Bo Nickal has successfully made weight for UFC Des Moines after allegedly tipping the scales 37lb above the weight at the start of fight week.
Middleweight contender Nickal faces former ONE Championship title holder Reinier De Ridder in the biggest step up yet of his career on Saturday night. The pair fight in the co-main event of UFC Des Moines, which is headlined by a bantamweight clash between Cory Sandhagen and Deiveson Figueiredo.
Nickal has never come close to missing weight before in his UFC career, but fans were keen to see him on the scale today. Four days ago, he shared a video claiming that he weighed deep into heavyweight territory before beginning his cut.
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Bo Nickal makes weight after alleged 37lb cut for UFC Des Moines
This morning in the fighter hotel for UFC Des Moines, Bo Nickal tipped the scales at 185.5lb for his fight with Reinier De Ridder. He was relatively early to the scales, and both men made the same weight, with the Dutchman in fact looking worse for wear of the two.
It seemed relatively run of the mill, with neither man having an issue with making weight in their collective 28 professional bouts. But what made it an intriguing moment was a video shared by Nickal a few days ago where he stepped on the scales and appeared to be 222.6lb.
That meant he was facing a cut of almost 37lb in a week, which would have been disastrous for his preparations. However, it is likely that the video is staged for promotion, with Nickal visibly wearing a lot of clothes in the clip and being out of shot when the number shows up on the scale.
It is almost certainly a faked video posted with the intention of going viral and helping to promote this, his biggest fight to date in the UFC.
Bo Nickal opened up about massive ‘bulk’ ahead of UFC Des Moines
Nickal maintains that the video is legitimate, and told MMAFighting earlier this week that he had simply gone a little too heavy with his pre-fight bulking. He insisted that the video was legitimate, noting that he was lighter when he removed his clothes and shoes.
“It’s the biggest cut [for a fight] for sure,” Nickal said. “I think that I’m always looking to adjust things and make sure that I’m, in each camp and each training cycle, improving and getting better, and I felt like the [extra] size is something that’s good for me.”
During an earlier part of the interview, he added: “A big part of my last camp these last few months has been to bulk up. I felt like that’s something that I wanted to focus on was getting my weight a little higher and making sure that I’m a full-size middleweight.
“So coming in at the weight, it’s just part of the job for me. Bringing the weight down is something that I’m used to. With wrestling, I’ve weighed in in hundreds of times since I’ve been at a young age and it’s business as usual for me.
“So that was definitely a little more than what I’m used to, but part of the job. No worries… It was a little heavier than what I expected, and I was wearing a hoodie and stuff like that.
“So it was a little less than what we saw on the scale, but, yeah, I knew I had a lot of work to do at that moment, but it is again, part of the job.”