TJ Dillashaw's weight cut

In January 2019 the UFC bantamweight champion dropped 10 pounds of division to fight for the flyweight title. The cut was documented by ESPN, the weights were published, and the sample from the weigh-in day came back positive for EPO.

The numbers ESPN recorded

The fight week alone is striking. From 140 on arrival to 124.6 at the weigh-in is 15.4 pounds, 11 percent of his body weight in about 3 days. With 2 days to go he still had 9.6 pounds to lose, roughly 7 percent of body weight, where the reference figures this site uses put the manageable loss at about 5.7 percent at 48 hours out. Where those figures come from.

The column that explains it is the body fat.

What 8 percent body fat means at 154 pounds

At 154 pounds and 8 percent body fat, a fighter is carrying about 12 pounds of fat. The weigh-in was more than 29 pounds away. Losing every ounce of that fat, which nobody can do and stay healthy, would still have covered well under half of the distance.

ESPN's second reading sharpens the point. If both readings are right, 8 percent at 154 and 8 percent at 139, then only about 1 pound of the first 15 came off as fat, and roughly 14 came from fat-free mass: water, glycogen, gut content and muscle. Body fat readings carry an error of a point or more either way, so treat that split as an estimate. How much a body fat number can tell you.

The first calculation needs no such caveat. There was not enough fat on him to reach 125 without losing something else.

The opposite case, a fighter with plenty of fat and a very long descent every camp, is Paddy Pimblett's.

My reading, from the outside: this is what a fighter who is already lean at 135, which is how he described himself, runs into when the division below is 10 pounds lighter. The fat that would make the drop cheap is not there, so the weight has to come out of everything else.

What he said happened in camp

In June 2019, on Chael Sonnen's podcast, he gave his account. He had pushed his body to the extreme, and about 6 weeks before the fight it began to fail: he was tired, and he no longer wanted to get up for practice. He tested his blood during camp and found that his hematocrit, the share of the blood made up of red cells, had dropped.

He then started injecting ProCrit, an anemia drug that is a synthetic form of EPO. EPO drives red blood cell production, which raises oxygen delivery. He said he knew it was prohibited, and that he did not think he could have taken the fight without it.

Nothing in that account reduces the violation, and he did not claim it did. What it does is connect the drug to the cut in his own words.

The sanction

USADA's decision is short. An in-competition urine sample collected on January 18, 2019, the day of the weigh-in, contained recombinant EPO. He accepted a 2-year period of ineligibility, the standard sanction under the UFC policy for a non-specified substance, backdated to that day. USADA also re-analyzed a sample from December 28, 2018, and found EPO in that one too.

The New York State Athletic Commission suspended him for a year. He gave up the bantamweight title before USADA announced the sanction.

EPO is injected. The UFC's head of athlete health at the time made the point that it does not turn up in contaminated supplements, which is why it is treated as one of the most serious violations there is. How strict liability works for fighters.

What the fight and the rest of the record show

The fight lasted 32 seconds. Cejudo stopped him with punches in the first round, and afterwards Dillashaw said he had felt good going in and that the stoppage came too early. Whether the cut decided that night cannot be known from the outside, and I will not pretend otherwise.

He returned at 135 in July 2021 and beat Cory Sandhagen by split decision. His last fight, for the bantamweight title in October 2022, was a loss to Aljamain Sterling. He never fought at 125 again.

The number to check before any drop

Body fat decides whether a lower division is reachable at all. Multiply body weight by body fat percentage and you have the most that could ever come off as fat, and the amount that can come off safely is well below that. When the distance to the limit is larger, the rest comes from water, glycogen and muscle, and the camp starts to feel the way he described it.

The calculator shows what a given gap means at your own weight, and choosing the division is where that number should be used, before anything is signed.

Common questions

How much weight did TJ Dillashaw cut for 125?

According to ESPN's coverage of the camp, he weighed 154 pounds with 8 percent body fat when he agreed to the fight and 124.6 at the official weigh-in 12 weeks later, a loss of 29.4 pounds.

Why did TJ Dillashaw take EPO?

By his own account, because his body began to crash about 6 weeks before the fight during the cut to 125, and he did not think he could take the fight without it. He said he knew it was prohibited.

How long was TJ Dillashaw suspended for EPO?

USADA suspended him for 2 years, backdated to January 18, 2019, when the positive sample was collected, and the New York State Athletic Commission for 1 year. He gave up the bantamweight title before the USADA sanction was announced.

Can EPO come from a contaminated supplement?

According to the UFC's head of athlete health at the time, no. EPO is injectable only and does not turn up in contaminated supplements, which is why a positive test is treated as one of the most serious violations.