With both men hitting their mark on the scales ahead of Saturday night’s UFC 253 headliner on ‘Fight Island’, Israel Adesanya and Paulo Costa had to be separated on the stage during their pre-fight stare-down.
Title challenger Paulo Costa, who was wearing a BJJ black belt, removed a white belt from his pocket and threw it at Adesanya who retorted immediately by whipping it back at the Brazilian before Dana White was forced to separate the two warring middleweights.
Costa’s jibe came after Adesanya had told the media that Costa “sucks as a grappler“, a point that he was apparently keen to challenge. This tense confrontation came after both men his their 185-pound marks on the scales to make their world title fight official.
Meanwhile, Dominick Reyes and Jan Blachowicz also registered light heavyweight championship weight ahead of their battle for the vacant 205-pounds title.
Two fighters missed weight during the two-hour weigh-in window. Zubaira Tukhugov weighed in at 150-pounds for his featherweight fight with Hakweem Dawodu — a full 4-pounds over the featherweight non-title limit. Ludovit Klein also missed by the same amount in advance of his featherweight fight with Shane Young.
Both Tukhugov and Klein are expected to be fined a percentage of their purses.
The full UFC 253 weigh-in results are:
MAIN CARD
(C) Israel Adesanya (184) vs. Paulo Costa (185) – for middleweight title
Jan Blachowicz (205) vs. Dominick Reyes (205) – for vacant light heavyweight title
Kai Kara-France (126) vs. Brandon Royval (126)
Sijara Eubanks (136) vs. Ketlen Vieira (136)
Hakeem Dawodu (145) vs. Zubaira Tukhugov (150) — Tukhugov missed weight
PRELIMINARY CARD
Alex da Silva (156) vs. Brad Riddell (156)
Jake Matthews (170) vs. Diego Sanchez (170)
Ludovit Klein (150) vs. Shane Young (146) — Klein missed weight.
Aleksa Camur (206) vs. William Knight (205)
Juan Espino (255) vs. Jeff Hughes (258)
Khadis Ibragimov (206) vs. Danilo Marques (206)
