My weight cut experience for IBJJF Worlds 2023
Written by Jaclyn | 11 minute read
Left: beginning of my weight cut, 132.5lbs, 19% body fat
Right: the end of my weight cut, 125lbs, 16% body fat
Welcome to our first blog post!
This is about my experience cutting weight for one of the biggest gi jiu jitsu tournaments in the world - IBJJF World’s — held in Long Beach, California every June.
To give you some back story, I’m a (new) purple belt in Brazilian jiu jitsu (this blog is about my blue belt expierence at World’s) and I’ve been training since 2018 at one of the biggest gyms in Toronto — Toronto BJJ.
By NO means am I a professional level athlete, but I compete 3-5 times a year. Up until this year, I’ve only ever competed in the Light weight division (129-141.6lbs by IBJJF standards), but this year my coach Vicky really encouraged me to try cutting down to Feather weight (118-129lbs).
So this is how it went!
Start date: March 7th (weight: 132.5lbs)
End date: June 3rd (weight: 125lbs + the gi)
I gave myself 3 months to cut, which is a pretty generous amount of time. I did this intentionally because…
A) I wanted to take my sweet-ass time to avoid feeling and performing like shit if I did it too fast;
B) I wanted to give myself EXTRA time in case things didn’t go as planned; and
C) I signed up for a comp early May (the Ontario Open) and wanted to make Feather weight for it. I treated this as a practice comp for World’s aiming to cut weight for this tournament and just maintain it for World’s
At the start of my weight cut (March 7th) I weighed 132.5lbs and hit my goal of 125lbs by the end of April. I gave myself 4lbs of leeway for the weight of the gi (125 + 4 = 129lb, perfect!)
Here’s what I’m going to cover:
Why and how I cut weight
Did it affect my performance?
Managing social outings - APRIL IS MY BIRTHDAY MONTH!
Period things & ovulation - what happened?!
Overall competition experience - did it make a difference? Was it worth it?!
Conclusion & plans moving forward
1. WHY and HOW I cut weight
To cut 7lbs of weight I counted macros
I’ve counted macros back in 2012 when I first started working as a personal trainer. Back then I wanted get lean for aesthetic reasons, sport performance wasn’t on the line. I did it very loosely … and stubbornly!
I went low carb and JUST ate salads and protein all day, everyday — no fruit, starchy veggies, potatoes, grains, pastas or breads — because at the time I thought the only way to get crazy lean was to go keto and get myself into ketosis. Long story short, it didn’t work, yet I stuck with it far toooo long just waiting, wishing, hoping that it would finally “click” and I’d magically get shredded …but it never worked!
I’ve since learned that using a more balanced macronutrient ratio, that takes total calories into account, works MUCH better for me.
When I started tracking the biggest adjustment I had to make was to eat more LEAN meat (chicken, turkey, egg whites, lean cuts of steak, extra lean ground beef) and less fatty, delicious cuts of steak (YUM!!!) I had to be more conscious about my fat intake which heavily influenced my overall calories.
FYI, fat is NOT bad! But when you’re working within a caloric restraint, consuming high fat foods on a balanced macro plan is going to easily push you over your daily fat target because fat, per gram, is much higher in calories compared to carbs and protein
1g fat = 9 calories
Whereas 1g protein = 4 calories, and 1g carbs = 4 calories
Tracking macros isn’t for everyone, I realize this, but I personally love how calculated it is. You set up your targets, follow and record everything diligently, and if it’s not working, you change something and try again. Because macros are so easy to manipulate it works a lot better for me than just guessing, or severely limiting the foods I can eat. I’m not guessing, I’m actually calculating, trying it out, then re-assessing with weekly weigh-ins honest check-in’s with myself about how I’m feeling and how closely I’ve been tracking. You have so much control and there’s very little guess work once you get into the swing of things.
I recommend everyone experiment with tracking macros for a couple of weeks (or even just a few days!) to LEARN and become more in-tune with what you’re eating. Even if you’re someone who isn’t looking to change your body composition or achieve huge goals it can be an eye-opening experience.
The most common thing clients say when they first start tracking:
“OH, I’M NOT EATING ENOUGH PROTEIN! Most things I eat are just carbs and fat”
How did I decide what my macros should be?
I used an app called Carbon, and after plugging in my info — age, weight, height, body fat, goal, activity level, and if I wanted “balanced” macros or not — it suggested I start around 1900 calories/day which I eventually tapered down to 1600-1700 near the end of my cut.
At the end of my weight cut I was around 1681 calories = 120g protein, 145g carbs, 69g fat
Here’s a snapshot of the app I used.
I stayed around the 1800-1900 mark for the first 2 weeks, and then I got really sick with strep throat which brought me down to 1100-1200 calories a day (NOT intentional!) for about 4-5 days, it just hurt SO BAD to eat! At this point, I was trying my best to hit my macros, but ended up eating mostly carbs and fat (soft things that were least irritating to my mouth). Eating protein was the worst! I dropped 3 lbs in a week because of this!!
Thankfully, according to the InBody scan we have at the gym, it said I lost mostly body fat and maintained my muscle mass during this big drop. PHEW!
These are my InBody results throughout my weight cut. Highlighted is the important data I tracked; Skeletal Muscle Mass, Body Fat Mass & Weight.
Left: 02/28/2023 (about a week before I started cutting weight) Right: 05/05/2023 (before the Ontario Open)
2. Did a caloric deficit affect my performance?
Yes and no. Let me explain…
Around week 5 I was sitting around 126-127lbs, but I started feeling depleted whenever I’d train bjj or lift. It was a similar feeling to when I went low carb — I felt weaker and my conditioning had gone to shit. My muscles felt heavy, they would burn and feel tired doing things that didn’t typically make them feel that way.
My solution? I added in a re-feed day once a week.
What’s a re-feed day?
One day (or more) a week where you increase your calories back to maintenance, typically in the form of carbs. I upped my carbs by 100 grams = 400 calories, bringing me close to maintenance calories. I felt the difference the next day during training! I had much more stamina and strength and it didn’t make me gain weight.
One day of increased calories will not make you gain fat, it’s overall weekly volume that matters!
I was lifting 3-4 hours/week and doing jiu jitsu 6-8 hours/week. Regarding my lifting performance, I did have to let go of any strength goals and hitting PR’s at this point (this is my forever goal, ha!). Instead I had to focus on maintaining the strength I already had, staying healthy, injury free and NOT losing precious muscle mass. It was hard for me to let this go, and I had to remind myself to be realistic with my goals right now and that this was temporarily.
My real focus was jiu jitsu, not lifting.
3. Managing social outings - Hello birthday month!!
April is a busy birthday month for me, not only is it my birthday but I have quite a few friends with birthdays during this month too … I had 3 birthday outings during my cut! Eeep!
At this point, I already started integrating a re-feed day once/week so I made these birthday meals my “re-feed meal” even if that birthday outing didn’t technically fall on the right re-feed day of the week. While I was out, I continued to eat protein-focused foods, but I also didn’t track what I ate too closely. I eye-balled it and let it be but I also didn’t go wild and crazy. I knew I was going to be over on calories and that I probably wasn’t going to follow my macros perfectly, but it didn’t matter because…
A) I still had lots of time before my competition(s);
B) I knew it was just one day of the week and one day isn’t going to ruin everything; and
C) It was my friggin birthday! I’m going to enjoy myself and eat some cake! :)
TBH, I will say, once you have a “freebie meal”, it’s challenging to get yourself back on track the following day (at least for Greg and myself it was!) Also, keep in mind, for some people re-feed days might not work if you have an all-or-nothing mentality. If that’s the case, you need to figure out a different approach and/or tackle your relationship with food first.
Alcohol – I drank a little that weekend (2 drinks. Woo! gettin’ wild!) and I felt depleted for a couple days afterwards. probably dehydration related. I retained some water which bumped my weight up slightly, but I wasn’t concerned because I new it would go back down quickly.
4. Period things!
Periods! I’m big into all-things women’s health (especially women’s health + athletics) and I want to discuss this.
Did my period affect my weight during check-in days? I think so, but not by THAT much. I usually get some bloating the day before and on the first day of my period. On these days the number on the scale went up slightly (by about one pound), but it would also fluctuate day-to-day regardless of my period by 0.5-2lbs. I also knew it wasn’t body fat, just water retention, so I wasn’t worried.
Luckily this year I was on the tail end of my period during Worlds, PHEW! (Last year I got my period the day BEFORE I fought, ARGH!!) Unfortunately, as a female in a weight class sport, it’s something to be aware of. Every women is different though so you may, or may not, have to take bloating/water retention/period things into consideration during weigh-ins.
Did my weight cut and calorie deficit affect my period? Did it stop ovulation?
No! It didn’t seem to, thankfully.
Being in a BIG deficit for TOO long can certainly screw with your hormones though and could lead you to lose your period and/or not ovulate. Just keep an eye on these things. Your period is like your “monthly health report card” — if something is off in this department, it can affect your overall performance. You NEED certain hormones to feel good and perform at your best and if you’re period is off, it could mean certain hormones are out of whack.
I track my ovulation using an app called NaturalCycles (using FAM – fertility awareness method). I take my basal body temperature each morning and when it rises and stays elevated for the rest of my cycle it means I’ve ovulated. Using this method my ovulation didn’t seemed to be affected by the cut.
According to my app I continued to ovulate regularly so that was good!
If I stuck on this cut for longer, or was in a larger deficit, maybe things would have gone haywire? I’m not sure.
5. Overall competition experience — was it worth it?
Yes and yes! 100% worth it!
The opponents I faced at both competitions (the Ontario Open and IBJJF World’s) felt lighter.
Normally fighting in Light, I would sit in the middle to lower end of the bracket, but for Feather I was now sitting at the top. I also felt like a giant compared to most of girls in this division which was hilarious because I’m really not tall!
won my first, lost my second
I’m enjoying being in this weight class so far, and it was fun to push myself to see what my body could handle mentally and physically during the cut.
I’ll cut weight again for future tournaments.
6. Conclusion and future plans
Overall the weight cut was easier and more effective than I expected. Considering my past, I was worried I’d get hung up on certain macro ratios and be stubborn to change them, but my mindset is much different now. I’ve grown and learned a lot both as a coach and a person compared to 10 years ago during my “stubborn low carb” phase.
My body responded faster than I thought it would. Once again, relating to my past experience I thought my weight wouldn’t budge, but I also had strep throat which accelerated the weight loss and was an unexpected blip in the whole process.
Did I miss certain foods? Yes and no. Technically, I could eat whatever fit my macros. I could eat cookies and chips and “fun foods”, but it would screw up my day and leave little to no room for healthier food.
Would I have still gotten lean if all I did was eat junk? Yes, provided I stayed within my calorie target.
Would I have felt great and performed at my best if I ate those things everyday? Probably not
Would I be missing some key micro-nutrients just eating junk food void of essential nutrients? Yes
Was I hungry being in a deficit? Sometimes. During the evenings after hard training days (or the mornings after hard training or high activity days) I would wake up very hungry. Something I may consider changing next time is manipulating my daily calorie needs based on my activity level on certain days to help with hunger and performance (kind of like a re-feed day but a slightly different strategy).
Would I do this again? Yes!
Left: A typical macro friendly meal (lots of rice and lean meat) I’d aim for 30-35g of protein at each meal
Right: These macro-friendly muffins from Summerhill Market in Toronto, “Grab ‘n Go Muffins” is the brand, check them out if you’re in the GTA and looking for a pretty macro friendly treat!
What’s next? Am I going to be in a caloric deficit forever?
Haha, definitely not. As cool as being lean looks, muscles POPPIN’ and all, it’s not all that matters to me. Next up, I want to figure out my maintenance calories then enter a mini bulk phase when I’m not planning on competing so I can start building more muscle again #bodybuilding
I’m going to see how high I can take my calories without feeling horribly, disgustingly full all the time, while minimizing excessive body fat gain … let’s see what happens!
Final thoughts!
It’s SO cool to be able to manipulate your body through food and activity. Having the knowledge and willingness to experiment is a very powerful and liberating feeling for me. There is no special handbook that tells you EXACTLY how to do this, and no exact hard and fast rules for everyone to follow when it comes to macros, because everyone is different. Being able to experiment on myself is a great way to add tools to my expanding toolbox so I can continue to help guide more clients on their own personal journey.
Bodies can do some cool shit!
What are you doing with yours?
For more information on my weight cut and other fitness tips, check out our Instagram @kaliberhealth
