SUMMARY
- Kayla Harrison fights Holly Holm in a bantamweight fight at UFC 300.
- Kayla Harrison will be making 135 lbs for the first time in her MMA career.
Kayla Harrison makes her UFC debut against Holly Holm at UFC 300. While fans are excited about Harrison competing in the UFC, there is one big concern.
Kayla Harrison vs. Holly Holm is going to be a bantamweight fight (135 lbs). And it’s not familiar territory for the two-time Olympic gold medalist. Kayla Harrison has competed in the PFL’s lightweight division (155 lbs) and had tons of success outside of the UFC.
The former PFL lightweight champion was scheduled to fight Julia Budd in a featherweight fight. However, she ended up fighting Aspen Ladd in a catchweight (150 lbs) fight after Julia Budd pulled out of the fight.
It’s needless to say that Harrison has mostly fought in the lightweight division throughout her MMA career. However, things get worse as she has competed in weight classes higher than 155 lbs as well.
What are the weight classes Kayla Harrison has competed in?
What’s fascinating is that Kayla Harrison has competed in weight classes way higher than the 155 lbs division. Before MMA, the Olympian found insane success in the world of Judo.
Kayla Harrison competed and won both of her gold medals in 172 lbs at the Olympics. It is to be noted that Ronda Rousey, who won a bronze medal in Judo at the Olympics, competed in 139 lbs and 154 lbs divisions before making her UFC debut in bantamweight.
It’s hard to ignore the massive amount of weight Kayla Harrison cut for her fights in the PFL’s lightweight division. And now she will be forced to cut 20 lbs more for her UFC debut against Holly Holm, which is a daunting task.
What is Kayla Harrison’s weight?
In a past interview with Luke Thomas, Kayla Harrison confessed her true feelings about weight cuts in MMA. Speaking against the grueling weight-cut process, Harrison stated:
“First of all, I don’t believe in cutting weight, I think it’s terrible for your body, I think if you’re gonna win, you’re gonna win at whatever weight you compete at and I think it’s sending a bad message to young girls and young kids. I don’t want anyone, especially my niece or someone to think that to be thinner is to be better. I just don’t believe in that. You’re big, you’re strong, you’re powerful, that’s the message that I want to send.”
Harrison also revealed that she walked around 160 lbs to 165 lbs (in 2019) before she attempted to fight in the featherweight division (145 lbs). So it is safe to say that Kayla Harrison would be cutting around 25 lbs for her UFC debut.
Even if that’s a lot of weight, we have seen fighters make such extreme weight cuts without any trouble. Alex Pereira cut more than 20 lbs for his middleweight fights. And fighters like Islam Makhachev, Khamzat Chimaev, and Khabib Nurmagomedov have gone through grueling weight cuts for their UFC fights before.
It’s needless to say that Kayla Harrison would go on an extremely strict diet and training routine to cut weight for her UFC debut. And it won’t be surprising to see the grueling weight-cut process have a negative impact on Kayla Harrison’s performance at UFC 300.
