He’s sitting with his head in his palms without daring to look at the clock. It’s 200 degrees Fahrenheit, and despite his team right outside the door, he feels as alone and helpless as ever. Only three pounds to go for the fighter who has gut his body clean of any and all fluids, and repeating in his head is, “how bad do I want it?”
Wrestlers and fighters alike have consciously made the choice to put their bodies through abuse, that much is clear. The grueling practices, the endless conditioning sessions, and the hand-to-hand combat where the athletes leave everything on the mat in pursuit of victory are all components in the lives of fighters. You could say they have the hardest job in the world, but that may still be an injustice.
Yet one of the most difficult things that fighters have on their plate is making weight before a fight. The week leading up to a bout is where the mental toughness of the athletes is put to its ultimate test, and some would say is harder than the fight itself.
Sweet Sweat, a product looking to help the fighters with their unsung troubles endured before a fight. Albolene (a mix of mineral oil, petrolatum paraffin, ceresin and beta-carotene) is a popular weight cutting cream that fighters and wrestlers have used for years, but it poses certain problems with dehydrating and closing pores. Sweet sweat has developed a formula that opens pores, enhancing and accelerating the sweating process during exercise. It is activated by the body’s elevated heart rate, and the effectiveness of the product is directly correlated to how vigorous the activity is. Made of all natural (and pronounceable) ingredients, this cream was made exactly for cutting weight (unlike Albolene that was originally developed for removing makeup).
As long as the weight cutting game is still around, meaning same-day weigh ins are not implemented in the UFC, fighters will always have their own methods. Sweet Sweat, while currently selling their product to hundreds of fighters in big organizations (Bellator, Strikeforce, and UFC), and sponsoring just a handful of them, their goal is to become a official UFC product. They ideally would like for fighters to be supplied Sweet Sweat by the UFC, along with the other included supplies, before cutting weight.
Companies everywhere constantly try ot become the next biggest thing, yet all too often, products are released that just blend in with the rest. The science and idea behind Sweet Sweat has the fighters in mind, and aims to make what they do, just a little bit easier.
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