[rich d]

So quick non question  ro the ukb training massive, i was talking to a couple of non climbing friends today about weight loss based on the fantastic cutting for mma documentary on BBC iPlayer and it turns out one of them is on a  clenbuterol cycle. He used to be a bodybuilder about 20 years ago, apart from them being prescription (I once had them for asthma) and I presume a bit dodge legally does anyone have any experience of them, their side effects and their positives/results as a counter balance.

[Nibile]

No direct experience, but from what I've read the positive effects are fat reduction and anabolic properties.
The side effects go from tremors, to anorexya to heart attacks.
Which ones count more is up to you.

[rich d]

Just to make clear Nibs I have no intention of taking them just interested in what my mate is potentially doing to himself.

[Nibile]

 

[monkoffunk]

That programme was pretty crazy, didn't appreciate just how extreme those guys cut. Looks horrendously dangerous. Totally useless for climbing even if it wasn't so unhealthy.

[rich d]

It's got to affect their performance hasn't it. They've got one day to rehydrate, never mind the lack of sleep and how rubbish they must feel. I don't see how they can then fight effectively.

[Nibile]

If one goes as far for a fight as to take anabolic steroids for cutting, it's highly likely that they're taking other stuff to counterbalance the side effects like sleep problems and so on.

[T_B]

That programme was pretty crazy, didn't appreciate just how extreme those guys cut. Looks horrendously dangerous. Totally useless for climbing even if it wasn't so unhealthy.

Yes, it was shocking. I thought they missed a trick by not including the post-weigh in re-hydration process and (I suspect) inevitable gorging? He said he put the 7.5Kg back on literally within hours. I'm amazed that the cutting doesn't have a negative effect on performance with the fight being just 48 hours after the weigh in.

I suspect it would help on some boulder problems, actually. Especially when the "word on the street" is that some of the top comp boulderers eat very little anyway (though personally Iv'e always found comps to be an endurance event...).

[dave]

Presumably if you're dehydrated to the tune of over a stone in water loss then your hands aren't going to be doing much sweating either. #connies

[Nibile]

But you could be so dehydrated that you rip a tendon by just putting your shoes on...

[moose]

That programme was pretty crazy, didn't appreciate just how extreme those guys cut. Looks horrendously dangerous. Totally useless for climbing even if it wasn't so unhealthy.

Yes, it was shocking. I thought they missed a trick by not including the post-weigh in re-hydration process and (I suspect) inevitable gorging? He said he put the 7.5Kg back on literally within hours. I'm amazed that the cutting doesn't have a negative effect on performance with the fight being just 48 hours after the weigh in.

Some boxing commissions have a post-weigh-in weigh-in - if you are fighting for an IBF title you are not allowed to gain more than 10lbs after the official weigh-in. 

The cutting supposedly does have a negative effect on performance.  A fighter who has made an aggressive weight-cut will be poorer than if they boxed at their "walk around" weight, but that is generally offset by being able to fight in a lower weight division: being much bigger come fight-night than someone who has not aggressivelely cut weight (or at least not "out bigged" if the opponent has done the same).

The effectiveness of big weight-cuts is all to do with the preparation (if you can afford a very good diet and conditioning team) and career arc a fighter envisages for themselves.  Cutting weight is generally a young fighter's game - gets more difficult with age. 

Without drugs, its generally done by drinking vast amounts of water for 2-3 weeks before the fight, and then not drinking anything in the immediate run-up.  Saul "Canelo" Alvarez, the Mexican superstar is a master - usually weighs-in for fights at the 154 lb limit (light middle-weight), looking like a dried-out zombie on the scales.  Come fight night, he is hugely thick-set, weighs up to 170 lb (light heavy-weight), and then bullies his smaller opposition whose physiologies mean they are fighting in a weight-class closer to their "natural" size. 

It can go wrong though - boxing is replete with fighters who have misjudged a weight cut and ended up having to cut too much weight too quickly - depleting themselves, rather than temporailly dehydrating.  They tend to "gas" badly late in fights; stamina especially seems to suffer with weight cutting.  The usual advice when fighting someone known to have had trouble making weight (rumours of trips to the sauna and starvation, last minute runs wrapped in bin bags) is to go to the body - hooks to the liver, sap the core. 

Also noticeable that many fighters with long, successful careers - Mayweather Jr, Froch, Bernard Hopkins etc - never went into weight-cutting much.  Those fighters tended to keep fit between fights (not bloat Ricky Hatton style) and both train and fight close to their natural weight - not gaining or losing weight drastically (maybe just a slow progressiion up the divisions with age, as they thicken out).

[monkoffunk]

I suspect it would help on some boulder problems, actually. Especially when the "word on the street" is that some of the top comp boulderers eat very little anyway (though personally Iv'e always found comps to be an endurance event...).

So I guess my feeling was even the boulderers who drop to extreme weights (relatively speaking)  do it in a more physiological way. These MMA chaps aren't actually performing at their cut weight and will be fairly weak at that point in time. For boulderers the weight loss is useful at the actual time of performance, so a weight cut of that magnitude and method surely can't help with execution of a problem I would have thought.

[lagerstarfish]

a made of mine died in January - heart attack

we suspected clen or dnp

in his last few days he was walking round in shorts and t shirt outside and sweating

[Sarnian]

I'm sorry to hear about your friend, do you know why he took it, was he competing?

Quite often the fighters re-hydrate with an intravenous drip, I think I heard it from Joe Rogan's podcast that one of the last things to rehydrate is a water barrier in the brain, which can take longer than a day, so although fighters seem recovered they are more susceptible to brain damage. They gain a huge weight advantage, but it's arguable whether the drop in performance is worth it, some fighters do really well without cutting much weight. I can't imagine dehydrating for climbing ever being worth it, although from the documentary I thought the guy spitting out saliva to save 100g was pretty funny, I might try that the next time I need a redpoint edge.

I think MMA will eventually try and implement a new weigh in procedure, not for the health of the fighters but because it leads to cancelled events. It was only recently that one of the most anticipated fights of the year Khabib vs. Ferguson was cancelled because Khabib was hospitalised with kidney pain whilst cutting weight.

The UFC have very strict anti-doping testing now, they brought in USADA and the guy who caught Lance Armstrong, so I'd imagine clenbuterol is banned. It's pretty interesting to look at fighers post and pre USADA testing.

[moose]

Quite often the fighters re-hydrate with an intravenous drip,

Not sure about MMA, but boxing follows the WADA / VADA rule that IV rehydration is limited to 50 milliliters per six hours, except for medical emergencies - as IVs can be used to flush out PED metabolites prior to the pre/post-fight blood or urine tests.  There was a controversy following Mayweather vs Pac when it was found that Mayweather had a much larger IV before the fight, which was given a retrospective TUE by a "friendly" Nevada State Athletic Commission doctor when it was discovered to have happened after the fight (a bit suspicious as Mayweathr had no problems making weight, so should not have been dehydrated).

[Murph]

Yes, it was shocking. I thought they missed a trick by not including the post-weigh in re-hydration process and (I suspect) inevitable gorging?

He said at the beginning of the film that he had previously gained 20kgs in the two weeks post cut. Impressive. Agree it would have been worth showing what happens next. 

[Nibile]

Which film?

[monkoffunk]

Which film?

The Weight Cut: Extreme Weight Loss

On BBC iplayer

[lagerstarfish]

I'm sorry to hear about your friend, do you know why he took it, was he competing?

when we last had a friendly weigh in, he was 15kg above the category he competed in - not MMA - he was a Strongman

[mark s]

ive never had them but a few mates have.mainly the bodybuilders who are going on stage. dont recall them talking about side effects from them. mainly for cutting or when on gear they may make the steroids more effective.

[moose]

Also noticeable that many fighters with long, successful careers - Mayweather Jr, Froch, Bernard Hopkins etc - never went into weight-cutting much.

A more contemporary example Gennedy 'GGG' Golovkin, current baddest man in the middle-weight division is small for his weight, and supposedly lives within 10lb of the 10lb divisional limit. His secret:

[rich d]

Also noticeable that many fighters with long, successful careers - Mayweather Jr, Froch, Bernard Hopkins etc - never went into weight-cutting much.

A more contemporary example Gennedy 'GGG' Golovkin, current baddest man in the middle-weight division is small for his weight, and supposedly lives within 10lb of the 10lb divisional limit. His secret:

Triple G's secret is he's hard as fucking nails.
My mate takes them twice a year to "cut" for his beach holiday..says he gets cramps and a few shakes in the first couple of days of a cycle (which he usually does for 2 weeks)

[Johnny Brown]

Fuck me, some people are vain aren't they?

[rich d]

Fuck me, some people are vain aren't they?

Oh yes.....