Supplements & nutrition
Supplements & nutrition
Everyday fuelling, label reading, supplement evidence and banned-substance risk.
The protein floor the combat-sport position stand says intake should not drop below during a descent, per kg body mass
Ricci et al., ISSN position stand, J Int Soc Sports Nutr 2025;22(1):2467909
Intake the general protein position stand says may be needed to maximise lean-mass retention in hypocaloric periods
Jäger et al., ISSN position stand, J Int Soc Sports Nutr 2017;14:20
Probability of a linear dose-response between daily protein and fat-free-mass change, across 29 studies
Refalo, Trexler & Helms, Strength Cond J, January 2025
Most nutrition questions in combat sports are really questions about what you can afford to lose. A fighter in a deficit is asking a body to repair from hard training while under-fuelled, and the useful literature is mostly about which inputs stop that from costing lean mass, bone or immune function.
Protein is the most studied of them. The combat-sport position stand puts the floor at 1.2–2.0 g/kg body mass during a descent; the general protein position stand suggests 2.3–3.1 g/kg/day may be needed to maximise lean-mass retention in hypocaloric periods in resistance-trained subjects, and a Bayesian meta-regression of 29 studies put the probability of a linear dose-response at over 97%. Protein during a weight cut reconciles those numbers, including the part where they are measured in different units.
The rest of the intake has floors too, and they are the ones people breach first when the scale stalls: carbohydrate periodisation, fat intake floors and micronutrients under energy restriction. Low energy availability in combat sports is what happens when several of them go at once.
Supplements are covered here on the same terms as everything else — what was measured, at what dose, and whether it matters to a fighter. Creatine and caffeine have the strongest cases; water pills have a much worse one than their popularity implies. Banned supplements and anti-doping risk is the one every tested athlete should read before buying anything.
Articles
Eating around two sessions a day and a job
The 30-minute anabolic window traced to its origin, what the ISSN combat stand says about sessions under six hours apart, and why the evidence is not in a deficit.
October 9, 2026 · 23 min read
Supplements & nutritionDaily hydration in fight camp
No combat sport appears in the sweat-rate literature. Here is what has actually been measured on ordinary training days, and why nobody can hand you a number.
October 8, 2026 · 23 min read
Supplements & nutritionWhat a long deficit costs beyond calories
A long deficit removes the food that carried iron, vitamin D and calcium. What the evidence shows, and why a blood test is the only honest answer. No doses.
October 7, 2026 · 21 min read
Supplements & nutritionThe dietary fat floor, and what is actually underneath it
The combat-sports position stand puts a fat floor under a descent. Both combat cohorts with measured fat data sat above it and were short on energy anyway.
October 6, 2026 · 22 min read
Supplements & nutritionCarbohydrate periodisation for fighters
Carbohydrate has a floor inside a camp deficit and a phase around it. What the 2025 ISSN stand puts under it, what depletion costs, and why train-low failed.
October 5, 2026 · 23 min read
Supplements & nutritionBeta-alanine for fighters
What the ISSN stand and trials in boxers, judoka and kickboxers say about beta-alanine's dose, its harmless tingling side effect, and where the evidence stops.
October 1, 2026 · 21 min read
Supplements & nutritionWhat to eat when cutting weight
Which foods earn a place on a fighter's plate in a deficit, what the trials actually measured, and which popular rules die the moment you chase the source.
September 29, 2026 · 21 min read
Supplements & nutritionDo water pills work for a weight cut?
Diuretics move fluid, and that is the least important fact about them. The 2026 Prohibited List, seven sanctioned athletes, and the kidney data.
September 28, 2026 · 21 min read
Supplements & nutritionWrestling diet plan for cutting weight
How a wrestler eats through a season-long descent: the macro floors, a worked sample day, tournament refuelling, school-day meals and the early RED-S signs.
September 23, 2026 · 22 min read
Supplements & nutritionFood logging accuracy in fight camp
Athletes under-report intake by a mean 19% against doubly labelled water. Here is where the error comes from, and why the log is still worth keeping.
September 11, 2026 · 23 min read
Supplements & nutritionBanned supplements and anti-doping risk
How a fighter fails a drug test without cheating: strict liability, supplement contamination, the 2026 Prohibited List, and what certification really covers.
September 2, 2026 · 22 min read
Supplements & nutritionCaffeine for fighters
What the ISSN position stand says about caffeine dose and timing, why the dehydration claim does not survive the meta-analysis, and its real cost during fight week.
September 1, 2026 · 20 min read
Supplements & nutritionLow energy availability and REDs in combat sports
The 30 kcal/kg threshold everyone quotes is not a diagnostic cut-off, and the IOC says so. What REDs is, what the evidence covers, and why fighters are high risk.
September 1, 2026 · 20 min read
Supplements & nutritionProtein during a weight cut
Two position stands give two different protein numbers for a fighter in a deficit. Here is why, which unit each uses, and what the 2025 meta-regression settled.
September 1, 2026 · 20 min read
Supplements & nutritionCreatine for fighters
Creatine has the best evidence of any legal supplement and it adds body mass. What the ISSN stand, the IOC consensus and the 2026 WADA list actually say.
August 31, 2026 · 22 min read
Questions fighters ask
How much protein does a fighter need when cutting weight?
The combat-sport position stand treats 1.2–2.0 g/kg body mass as a floor during a descent, not a target. The general protein position stand suggests 2.3–3.1 g/kg/day may be needed to maximise lean-mass retention during hypocaloric periods in resistance-trained subjects, and the underlying systematic review scaled that upward with the severity of restriction and with leanness — measured per kg of fat-free mass rather than body weight.
What should you eat while cutting weight for a fight?
Enough protein to defend lean mass, carbohydrate above the floor the training requires, and fat not driven to zero — then the deficit comes out of what is left. The specific grams change every week as bodyweight falls, which is the part that is tedious to do by hand and the reason the app recalculates it.
Do water pills help you make weight?
They move the scale and that is not the same as helping. Diuretics are banned by WADA for tested athletes, carry real cardiovascular risk during an acute cut, and shift fluid the athlete then has to replace before competing. Fighter Cut covers what is actually known about them in its own article.
Is creatine a problem during a weight cut?
Creatine draws water into muscle, so it can add a small amount of scale weight — which is why some fighters drop it near a weigh-in. Whether that trade is worth losing the performance effect depends on how close the cut is and how much margin you have.
How do tested athletes avoid a banned-substance positive from supplements?
By treating the label as insufficient evidence. Contamination and undeclared ingredients are the usual route to a positive rather than deliberate use, which is why third-party batch testing matters and why the app carries WADA flags and testing badges on every supplement in its register.