‘Avoiding The Cut’- written by Brandon “Sequoyah” Sandford

Avoiding the cut

by Sequoyah Sandford on Sunday, 21 August 2011 at 11:49

This is what you want to do. I am going to base this off of a 4 week training camp. Week one and two of your diet should look like this. (make sure you take vitamins and minerals during this camp!)

• Breakfast: 2-3 egg whites, some turkey burger w/ cheese, use low carb tortillas if you want to make burritos. A piece of fruit and a tablespoon of peanut butter. Vitamins.
• Lunch-Salad with raw veggies and chopped up chicken breast. Try to get a low carb dressing like honey mustard of light Italian.
• Dinner- Eat light like maybe another salad or a small serving of meat and some rice or some fruit and veggies because you are unable to burn this off during your sleep.
• Pre-work out snack: half cup of steamed rice and a half can of tuna or some almonds or other type of nut. Or a just drink a supplement.
• Post work out snack: Eat proteins, like the other half of the tuna and maybe a low carb protein shake or protein bar.

Week 3-4

•  Cut out all dairy from your diet
•  Also, if you want to drink protein shakes use them as a meal replacement not with a meal
• This is where you step it up. Cardio twice a day if you can. If you can do cardio twice a day let me know and I will adjust this outline around that. But for now I will keep at cardio once a day.
• The quickest way to lose weight is to not eat 5 hours before you go to bed and if you were doing two-a-days you wouldn’t eat breakfast. You would do cardio first to burn more fat before you ate.
• All light meals*
• Also, you want to keep your sodium in take low during the last week.
• Breakfast-1 piece of fruit, a salad or some raw veggies. A little bit of rice if you are feeling slow.
• Midday snack- two boiled eggs and some carrots and maybe some blueberries.
• Last meal of the day should be before your cardio. Eat a piece of chicken or fish, a salad and a 1/2 cup of steamed rice.

The week of your cut water load, drink a gallon of water a day. 2 days before your cut switch to a gallon of distilled a day. 24 hours before your weigh-ins no food or drink.

This is a real basic outline not too specific so if you have any specific question ask, the more questions you ask the better I can tweak your diet and make sure it works for you.

Post weigh-ins drink a big bottle of pedialyte then drink lots of water until your urine is clear. Then still eat clean you want to have clean energy for your fight. Eat clean on fight day as well. But do add carbs to your meals.

Please ask questions I am trying to tweak this so I can have it down to a science.

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MMA-Safely Cutting Weight

What’s The Risk?

What is safe for your fighter when it comes to cutting weight? Are they eating healthy, dehydrating properly and rehydrating at the proper rate?

Some of you may have sons or daughters that are serious in their habits to make themselves the best conditioned fighter out there, right? But really, what is safe when it comes to their dieting and cutting weight right before the fight? Sometimes I wonder if I am the only parent out there that has this question.

So many times before my son’s fight I witness his body go through so many physiological changes in just a matter of days. It has actually scared me and has prompted me to do a bit of research on what is healthy and what is not. I found some interesting things at www.grapplearts.com. One is an overview of the proper methods of dieting:

There are basically two methods to cutting weight:

• Method 1 – Dieting. This is the gradual reduction in weight through dieting (usually taking anywhere from 1 week to several months).   Although rapid weight loss through dieting can be harmful to health if it is too severe or if you have some pre-existing medical conditions, it isn’t as dangerous as the next method…
• Method 2 – Dehydration. This is the more rapid loss of weight via limiting water intake, exercising, sauna suits and saunas: here most of the weight comes off in the last 24 to 48 hours.

These two methods aren’t completely independent: they are often used together, with dehydration preceding dehydration. Furthermore even if you are only dehydrating (method 2) you still have to watch and manipulate aspects of your diet to avoid retaining water. One critical difference, however, is that given long enough between the weigh-in and the competition you can gain back almost all the weight lost due to dehydration, albeit with ion.Trying to function at a high level athletically while dehydrated is basically impossible, so the bigger the weight cut the more important it becomes that re-hydration is done properly. Weight cutting via dehydration is only really feasible when there is a long recovery time between the weigh-in and the actual competition. Also, competitors can cut a lot more weight if the weigh-ins are on the day before the competition (as opposed to the morning of the competition). When the rules allow (or mandate) competitors to weigh in on the day before a competition a sizeable advantage can go to the best weight cutter:   weighing 180 lbs in a 170 lb division is fairly common, and some heavier fighters can gain almost 15 lbs of lost weight back in 24 hours.

Check an awesome article I also found by GrappleArts, titled “How to Cut and Make Weight”. It thoroughly explains the best and safest way to make weight when going into your fight. I found it to be the about the exact same regimen my son uses in his cutting techniques and it has deemed to be advantageous for him so far in his dieting and hydrating habits.

  

Another interesting link I found from GrappleArts is  The Effects of Dehydration On Physiolgical Functioning. This article strictly pertains to the physiological effects of dehydration. For all of you serious MMA buffs and grapplers, this would be good information for you to store in the forefronts of your mind when cutting weight. It explains the risks and dangers of dehydrating/rehydrating incorrectly and how to do it properly as to not cause any permanent or fatal damage. 

One other useful site that my son, Brandon “Sequoyah” Sandford-Mixed Martial Arts Champion for Jackson MMA’s Team Spartan of Jackson, MI,  personally recommends for dieting is The Definitive Guide To MMA Nutrition . This is a very informative blog written by performance trainer and nutrition specialist Jimmy Smith.  Jimmy Smith is a 6’6 former college basketball player who was dissatisfied with his then current state of performance and physique enhancement so he set out to make it better and provide better information. This particular guide is for  fighters who are going into camp and looking to lose some fat and improve their performance. This post does NOT include a final well prep for those that still need to shed a few pounds to make weight or the water and nutrient manipulation and Jimmy recommends for a fighter  to make weight then refeed properly for their fight.  This is an excellent resource for those of you who are wanting to take there dieting to the proper levels.

Mind you, my son always takes the healthy approach to dieting and cutting weight, eating fish and fresh vegetables and has an excellent coach to guide him in the right direction.  You should do the same when your cutting weight. However, I do tend to worry myself if he cuts it too quickly or if he is dehydrating too much. He always reminds me that he knows what he’s doing. But without the constant watchful eye of a physician, that leaves me with the thoughts of keeping my own watchful eye as a parent.

So with that, I would recommend everyone talk with your health care physician on your best approach to dieting and exercise for own personal physical & metabolic makeup. Everyone’s different so we aren’t all going to obtain equal results with the same exact dieting habits. Just keep this in mind when deciding on how your going to best cut weight!!