Mackenzie Dern Will Stay at Strawweight Despite Weight Cutting Struggles

Mackenzie Dern will stay at strawweight.

The highly touted prospect who just made her UFC debut earlier this year has spent several days working at the UFC Performance Institute in Las Vegas in hopes of getting help to keep her weight in check for the future.

For her last fight against Amanda Cooper in May, Dern came in a whopping seven pounds over the strawweight limit before earning a first round submission victory the next day.

Dern faced a mountain of criticism for missing weight in large part because it was the third time she’s done it during her short professional fighting career.

Still with so much potential for her future, the UFC decided to work with Dern in hopes of either helping her cut weight to compete at 115 pounds or convince her that she had to fight at flyweight moving forward.

It seems after working with the nutritionists and experts at the UFC Performance Institute that Dern is convinced more now than ever that she’s built to be a strawweight and that’s where she’s going to stay.

”Everyone here agrees I have a body type that fits at strawweight, in the category that I am, so the plan is to continue in it,” Dern told Combate in Brazil. “But we want to diet and train so that I do not have to cut so much weight, I’ll cut very little. After the fight, I will not go up that much.

“Regardless of what will be decided on the weigh-in, whether or not it will return for the afternoon, it will not change my situation much, because, the way they want me to be the best possible athlete, it will be a very quiet thing.”

Dern also admitted that taking fights back-to-back in March and May probably contributed to her weight cutting woes but ultimately she’s taking responsibility for her shortcomings.

The only thing she can do now is move forward and Dern hopes to continue working with the UFC Performance Institute in hopes that she will be healthy and well prepared for her next weight cut before fighting again.

“I’m learning here every day, every day I learn something different from my body that I did not even know, things that get in the way of my cut, that I had difficulty due to the way I cut,” Dern explained. “Now that I’m working with the UFC, I’m going to come back here every four weeks, take the tests to see how my body is reacting. But otherwise my workout will continue normal.”