HBO’s ‘Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel’ Investigates Weight-Cutting in MMA

With its 25th anniversary this season, HBO’s “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel” returns on Sept. 22 (10 p.m. ET) and features a topic central to the mixed martial arts landscape: The widely-practiced method of weight-cutting.

Producer Jake Rosenwasser and correspondent David Scott explore what is described as extreme dehydration practices used by mixed martial arts fighters to make weight.

Weight Cutting:

A day before a mixed martial arts fight, competitors determined to gain a competitive edge and fight at a lower weight class often dangerously dehydrate themselves, sometimes dropping close to 20 percent of their weight in a matter of hours. Scott examines the serious health complications associated with weight-cutting, which has endangered fighters’ lives, and at times, proven to be fatal, leaving some in the sport to question whether the age-old practice should be reined in.