Main EPQ Project
Introduction
My essay will cover how weight-cutting harms athletes in fighting sports and
how it could be prevented or made safer for the athletes. Combat sports are
a contact sport where athletes face each other in one-on-one combat under
a specific rule set. To make it fairer, combat sports usually have weight
classes so competitors face athletes that are the same size as them so some
athletes will weight cut to get to a lower weight class. Weight-cutting is
defined as the practice of people losing between 5 to 10 per cent of their
body weight before competition by Samantha Dawes (weight cutting: What is
it and should it be regulated? ABC). Athletes usually aim to gain an edge
over their opponents by weight cutting. I chose weight cutting as a topic
since I was already interested in fighting sports such as MMA and being
interested in the biology behind. Furthermore, I believe it is a very important
issue in sport as it puts athletes at significant physical risk and a solution
needs to be found to make athletes safer.
There are many methods that are used by athletes to weight cut such as
fasting or restricting food intake, not drinking liquids for 12 hours or more,
saunas or steam rooms, cardio in heated rooms, and insulation suits all to
promote water weight loss or even diuretics and laxatives to promote
vomiting.
Opinions on weight-cutting are nearly always against the practice. Andy
Foster, executive officer of the California state Athletic Commission believes
that it ‘is the biggest problem in combat sports,’ and he further claimed that
‘5 or 10 percent of people are doping. The number of people dehydrating is
much, much higher... (weight cutting is) a traumatic event. Then the very
next day, you combine that with another traumatic event, and that’s called a
fight. Combine these two things, and you’re just asking for trouble.’ (.
Although opinions on the severity of the practice are divided, with Dana
White, president of the UFC (The biggest MMA organization in the world)
claiming “In the UFC, these guys have plenty of time. They know when they
have to fight. They know the time they have. They diet and do the proper
nutrition to get down the right way. When they get closer (to weigh-ins), they
cut a few pounds. That's the healthy, normal way to do it.” (Dana White and
Anderson Silva on Weight-Cutting Controversy: "No Fight is Worth Dying
Over": MMAweekly.com), despite White’s comment there have been many
dangerous incidents and calls for change of the practice in the UFC as well.
On the other side of the debate figures such as the Senior Vice President of
Athlete Health and Performance for the UFC, Jeff Novitsky stated “Some
athletes drain 10-15 percent of their water in two or three days. After that
point, [medical professionals] I’ve spoken to recommend immediate
hospitalization.”.
The significant controversy around the dangers of Weight-cutting in fighting
sports shows that discussion around the topic needs to take place so that
fight sports can be changed for the better.
Why is weight-cutting so prevalent?
There have been many studies showing that weight-cutting is extremely
prevalent among athletes, for example a study of the prevalence and
popularity of weight loss strategies in 637 Brazilian martial artists found that
weight-cutting was commonly undertaken in all fighting sports (‘Weight Loss
Strategies in Combat Sports and Concerning Habits in Mixed Martial Arts’
Human kinetics). Furthermore, weight cutting is not just limited to the senior
level as a survey of 2532 Michigan high school wrestlers averaging the age
of 16 found that 2/3 of them of done weight-cutting for wrestling and had
begun the practice at an average age of only 14 years old (‘Weight loss
methods of high school wrestlers’ Medicine and Science in sports exercise).
Although with all the negative stigma around weight-cutting it may seem
strange why it’s so prevalent in combat sports, but for the athletes there
appears to be huge benefits for weight-cutting and winning fights.
The main advantage is usually that the athlete will gain a size advantage
during the fight as they regain the weight after weigh ins, this will make it
harder to grapple and control them in wrestling sports. For a taller athlete
(who would be heavier on average) it would allow the athlete to cut a lighter
weight class where they would now have a significant reach advantage over
their on average shorter competitors, helping them in both wrestling and
striking sports.
There are is also some scientific evidence which supports the notion of
weight cutting being effective, a study on rapid weight gain predicting
success used 700 professional MMA fights involving 1400 weigh-ins in 21
different promotions and concluded that with every 1% of additional rapid
weight gain the chance of winning increased by 4.5% ("Rapid weight gain
predicts fight success in mixed martial arts – evidence from 1,400 weigh-ins"
from Taylor and Francis online). Furthermore, a study on a regional level
wrestling competition found that people who has more aggressively weight
cut, were more successful than those who did (‘Weight loss patterns and
success rates in high school wrestlers’ National Library of Medicine). This
scientific evidence and the perceived benefits of weight-cutting persuades
many combat athletes to take part in weight cutting. Although there is also a
lot of contradictory scientific evidence making weight cutting as a practice
seem more uncertain. In 2021 an experiment on 75 MMA athletes who were
weight cutting was conducted to study whether the proportion of weight cut
by an athlete affected their performance in the fight. The study found that
winners of their fights on average cut less weight (8.6%) compared to losers
who cut more (at 10.6%), suggesting that cutting more weight could
decrease fight success and completely opposing the idea that weight cutting
is beneficial.(‘ Weight-Cutting Implications for Competition Outcomes in
Mixed Martial Arts Cage Fighting’).
There is also more to weight cutting then just the pure performance aspect,
it has been around for so long in so many combat sports that it has become
normalised and part of the culture. For instance, when talking about the
culture in wrestling a nutritionist familiar with working wrestlers, George
Lockhart explained “It’s tradition. ... They’ve done it the same way for so
long. There’s almost a quiet understanding that they all kind of agreed to.”.
Indian Olympic Wrestler Seema Bisla further explained on their culture
saying "It's a mentality that you develop early on. Some people can't do it.
But the athletes who are able to take that problem are the ones who get the
discipline to make it to the top level,", suggesting that those who cannot do
the cut are in some way too weak to make it to the top level. However, this
culture is not just limited to wrestling and is present in almost every combat
sport at varying degrees, resulting in many athletes weight cutting despite
the mixed evidence in it being beneficial.
Why weight cutting is so harmful and needs to be
prevented/made safer.
As mentioned before everybody who is aware of weight-cutting is also aware
of how harmful and dangerous the practice is. This is because of the huge
abundance of undeniable scientific evidence on the harmful effects as well as
the examples of deaths caused by weight cutting. There is a multitude of
negative physical effects of weight cutting such as the effect it has on
decreasing aerobic fitness due to dehydration, decreased plasma volume,
increased heart rate, hydro electrolytic disturbances, impaired
thermoregulation, and muscle glycogen depletion. Decreased aerobic fitness
could have a significant impact on an athlete's performance within the fight
and training as they will become tired more easily, which will also make
injury more likely (‘Weight loss in combat sports: physiological, psychological
and performance effects’ Taylor and Francis online).
Due to significant dehydration the blood also thickens causing the kidneys to
have to work more to filter it, consequently the kidneys cannot produce
enough urine to flush themselves out, making kidney stones and infections
more likely. More severely dehydrated athletes could suffer from kidney
failure, seizures and coma which may lead to death (‘Weight Cutting: Solving
'The Biggest Problem in Combat Sports' Bleacher Report’). This is not the
only issue caused by the thickened blood as it also increases the risk of
ischaemic heart disease and strokes, which could again, lead to death (‘The
Current State of Weight-Cutting in Combat Sports’ National Library of
Medicine).
Dehydration from the weight cut can also alter brain morphology meaning
that there is less cushioning in the skull (‘The Current State of Weight-
Cutting in Combat Sports’ National Library of Medicine) and also makes the
brain smaller as there is less cerebrospinal fluid allowing more room for the
brain to bounce in the skull during head impacts (‘Weight Cutting: Solving
'The Biggest Problem in Combat Sports' Bleacher Report’) such as strikes in a
fight, resulting in a higher risk of head trauma such as concussions.
There is also a good amount of evidence that weight-cutting overall does
cause injury. Oöpik et al, discovered that a 5% decrease in body mass would
interfere with metabolism and impair muscle contraction leading to a higher
risk of injury (‘Oöpik et al’ web of science).
The true danger of weight cutting can be observed by the multitude of tragic
outcomes that it has been responsible for when things go wrong. An
especially significant example of this would be the death of three college
wrestlers in the span of 6 weeks in 1997 all due to weight cutting
(‘WRESTLING; Collegiate Wrestling Deaths Raise Fears About Training’ NY
Times).
