UFC 279: Khamzat Chimaev misses weight for Nate Diaz fight
At the UFC 279 weigh-ins, Khamzat Chimaev weighed 178 pounds.
There was no way the unbeaten Swedish boxer could shed the requisite weight in the hour following his first and final weigh-in. That meant he had to withdraw from his highly anticipated showdown with Diaz, the final fight on the Stockton brawler’s UFC contract. Fans were irritated that Khamzat Chimaev had disrupted a highly anticipated match, but White has since stated that the missed weight was due to doctor’s advice.
178.5 for @KChimaev. He will have an additional hour to make the weight.
[ #UFC279 | Tomorrow | Live on ESPN+ PPV: https://t.co/rJY1WZoKAA ] pic.twitter.com/0xTW3aTzwL
— UFC (@ufc) September 9, 2022
“If you watched him yesterday, he was incredibly skinny and should have came in on weight,” UFC president Dana White told reporters. “He began to lose weight and began to experience locking up, cramps, and other symptoms of a poor diet. Unlike ten years before, we sent in a doctor to assess if he should continue to lose weight, and the doctor advised him he shouldn’t.”
The promotion’s statement confirmed that depiction of events, saying, “Owing to a suggestion from the UFC medical staff, Khamzat Chimaev was recommended to halt reducing weight due to weight management difficulties.”
Khamzat Chimaev weighed in at 7.5 pounds over the limit ahead of his #UFC279 fight against Nate Diaz
(via @JohnMorgan_MMA) pic.twitter.com/jP8vwuPr76
— Sports Illustrated (@SInow) September 9, 2022
Chimaev weighed in at 178.5 pounds at the UFC weigh-in, seven and a half pounds above the non-title welterweight restriction.
Chimaev rushed to Twitter after failing to meet the weight restriction to playfully blame training partner Darren Till for the failure, tweeting a doctored photo of the duo alongside smiling emojis with the comment ‘it’s his fault.’
@darrentill2 It’s his fault 😂 pic.twitter.com/chmZTZ7ctc
— Khamzat Chimaev (@KChimaev) September 9, 2022
Fortunately, White was able to make a last-minute change to the fight card, which preserved some of the excitement around the fight card.
“It’s been a heck of a night and a hell of a morning,” White told the press. “It’s not by chance that we put men with similar weights on the same card in case something goes wrong, but it worked well. When something like this happens, you obviously have men who have been training for another individual for a long time. Getting these men to agree on different fights might be difficult at times, but we got ’em all done, and they’re all locked in.”
Tony Ferguson was supposed to fight Li Jingliang in the co-main event on Saturday night, but the former interim lightweight champion will now face Diaz instead. Chimaev, meantime, will battle 2020 MVP Kevin Holland at a catchweight, while the fighter who was slated to face Holland, Daniel Rodriguez, will fight Jingliang.
