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Side-by-side pic: Lyoto Machida at light heavyweight vs. middleweight 'Dragon' debut at UFC Fight Night 30

What goes up, must come down. Get a look at the new-and-improved Lyoto Machida as he prepares to make his middleweight debut against Mark Munoz tomorrow in Manchester.

ZUFFA LLC via Getty Images

Lean and mean!

Lyoto Machida tipped the scales at 185 pounds earlier today at the UFC Fight Night 30 weigh in event (results here) with such ease, it was almost as if he'd been doing it his entire career.

Not so.

"The Dragon" is making his first trip to the middleweight division after finding himself in no man's land at 205 pounds. True, he once held the light heavyweight championship, but a recent loss to Phil Davis eliminated him from the division title chase.

Here's a look at Machida 2.0:

Machida-sbs_medium

Click to enlarge. Photos courtesy of Esther Lin for MMA Fighting and ZUFFA LLC via Getty Images.

In order to throw his name into the 185-pound hat, Machida must first dispose of longtime division stalwart Mark Munoz, who wants to make a run for the title himself. They'll slug it out in tomorrow night's UFC Fight Night 30 main event, which takes place at the Phones 4u Arena in Manchester, England.

See their staredown pic here.

So, having now seen the difference between the Brazilian at both weights, how do you factor that -- as well as how smoothly he made the cut -- into his approach against "The Filipino Wrecking Machine?"

For more on "Machida vs. Munoz" click here.


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