Seven QUESTIONS WITH...NUTRITIONIST AND UFC FIT CONSULTANT MIKE DOLCE

FSM: You’ve worked with some of the biggest names in MMA, and have become Dana White’s go-to-guy when he has a fighter who’s struggling to make weight. How has your relationship with the UFC developed?
Dolce: I’ve been working with mixed martial artists since before Zuffa purchased the UFC, since before there were unified rules, and since before the term “mixed martial arts” was even invented. Twelve years ago I was working with UFC athletes, and from that point the people inside the UFC have seen me and become aware of my work, primarily with their most troubled athletes. I became known as the guy that would get the worst weight-cutters in the game into great shape. Never in my career has an athlete failed to make weight or underperformed as a result of their training programme, and that’s because of myself, my science and techniques. This is my life and this is my passion, and after stepping across the UFC stage with over 150 fighters, the people in Zuffa realised that what I was doing was something vastly different to what every other coach on the planet was doing.
Now, I thought I was just doing the same job as everybody else; I didn’t quite realise that my techniques were so different – I just thought we were doing good work. But when Dana White and Lorenzo Fertitta decided they wanted to move forward with a fitness programme, they told their executives, ‘If Dolce doesn’t sign on the dotted line then we’re going to scrap the project, because we can’t go into the market with anything less than the absolute best.”
That blew my mind to hear that, and it gave me the confidence to go forward and say the things I’m saying.

Elsewhere, UFC Fit has been sold to people as something they could do in their homes. What’s the benefit of linking up with Gymbox?
In the United States and Australia, UFC Fit is also available inside our UFC Gyms. It’s an amazing partnership that proved the model. So when we moved to the UK, we were looking for a proper partner, and that’s why Gymbox immediately became number one on our list: they are the premier provider of combat-based programmes for in-gym use, so we knew there was a possible relationship that could be excellent for both of us.
So while we’ll be releasing the home version of the programme sometime in 2014, we can immediately introduce it to the public at Gymbox, to allow the in-gym training that creates the community support. You can start your training here at Gymbox, and then soon you’ll be able to continue that training in your own home.

What’s the best strategy for successfully cutting weight?
The weight-cut starts 52 weeks before competition. If you start your weight cut the week of competition, you’ve already made a drastic mistake. Even if you start cutting weight eight weeks before competition, you’re not going to be in quite the shape that you could be.
What I do is take a lifestyle-based approach to health and fitness, knowing that the healthier the athlete, the better the athlete will perform, and the easier their body will adapt to the weight cut. That’s why my athletes are able to compete consistently at such elite levels, and only get better each time they turn up.

How do you handle fighters who don’t have good diets?
I love athletes like that. When I start working with athletes, I don’t try to force my principles on them; instead, I try to troubleshoot what they’ve been doing wrong, and educate them into what they could do better. Fortunately, I’m an advocate of eating a lot of food, often, staying completely hydrated, and training intelligently. So the athlete immediately starts feeling better when they begin following my suggestions, because they’re eating every two to three hours, and they’re eating a meal that they absolutely love. Once they do that, their muscle mass increases, their body fat decreases, their energy levels go through the roof, and they gain greater clarity of thinking. Their ability to perform also improves. It’s very natural, because they feel better from the first meal, and it continues to get better as they go along.

What is the theory behind eating lots of small meals?
The problem with eating a few square meals a day is that it’s only eating specific foods - things like chicken, broccoli and rice are very common. It’s very bland food, and unfortunately people become nutrient deficient because they’re not varying their food sources. What I try to do is have them eat often, constantly moving their metabolism forward, keeping their blood sugar stable, and ensuring they get all the essential nutrients they need to stay healthy and recover from the intensive training sessions. This way, their body continues to build muscle mass and lose fat as they get closer to competition, as opposed to the other way, where their body starts breaking down. That’s what happens with bodybuilders: when they step onto the stage, that’s the unhealthiest they’ve been, whereas with my athletes, the day of competition is the healthiest day of their life.

At the opposite extreme; how do you ensure a fighter doesn’t wear themselves out by doing too much training?
That something that comes from the education process. I’m an advocate of resting completely, training intelligently, and feeding the body a wide variety of nutrients. If any of those steps are not being taken, then there will be misperformance.
When I work with an athlete, I make sure they are resting completely. With most, I become the filter between them and their coaches; I’m not telling them how to grapple or kick, but what I do is offer structure to coaches to follow – when to train them intensively and when the athlete needs to take time off. I build that structure into their training programme to make sure they are not over-trained. I would rather have an under-trained athlete than an over-trained one, knowing that the over-trained athlete will be too burnt out to do anything, whereas an under-trained athlete will still start the fight sharp.

Finally, what advice would you give to our readers about staying in shape and improving their physique?
I’m going to make this very simple for everybody. The first step is to drink more water. The second step is to eat real food, as I call it: home-grown nutrients. The third step is to eat often, every two to three hours, based on what you just did and what you’re about to do. The next is to eat until you’re satisfied, not until your full. And the last one is to be accountable, and that’s so simple anybody can do it, regardless of your educational background, your finances or health and fitness goals.
If you follow those principles you can get in amazing shape, and have the body you want. Then we start to add the training on top of that: you train intelligently with a programme like UFC Fit, to continue to improve your body. In this age of information, the internet makes all of this easily available, so it comes down to applying these simple daily principles.

UFC Fit is the first training and nutrition programme from the Ultimate Fighting Championship. UFC Fit launches on March 1 and will be exclusively available at all Gymbox branches. For more information visit www.uf