Do I have to cut weight?

For a first one, no. Pick the division your body already sits near and turn up strong. That is the entire plan.

Cutting is a tool for people with a reason for it, and it charges you every time. A dehydrated athlete gasses early, moves slow and takes shots worse. Plenty of first bouts are lost in a sauna on the Thursday, not in the ring on the Saturday.

What I actually do is check your weight and your rest through fight week and make sure you are eating and drinking like an athlete instead of guessing. If your walking-around weight sits awkwardly between two divisions, that gets fixed in the eight or ten weeks of training and food before the date, not in a panic over the last seventy-two hours. See how long a fight camp runs.

Water is where first-timers go wrong in both directions. Turning up to fight week already behind is common and makes everything harder, and playing games with water in the last few days is worse: how much water to bring. What actually moves the needle late is sleep and food, both boring, both effective: how to recover between sessions. And if there is a same-day weigh-in, plan the whole day backwards from it rather than improvising: what fight night actually looks like.

Anything drastic is a medical question, not a coaching one. Sweat suits, water loading, fasting, pills, whatever you read on a forum. Talk to a doctor and I will train around whatever they tell you. I am a coach. I am not writing you a diet.

Tell me the event and the division early, before you sign anything.