Rafael Alves Fight Cancelled After Missing Weight By 11.5 Pounds

Rafael Alves broke an unwanted UFC record, as he became the fighter to miss weight by the biggest margin on Friday afternoon, missing the featherweight mark by 11.5 pounds.

There has been many difficult weight cuts in the history of fight sports, and many occasions when fighters have failed to make weight, but it's usually by a couple of pounds.

On Friday Alves, weighing in ahead of UFC Vegas 19 on Saturday night, managed to miss the non title featherweight limit of 146 lbs by weighing in at 157.5 lbs.

That weight miss means that not only did he fail to be within the legal featherweight limit, but, he also missed the legal limit of 156 lbs for a non title lightweight fight.

Alves would have had to be fighting at super lightweight to have made a fight, although he'd have been close enough to lightweight to potentially given time to make weight.

However at feather he had far too much work to do so unsurprisingly the fight with Patrick Sabianti for Saturday had to be cancelled.

Alves was part of Dana White's contender series in August last year and defeated Alejandro Flores, with a second round guillotine choke.

He was meant to make his UFC card debut against Mike Trizano this weekend, until his opponent had to be pulled out because of injury before being replaced by Sabianti.

Following the cancellation of the fight, the 30-year-old took to social media to apologise for missing weight, saying, "Guys, I fell ill during my weight cut and my fight was cancelled. I'm sorry, but my health above everything."

Alves' apology on his Instagram story. Image: Instagram/@rafaeltheturn

The Brazilian is a former Titan FC interim lightweight champion but decided to cut the 10 lbs to fight at featherweight for his first UFC appearance, although clearly he didn't manage it.

He revealed earlier in the week that he was going to take teammate Colby Covington's advice and return back to his more natural weight.

"He [Covington] always tells me to move up a weight class," Alves told MMA Fighting, "He told me, 'You're big for this weight class and no one will catch you at 155.' I'm going up to 155 pounds after this fight."

"My normal weight is 195 pounds and I cut to 145. If I go to 155, I make weight no problem. I could make it today if I had to."

Clearly he wasn't kidding when he said he could have made 155!

Topics: Featherweight, MMA, USA, UFC Fight Night

Ryan Sidle

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