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19th Dec 2017

Khabib Nurmagomedov finally addresses weight rumours

Straight from the horse's mouth

Ben Kiely

What in the world does Khabib Nurmagomedov weigh?

Fans are understandably concerned about how much Khabib Nurmagomedov weighs ahead of his highly-anticipated return bout against Edson Barboza at UFC 219.

Nurmagomedov has missed weight once in his UFC career. At UFC 160, he came in two-and-a-half pounds over the lightweight limit for his bout against Abel Trujillo. He was given two hours to cut down to the upper limit of 156 lbs, but he opted to forfeit a percentage of his fight purse to his opponent instead.

Earlier this year, a botched weight cut forced him to withdraw from his scheduled interim title fight against Tony Ferguson at UFC 209. He was rushed to hospital the morning of the weigh-ins and was rehydrated with the use of IVs, which is prohibited in the UFC. ‘The Eagle’ was given an exemption to use it for medical reasons.

Eight months after that debacle, he is scheduled to return to the Octagon. Initial reports that he was keeping the weight low early in his fight camp.

Since then, Josh Thomson, the co-captain of Khabib’s team, dropped some concerning comments regarding Nurmagomedov’s weight.  During an appearance on the Big Brown Breakdown, he claimed that Khabib was actually in the mid 190s around the time of Helwani’s tweet and had yet to drop below 182 lbs.

Nurmagomedov shed some light on the situation during a recent social media Q & A. His message was simple, “don’t believe everything you hear on the internet.”

“I weighed this morning, 15lbs (left to cut). 14 days or two weeks to weigh-in, I think it’s good. Seven kilograms, not bad.”

That’s what we wanted to hear. If Nurmagomedov is telling the truth, one would hope that making 156 lbs would be tiramisu cake walk.