How Do You Lose Weight Fast For Wrestling

Apparently, we grow our kids short and slim, so when my very skinny freshman son decided to join the high-school wrestling team, he was quite quickly asked if he would wrestle at varsity in the 103 weight class. He wrestled the year before in eighth grade at 90 pounds, and although he had grown a lot, I still went into the process assuming that thin kids would never have to cut weight for a sport.

Before the season started, the boys do something called an alpha weigh-in. That was explained to me as basically their base weight along with a urine test and body fat percentage. Using some sort of algorithmic calculations, the coaches would determine how much weight it was safe for him to lose.

This is a huge health upgrade from when I was in high school and there were no such restrictions! I was incredibly pleased that wrestlers are no longer asked to cut dramatic, potentially harmful amounts of weight.

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Paul’s alpha weigh-in determined that he could only cut from 106 to 104. I mistakenly thought that this weigh-in applied to the entire season and that he would not be asked to cut more weight for wrestling matches…

Imagine my surprise when on a Tuesday morning, which is “weigh-in day” before a Wednesday meeting, Paul ate a bowl of oatmeal the size of his five-year-old brother’s first serving. In other words, that’s about a fourth of what he would usually eat before having seconds.

As he was packing his lunch, I said, “What’s going on, bud, aren’t you feeling well?” He informed me that he had to cut two pounds by five o’clock that evening.

How To Lose Weight For Wrestling Fast

“What!?” I cried, “You’re telling me this now? When did you find this out? Paul, I would have done research on how to cut weight safely if I had some advance warning. You have to do this

“Did the coaches give you any instructions on how to do this?” I asked. He explained that to the coaches basically just told him to drink lots of water early in the day, eat very light, and include a lot of fruit.

I was in shock and appalled that this was going to be our new reality for the season, so I set about asking health experts in my community for advice and researching safe ways to cut just a few pounds.

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Don’t get me wrong: I don’t think it’s safe or healthy for teenage boys to cut very much weight at all. Some boys come out of football season at 180 pounds and go into wrestling season at 160! This is not okay, and there are definitely potential short- and long-term health ramifications with yo-yo dieting and losing that much weight.

I do understand, though, that in the sport of wrestling as well as some others like judo, taekwondo, MMA fighting, and boxing, teenagers and young adults may need to cut just a few pounds to hit the weight they need.

As it turned out with Paul, he could drop two to three pounds easily in a wrestling practice just by sweating and exercising. He didn’t even wear plastic bags or sweatshirts like they used to when I was in high school. Gross!

How Wrestlers Cut Weight Without Risking Their Health

There are safe ways to lose a couple of pounds in a day if that’s what your sport requires, or better yet, maintain a healthy, competitive weight AND competitive energy and nourishment. I’m grateful to the following health experts for helping me out:

Before we jump into 5 practical ways for student-athletes (or adults!) to hit a competitive weight that they desire, we have to discuss the safety of this practice.

Plenty of sports require weight classes in both genders, and both in the sports world and things like pageants, we find young people obsessed with “cutting weight.”

Cutting Weight For Youth Wrestling

Although there are safety measures in place now to prevent severe dehydration, negative impacts begin at just 1% weight loss, and Jill Lane says that up to 75% of student-athletes are already dehydrated on a regular basis (defined as a 2% body weight loss from water).

Jill won’t even work with a client unless they’re willing to stay within a few pounds of competition weight the whole season, and her goal is to keep her athletes well-nourished and well-hydrated and then work on peak performance.

Many athletes, however, go on roller coasters of cutting weight and then “back to normal” which ends up being a binge on junk food.

Wrestling Diet To Gain Weight

An intense focus on food, particularly with body image in mind, can be a toxic ingredient for disordered eating, which affects 3-4% of adults and 2.7% of adolescents, two to five times higher for females.

Jess Sherman, MEd, RHN, calls for awareness of the red flags in the medical field for the practice of cutting weight. She pointed out that awareness alone has made great improvements when it comes to concussions and helping athletes avoid and recover, and she believes the same can happen here.

Dr. Kirk Gair works with a lot of high school athletes and has seen improvements in the dehydration regulations, but also coaches who have figured out how to get around those safety measures. He told me it’s not uncommon for coaches to take an athlete to a big competition and have them sit in their underwear in the van with the A/C on full blast on their skin — to shiver out a last pound or two.

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He assesses: “It is dangerous, but the pressure from coaches and parents to get a scholarship leads to crazy actions.” He agrees with Jill Lane that athletes “need to focus on healthy eating all the time to be at their optimal weight.”

“I realize that many times athletes have to sacrifice optimal health and longevity in the long run, for optimal performance and ‘winning’ in the short term. But should that apply to high school athletes, especially wrestlers? The most effective way to ensure ‘healthy weight cutting’ and not lose performance is weeks and months BEFORE actual competition – a healthy diet with whole foods, fruits, vegetables, lean protein, and healthy fats. Add in instruction on refreshing quality sleep, optimal spine and posture, and stress reduction strategies, and you’ll have a high performing healthy athlete for the long haul. I love that guidelines and rules for cutting weight have been upgraded over the years. Now it’s a matter of following them and not falling prey to the ‘quick fix, short term, win at all costs’ dogma that can happen in competitive environments.”

Nutritionist Sara Vance is appalled that cutting weight in any way is still allowed: “If it were my kid, I’d tell him to wrestle at his normal weight, and not punish his body like all the others – and he will be stronger than the others who are not taking care of themselves – enough to wrestle in that weight class.”

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Imagine if athletes were able to improve their strength, endurance, and decision-making capacity by 20% each just by how they chose to fuel themselves? Being one weight class up wouldn’t bring their performance down one bit.

Let’s talk about diet as nourishment, the way it should be, and not as a way to cut calories and weight for a temporary purpose.

If an athlete wants to compete at a very lean weight, it’s his or her responsibility to continue to be nourished with a variety of foods and enough calories to compete in their sport at their best level. So “diet” in this context isn’t what to eat on the day of weigh-in like my son was counseled. It should be looked at as a sustainable lifestyle, at least for the season.

Bjj Vs. Wrestling

Dr. Gair helps athletes in Southern California get off the processed carb roller coaster with what he calls a “healthy keto” eating pattern to both increase energy and remain very lean. He sometimes incorporates “healthy intermittent fasting” as well, but he cautions that it’s too easy to follow the rules but use processed foods and not enough vegetables, which is never the goal.

Jill Lane disagrees with a practical perspective: “I don’t do keto at all with youth… most are just trying to not live off junk food and are grossly undernourished and under fueled so it’s more about adding nourishing food than doing anything ‘fancy.’”

I appreciate both perspectives because you need to start your student-athlete where they are. If a wrestler is eating mostly processed junk food and tries to switch to a plant-based, intermittent fasting plan, they’ll likely have trouble sticking to it.

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On the other hand, if your family eats mostly real food already (and especially if you’ve got a kid with a self-disciplined personality), healthy keto with a focus on energy and plant foods might be just what they need.

I know high school kids who can stick fairly well to a salad-chicken-broccoli diet, at least for the days before big events, and with that sort of focus and discipline, they might as well have better fuel that will improve their performance on the mat as well as the number on the scale.

Here are the meal planning services (in no particular order) that

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