Win or Learn: MMA, Conor McGregor and Me: A Trainer's Journey

by John Kavanagh

  For Conor’s third professional fight, I decided to raise the bar. At Cage of Truth 3 on 28 June 2008, he’d face Artemij Sitenkov from Lithuania. This opponent was older and more experienced, and although he wouldn’t be able to trouble Conor if the fight stayed standing, Sitenkov had an extensive background in the Russian martial art of Sambo, which has its roots in various forms of wrestling and involves lots of leg- and arm-locks. In other words, I knew the fight would be over for Conor if it went to the ground. But perhaps there was a side of me that felt this cocky boxer needed to be submitted in order to appreciate the importance of that aspect of the game. And maybe that side of me also felt that he needed to be taught a lesson, because Conor’s mind still seemed to be focused more on partying than on training. When fighters turn up at my gym, they’ll get everything they need from me. But I won’t drag them to the gym. That’s something each individual needs to be accountable for.

  The plan for Conor in the fight was to land his strikes and back away, but Sitenkov wasted no time in shooting for a takedown, so that blueprint went straight out the window. Conor actually defended the takedown attempt well. Sitenkov opted to pull guard: dropping to his back, with his legs wrapped around Conor. Conor sought to posture up and land strikes, but then he made a costly error. In an attempt to pass guard – effectively, to breach Sitenkov’s defences – he allowed Sitenkov to transition and lock on to his leg in search of a kneebar submission.

  I just sat there thinking: What on earth are you doing? You don’t even know how to pass guard yet! The excitement of having so many of his friends and family there among the few hundred spectators in the crowd had obviously got into Conor’s head, and he pursued an ambitious move a little too enthusiastically in search of the finish. He didn’t yet possess the grappling pedigree to carry it out. As Sitenkov aimed to extend his leg and execute the finish, Conor tried to fight him off with punches on the ground. But eventually Sitenkov got what he wanted and Conor tapped out.

  That night was the first time I met Conor’s parents. They’d turned up to see him fight and it was all over in sixty-nine seconds. Parents and other loved ones are often worried about fighters getting badly hurt, but that’s never the primary concern for the fighters themselves. Their main issue is that they don’t want to be embarrassed in front of people they know. That’s what young men in the changing room have told me countless times: ‘Whatever happens, I just don’t want to look silly.’

  To be in a bloody brawl and being smashed to pieces, there’s probably a small part of them that enjoys that. But to be quickly knocked out or submitted is every young fighter’s worst nightmare, and that’s exactly what happened to Conor against Artemij Sitenkov.

  That wasn’t the only problem which arose from that fight. As the promoter of the Cage of Truth events, I used to give the local fighters tickets to sell on to friends and family. They’d pass the proceeds on to me, minus a commission. Conor had taken 25 tickets at €20 each, so we’re talking €500 worth of tickets.

  At the end of the night, when the other fighters on the show were handing in the money from their ticket sales, Conor said he didn’t have his with him.

  ‘Sorry, John. I forgot to bring it with me,’ he said. ‘I’ll bring it into the gym next week.’

  That wasn’t unusual for Conor. He rarely paid fees at the gym, but I was always lenient with him, perhaps in the knowledge that it might ultimately pay off. But the truth was that he didn’t have the money. As he sold the tickets in the build-up to the fight, he was spending the proceeds on the premise that he’d just replace it later on. In the end he’d spent it all and there wasn’t a cent left.

  That week went by and there was no sign of Conor. A week then became a month. Eventually, I gave up on calling him.

  Another month or so had passed by the time I finally received a phone call from the McGregor household, but it wasn’t Conor on the other end of the line. It was his mother. Although I had been briefly introduced to her at the Sitenkov fight, we had never really had a conversation. When she called and told me who she was, I thought to myself: Oh yeah, that little shit who took my money and ran away. What could his mother possibly be calling me for?

  ‘I was wondering if you could come up and see Conor,’ she said. ‘He hasn’t been training at all lately and he has lost his way a little bit. We’re a bit worried about him.’

  To be honest, I didn’t really want to know at first. Why would I? Conor was in my debt. I owed him nothing. My gym was by no means thriving financially at that stage, so I wasn’t exactly in a position to be nonchalant about €500.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said, ‘what did you say your own name is again?’

  ‘Margaret.’

  Ah. That sort of hit me because my own mother’s name is also Margaret. A small thing, but it resonated with me. It immediately helped me to see that this was just a concerned mother who was pleading with me to help her son. Fifteen years earlier, if I had been going through something difficult and my mother had asked somebody to get involved, would I have wanted that person to ignore her? It was clear from speaking to Margaret that something was wrong. She didn’t sound good as she told me that Conor was going through a rough patch.

  ‘I don’t think anybody other than you can help him,’ she said.

  It didn’t surprise me to learn that Conor had veered off course during those weeks he’d been away from the gym. In the short time that I had known him, I was well aware that he had a tendency to drift.

  I agreed to call up to the family home in Lucan to have a chat with Conor. All the family were there: Conor’s parents and his two sisters. They all looked worried, concerned for their son, their brother.

  They told me a bit more: that he seemed to be in a state of depression and was refusing to leave his bedroom. He didn’t want to train. He didn’t want to do anything – other than tell people to fuck off and leave him alone.

  Conor didn’t know I was downstairs with his family. He wasn’t expecting me at all. I went up and knocked on his bedroom door.

  ‘Wha’?’ a voice grumbled from inside.

  When I opened the door, he looked like he had seen a ghost. He certainly didn’t resemble the healthy young athlete I had gotten to know.

  I sat down on the bed and we started talking. I told Conor that I knew he was mixing with people he shouldn’t have been mixing with and getting up to things he shouldn’t have been getting up to. I told him that it clearly wasn’t doing him any good. I asked him to tell me if I was wasting my time. Should I leave the house and never come back again? Or, do you want to start off with a clean slate?

  This was a Friday night, so I told him if he came to the gym on Monday we could forget about the tickets and start from scratch. But first, I needed to hear that acceptance of responsibility: Yes, I’ve fucked up, but I’m willing to do whatever it takes to make it better. If that hadn’t been there, I would have walked straight out the door. I didn’t want to do that. In spite of the incident with the tickets, I liked Conor and knew he had the ability to go places in MMA. His family had gone to great lengths to have me come over and speak to him. I was willing to give Conor a clean slate, but from Monday onwards it was never to get to this stage again.

  ‘Whatever you need, I’ll provide,’ I said. ‘But you don’t take a step back or fall off this path. You’ve got to give me everything back, one hundred per cent.’

  Conor took it all on board, looked me in the eye and said: ‘You’re right. Let’s do it.’

  He accepted that he was pursuing an ominous lifestyle, hanging around with the wrong people and heading down a dangerous road. Throwing his life away, basically. There were tears – from both of us – but we made a commitment to each other there and then. The following Monday, Conor returned to the gym.

  If Conor hadn’t come back, he was on such a slippery slope that it’s difficult to guess what might have become of him. Fighting was his passion. Without that, where was he likely to go? I’m happy that Conor’s mother picked
up the phone and called me that evening. I’m also glad that her parents decided to name her Margaret! That personal connection was a factor in me getting involved, though I had a soft spot for Conor anyway. He was sort of like a little brother, even back then.

  I get phone calls from concerned parents fairly regularly. I remember one kid’s mother ringing me to say that her son was refusing to do his homework. She put the boy on the phone to me and I told him he wouldn’t be allowed to train at the gym unless his homework was done. As I was speaking to him, I began to realize that I didn’t recognize his voice. His name wasn’t familiar either. When his mother took the phone again, I asked her if he was a member at Straight Blast Gym.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘But I knew he’d listen to you and that you’d put him straight.’

  Fair enough.

  Not so long ago, the punishment for kids was to ground them or take away their PlayStation. Now it seems they’re being told that they can’t go to SBG unless they behave themselves!

  Conor still needed a bit of supervising after that. If he stayed out until 1 a.m., I was aware of it and I let him know. So he knew not to push his luck. But the bottom line was that he kept showing up to the gym. He stayed on track. I still wasn’t convinced that he would react differently to another defeat, but only time would tell. Giving Conor a clean slate after the Sitenkov saga cost me a few hundred, but it would soon prove itself to be a very worthwhile investment.

  6

  Keeping an eye on Conor McGregor was by no means the only challenge I faced in 2008. After nearly two years in Rathcoole, we had settled in well at the new gym. In spite of its peripheral location, membership was steadily increasing, particularly among the younger age groups.

  Then, quite suddenly, I was hit with an unexpected setback that would push me closer than I’ve ever been to throwing in the towel.

  While going through the post in my office one morning, I came across a letter from the owner of the building. It was short and to the point. The businesses on either side of us in the industrial estate weren’t happy about kids running in and out of the gym. They were concerned about a child being hit by a van or a forklift. In hindsight they were absolutely correct: an accident could very easily have happened. But at the time, focused on the implications for the gym, I didn’t really see it that way.

  I was given one week to vacate the premises. I stared at the letter in disbelief. Finding the place in Rathcoole had been an enormous chore, yet less than two years later we were back in the same position: looking for a new home.

  I really wasn’t sure if I had the mental energy to go through it all again. My dad helped me look for new premises, but the search was a bit half-hearted. Thankfully, we managed to convince the owner of the building to give us a few weeks’ grace, so we were able to keep going while looking for a new premises, but I felt like I was only postponing the inevitable. It seemed as though I was approaching a crossroads in my life.

  My parents, while still not fully on board with the whole MMA thing, had seen how much effort I had invested in it, and they were supportive during what was a difficult time, but ultimately they were still in favour of me putting my engineering degree to use. I was starting to come around to their way of thinking. I’d never expected MMA to make me rich, but I had believed it was possible to make ends meet while doing something I loved. Seven years after opening my first gym, it appeared that I was back at square one. Sure, we had come a long way, and there were now some very promising fighters in the team, but the reality of my situation was that I was a thirty-one-year-old with an engineering degree, but with no clear prospects and not a cent in my bank account. When I evaluated the pros and cons of continuing to pursue a career as an MMA coach, the cons heavily outweighed the pros. For the first time in my life, I opened the jobs section of the newspaper and assessed my options.

  Fed up and lacking motivation, I was quite close to giving up altogether when I was tipped off about a potential premises on the Long Mile Road. I needed a lifeline and perhaps this was it. I had no idea if the place was even going to be suitable, but it was the first positive development in the three months since we had left Rathcoole, so I clung to the hope that something good might come of it. I went to take a look at it and brought my dad with me.

  ‘This place is a dump,’ he said. And that was before he had even spotted the tree that was growing down at the back of the building. A tree! Indoors! How is that even possible? Apparently the place was an old woollen mill that hadn’t been occupied for many years. It was absolutely filthy. But it was an available space, and immediately my optimism returned. My dad couldn’t see how it was going to work, and I sought to reassure him: ‘It’s not so bad. A bit of cleaning, a lick of paint and a lumberjack will sort this out.’

  ‘For Jesus’ sake, John! There’s fungus growing out of the walls.’

  One thing the place definitely did have going for it was that it was much closer to the city centre. But that would also come at a cost. I was already €25,000 in the red, having taken out a loan for Rathcoole. Relocating to Long Mile required an additional top-up of €15,000. For that, the bank needed someone to act as guarantor. My parents obviously had a little bit of faith in me because they stepped up to the plate when I needed them, putting their house at stake in the process.

  With a €40,000 loan to pay off, I signed a lease to move Ireland’s top MMA team into an old mill so damp that it had an indoor tree. It might not sound like anything to get excited about, but after a weekend clear-out I was ready to give one last push to get SBG Ireland back on track. Over the course of a couple of days, almost every one of our sixty members chipped in as we set about making the place look like a gym. No matter where the gym has moved to over the years, the people involved have all stayed with me, as well as helping to get each new version set up. I’m eternally grateful for their incredible loyalty.

  My parents, sister and brother also made a massive contribution to the painting and cleaning. By the time we got someone to remove the tree, the place actually looked pretty good: like a gym where we could build success.

  Quite soon after we set up camp on the Long Mile Road, a major opportunity presented itself. For the first time ever, the UFC announced that it would be hosting a show in the Republic of Ireland. Taking place in Dublin on 17 January 2009, the event would feature legends like Dan Henderson, Rich Franklin, Maurício Rua and Mark Coleman.

  This was a massive development for MMA in Ireland. The UFC had been to Belfast eighteen months earlier, but that was viewed by most as another UK event. For the UFC to acknowledge its growing fan base in the rest of Ireland was significant. Since its first event back in 1993, the UFC had developed into the world’s largest organization in mixed martial arts. It was where every fighter aspired to be. MMA was still very much a niche sport in Ireland, but the UFC had decided to come nevertheless. This was a huge opportunity for SBG Ireland.

  I knew the UFC would be looking for a local fighter to compete on the card. In my mind, there wasn’t a shadow of a doubt about Tom Egan being the right man for the job. At twenty years of age and having fought – and won – just four times, Tom was still quite inexperienced. He had only competed in small local shows so far, and the step up to the UFC would be enormous. It would be a big risk, but I was adamant that it was a risk worth taking. If the UFC were looking for a fighter to represent Irish MMA, nobody had a better chance of doing the job successfully than Tom.

  When it was announced that UFC 93 would be taking place at the O2 Arena, I managed to get contact details for Joe Silva, the UFC’s matchmaker. For weeks I bombarded him with e-mails, explaining why Tom Egan was the fighter he needed to represent Ireland.

  He eventually responded: ‘You want to put a guy with just four fights in the UFC?’

  ‘You’re going to give a debut to an Irish fighter for this card,’ I replied. ‘Trust me, I’ve been around the Irish scene longer than anybody and I can assure you that Tom Egan is the best fighter in the country.’<
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  Although his grappling was yet to mature fully, Tom was as well-rounded as any fighter in Ireland at the time, and his striking was particularly impressive. He was young, he was charismatic and he could hold himself well in front of a TV camera. I just thought it all made sense for the UFC.

  Joe was in touch again a few days later to say that the UFC were offering Tom Egan a four-fight contract, starting with a bout at UFC 93. That was the good news. The bad news was that Tom’s opponent was dynamite. John Hathaway was an unbeaten welterweight from England, and although he too would be making his UFC debut, Hathaway was significantly more experienced, having bulldozed through the UK scene to accumulate a record of 10–0. More significantly, however, he was a monstrous grappler.

  Tom and I had been hoping for a match-up with Dan Hardy, who had made his UFC debut just a few months earlier. Hardy, like Tom, was mostly a striker. Hathaway, on the other hand, would provide a really tricky test for Tom at such an early stage in his development as a mixed martial artist. Nevertheless, we embraced the challenge and prepared to put on a show. Tom was going in as the token Irish guy, but we were determined to prove that he deserved his shot.

  Having the UFC in Dublin was an amazing experience. For the first time ever, MMA was making the news in Ireland. The organization gave it a huge promotional push and the tickets – just under 10,000 of them – sold out within a fortnight. As Tom was about to become the first fighter from the Republic of Ireland to compete in the famed UFC octagon, he had a fairly hectic schedule of media commitments in the build-up to the event. But none of that was a problem as far as we were concerned. This was what we had been striving towards, so we made sure to enjoy it all. Seeing Tom at press conferences and photoshoots with some of the biggest names in the sport was pretty surreal. There was a massive buzz around Dublin throughout the week, with the likes of UFC president Dana White being in town. This was our first taste of the big time. It was also a massive deal to have UFC TV crews turning up at our little gym on the Long Mile Road. That was fun, and it was also very welcome from a commercial point of view. Conor McGregor was having the time of his life, running around all week taking selfies with the UFC legends who were in Dublin.