Tom here – I want to talk about something important.
When you’re cutting weight, you’ll often hear conflicting stories on how much water you should be drinking. Some will tell you to drink as little as possible, others will tell you that drinking water is fine as long as you control it. It can be difficult to know what to do when you’re under pressure to perform and make weight by a certain time – especially depending on the sport you compete in. When I was cutting weight for wrestling my coach would push me into practices that I wouldn’t agree with today. He just wanted me to do well, but while I made weight, I still think some of those practices might have hurt my performance.

Back to water. Here’s my take: you need water to live. You need more to perform. Controlling water intake is fine in moderation but if you’re trying to limit the water you drink to extreme levels you’re only hurting yourself. Long term water deprivation is not how to cut weight. After all – how are you going to lose any water weight if you don’t have any to begin with?

The best thing to do is drink plenty of water all year round, perhaps even more thank you feel thirsty for. Stick to water. Especially when cutting down on food intake, the water stops you from feeling so hungry. The only time to think about cutting water intake is a few days before a match. I would only start to seriously limit how much water I’d drink either the day of weigh in, or the day before. That way there is enough water weight to lose and I’d feel good enough to wrestle.

Sometimes you’ll find that you’re still a little over and thats when some people sweat out the extra weight by exercising in black trash bags to cut weight fast. I admit I did used to do this, but today the practice is illegal in wrestling and I can’t advise it. Be aware – this can be DANGEROUS and has killed people. Never, ever do it after long term water deprivation (which isn’t a good idea anyway). If you’ve been sensible with the water you drink, not limited yourself and need to sweat out a couple of pounds, then it be less dangerous – but I still can’t advise it.

The only time I ever had to sweat out extra water was when I screwed up my preparation. Remember: cutting weight is a process. Its mid to long term and much easier to do that way than all at once!