All four UFC 333 champions make weight as Caliari misses by 4.5 pounds in Abu Dhabi

All four title-fight competitors successfully made weight for UFC 333 in Abu Dhabi on Friday, setting up a clean championship card on Saturday — though a significant miss in the prelims threatened to steal the headlines.

Featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski weighed in at 144.5 pounds for his main event title defence against the undefeated Movsar Evloev, who came in exactly at the 145-pound limit. In the co-main event, Petr Yan and Merab Dvalishvili both registered 135 pounds for their bantamweight title trilogy, with Yan’s belt on the line.

The smooth run through the championship bouts was undercut by strawweight preliminary competitor Nicolle Caliari, who came in at 120.5 pounds — 4.5 pounds over the 115-pound non-title limit, even accounting for the standard one-pound allowance. As a result, her bout against Iasmin Lucindo, who made weight at 115 pounds, will proceed as a catchweight contest, with Caliari forfeiting 30 percent of her purse as a financial penalty for the miss.

The remaining 27 fighters on the card all made weight without issue during Friday morning’s session in Abu Dhabi.

The main card features Lone’er Kavanagh (125.5) against Ramazan Temirov (126) at flyweight, Alexander Volkov (256) taking on Rizvan Kuniev (265) in a heavyweight clash, and Aaron Pico (145.5) facing Losene Keita (146) at featherweight.

The preliminary card includes light heavyweight matchups between Azamat Murzakanov (206) and Dominick Reyes (205), and Nikita Krylov (206) against Abdul Rakhman Yakhyaev (206), alongside Abus Magomedov (185.5) vs. Cam Rowston (185) at middleweight and Grant Dawson (156) vs. Nurullo Aliev (155) at lightweight.

Early preliminary bouts include Colby Thicknesse (135.5) vs. Asaf Chopurov (136), Abubakar Vagaev (185.5) vs. Jacob Malkoun (186), Bolaji Oki (146) vs. Daniel Santos (146), and Kody Steele (156) vs. Noah Gugnon (156).