meaning they fight impaired. Messing with your kidneys and liver like that seems dangerous while trying to fight. I wonder how many have enlarged organs going into the Octagon and then flying home. A lot of unnecessary risks and each person is so different.

Anyone else realize how he was basically going “ya I agree that would be good, buut we’ll trust what we are doing right now” like dude why not do both

I think a good way to eliminate weight cutting would be to make the fighters weigh in twice a week four weeks prior to the fight. You could give them a slight window of a few pounds that they have to be within, but if they miss weight once within that four week period then they have officially missed weight for the fight.

Warning, the following is just me spit-ballin': Why not base weight on muscle mass and bone, and give an allowance for fat. If the fighter has to lose muscle to make a weight then they should not be in a weight class. Also I dont know how water weigh ins work, but it would be nice if weigh ins could simply ignore water weight. And give a small allowance for fat (say 3% buffer), have official weigh ins occur in tanks. I dont see why water weight should be a consideration, there should be no reason to dehydrate a fighter, in fact for truly entertaining fights you want to ensure all fighters are constantly hydrated. Have fighters certified for a specific weight class, and they need to maintain a range at least a month in advance. Slightly being overweight could simply be a point deduction, as long as it is not a trend for the fighter, but doing so several times could be a mandatory bump up. They could even transfer some of the purse from the overweight fighter to the other for taking the fight. As well as give the on weight fighter the fight automatically in the event of a draw. On a slight tangent, I think it would be interesting to have fighters who test positive for steroids be allowed to fight, but the stipulation would be they need to make their weight class, but fight a weight class up. But once you get to the heavyweights, I have no idea what you do there, other then pit positive testers against each other. (have a clean and dirty division). But I assume the problem would be with licencing and insurance for the fights, since drugging is illegal. Maybe just have all the fights in Mexico. (Of course I dont know if steroids are actually legal there, or if they are banned, but the ban is rarely enforced.)

Just have them weigh in on the day. Ppl wouldn’t miss weight. Wrestlers almost never miss weight.

Why don't they just move weigh ins to like 15 minutes before the fight? Wouldn't that solve the whole issue?

The cushion on the headphones on Jeff novitsky's head makes me feel uncomfortable hahaha

You just need to make it so that fighters have to meet a certain hydration level, otherwise they can't fight in that weight class. In general, men should have a total body water percentage between 50 and 65 percent, while the ideal range for women is between 45 and 60 percent.

Disturbing. This is the dark, ugly side of being a UFC fighter.

yes please to the 10% rule. Don't let fighters weigh in more than 10% extra than their weight class a few hours before the fight. Then keep getting stricter and stricter as time goes by.

The Performance Institute and its tests are not a panacea. Weight cutting/dehydration are so dangerous.

Must be nice to be a heavyweight. Most guys in that weight class don't cut since 205-265 is such a wide range.

It's a simple change to stop it do the weight in at the fight its a shame because even that won't work because all you will have is dehydrated fighters trying to fight in the ring 💪

have to disagree about weight cutting not being a factor in discipline. Cutting weight and making that regulated weight takes huge amounts of discipline. One of the reason why i can't hate Conor all that much for destroying the 145ib division. That was probably one of the most pure forms of discipline in his entire arsenal.

7:40 I learned this the hard way xD. Signed up for a kickboxing tourney to fight at 155 2 weeks before it ran, weighed 176 at the time. Dropped down to 155.5 for the tourney but only had 4 hours to rehydrate and get some carbs in me. Those 4 hours I only filled my tank maybe 20%? Watching the footage back was cringey I looked like I was moving in slow mo

if both fighter cut weight then they'll be around the same weight when they fight....it would be great if they could weight fighters just before they walk out to know what they actually weigh.

Weight cutting only gives you an advantage if the other guys doesnt. Now everyone does it. So now its a case of who is willing to cut the most, means they will be slightly bigger when they rehydrate, but are weak as a kitten.

The classes should be different. 145-160-175-190-205-220+ for heavyweight

They should have fighters fight within plus 10 pounds of the weight category. Someone is gonna die through weight cutting and then they will change the rules, but why wait until someone dies before changing rules?

The Roe Joegan Spexerience

Guys should not be afraid to fight somebody their own size

I think they should have a two miss rule: You miss weight twice, you fight in the next weight class above. You miss weight a third time, than you get suspended for 9 months to a year. You miss it a forth time you get automatically cut.

I had no idea it worked like this

I think the UFC adopted weight classes to legitimize the sport for marketing purposes, but as a fan, I prefer if the athletes are at their best

I didn’t realize wonderboy shaved his head

Theres an easy fix to the dangerous weight cut problem and im probably gonna get shit for this but.. Weigh them right before the fight. Have it so the fighters are fighting at the actual weight of their class. I mean the way it is now a middleweight fight, which for the UFC is 185 i think, on the night of the fight it isnt even 2 middleweights fighting. Its really 2 light heavys fighting. Dont get me wrong, ive gone thru weight cuts and i know its literally torture so i salute these guys and gals putting themselves thru it but its dangerous as hell. I cut from 175 down to 154 for a fight once. That was my worst weight cut and even though on fight night i was more like 168 but i was so drained and fatigued it was almost went against the entire point of the cut. I'd rather have fought at 160 and felt good and lose the few pound weight advantage tbh.

What if we weighed them every week for a month before the fight and on the day of. Then calculate the avg and bam thats your weight for the fight

Weight in halt an hour before the fight! No more light heavyweights having to fight heavywrights!

5 years later and still nothing has been done about this issue by the UFC

I feel like the obvious answer is to weigh them right before the fight, or at the very least, on the same day. That literally solves every single one of these problems with absolutely no down sides at all whatsoever, plus it’s SO obvious. Why in the fuck is this not done? Am I missing something?

Safe and fair for the fighters. Why isn't this done yesterday?

I can see the fighting institute being a staple of the UFC within a year or two. It makes sense for new fighters who don't have a lot of money to spend time there. Some can't, they have kids and such but.... it's at least one option. Really great idea. Glad they made it.

Weighing in on fight night probably won’t solve the problem. People could still cheat with an IV and the possibility of death is soo much greater. Some guys just want to win and logic comes second to that so if they need to cut the weight and fight dehydrated, they will

i think they should be able to cut some weight ,but 15 or 20 pounds is ridiculous .If you wanna fight little guys you need to be little not just thirsty.

Amen Joe Rogan

Another thing: Many fighters are correct: They need another class. 155-Lightweight, 165-Welterweight, 175-Middleweight, 190-Cruiserweight, 205-Light Heavy

They should weigh in before entering the cage to show the disadvantage one of the fighters is facing. Someone goes down to 145, against an actual 145er, you know there's going to be a huge gap in weight

Weigh in right before the fight

I'd rather see fighters fight at or close to their natural weight. Right now guys who walk around over 200 pounds fight t 170 or even 155. That's crazy. A fighter shouldn't be allowed to cut more than about 5% of their normal weight. Change the weight classes.

I think fighters should fight close to their natural weight. Fighters should weigh no more than 5 lbs the night of their fights than they did the day before on the weight cut, but also have a rule that fighters can be no more than maybe 5 lbs apart an hour before the fight starts..... I remember watching an Arturo Gatti fight in which he weighed 20lbs more (per the commentator) the night of his fight than he did the night before's weight cut. He was noticeably bigger than the guy he literally almost slaughtered. I never could cut that much weight when I wrestled in high school. 5lbs was the most I could manage. I just didn't carry the weight wherein I could cut it like that.

A weight class every 10 pounds would create too many divisions and delude the importance of titles. It's one of the things that hurt boxing. You could do every 15 pounds or even 20 despite Joe's disapproval. Where is the rule that you have to weight exactly up to the limit? If you come in 3 or 4 pounds under is it really that much of a disadvantage when you compare how much someone might be over the limit on fight night right now?

Rogan is 100% right weight cutting as it is today is sanctioned cheating. Like for example let's say someone who normally fights at welterweight(170lbs) is scheduled for a lightweight bout (155lbs) and let's say his walk around weight is 178-180 and with training and dieting he drops that to 173ish and then cuts the 15 or so lbs, yea sure they both weighed in at 155 at the official weigh in but that's not their fight weight and that dude is going to stuff his face and drink gallons of water between the post weigh in and actuall right time and gain some significant weight back and CAN have an advantage over the other guy who is naturally at around 155. This happens all the time in all different weight classes I mean honestly think about it, I'm sure everyone here has watched a fight and said to themselves that dude looks bigger than the other guy or that dude looks a little smaller. Now plz forgive me if my example isn't accurate for I'm not an expert I just think and agree with Ryan that a fight should be between two equal competitors and it should be technique, strategy, cardio etc that determines a fight.

My first and only fight so far I was fighting at 148 and the Sunday of week of the fight. I was around 155 but after the water load I was 170 I made weight. But them epsom salt baths are no joke. I got out of the tub I felt like I had the spins from being drunk and my heart felt like it was beating out of it chest. But once I rehydrated I felt like a million bucks. The day of the fight I weighed 160. But at the start of the eight week camp I was 185

This guy looks like wonderboy with a shaved head.

Weigh in an hour b4 the fight. Problem solved

the real problem is, it takes weeks to get rehydrated properly...

If izzy can stay at 186 lbs and beat Jon for the LHW title like he says hes going to do.. I see more people following suit... if he gets flatlined then were back to square one. Hydration testing is the best we got right now for keeping it safe. Weighing the fighters same day will cause insane cancellations and changes. Also people won't stay in a class, they'll keep bouncing around. I feel on your fight license you should register at a weight class and for 365 days that stays.

They are both bald. It's funny.

They should implement lenght classes cause a 6'4 guy has no business fighting a man that's 5"8 but the same weight

Who is here after Julija Stoliarenko fainted?

If you're worried about the consequences of making rules that would put fighter's health in jeopardy (if you don't make the weight, you're suspended for 12 months), why the fuck would you make weight-cutting part of the UFC culture? It's beyond fucked.

The only way to stop weight cutting is to get rid of weight classes.

Hell Joe is also one on it to

Weigh in 1 minute before the fight. You go in knowing who you are. Punishing your body isn’t fair, the fights aren’t fair.