Conor McGregor is back in the gym training for a comeback fight, and he wants it to be at the White House against Michael Chandler.
What “The Notorious” wants isn’t really news — McGregor has been talking
about fighting at the June UFC White House card since U.S. president Donald Trump announced it over 4th of July weekend. But now we have Conor’s longtime coach and friend John Kavanagh confirming that the Mac is already at the gym preparing for the date.
“Us, on on our end, we’re 100% in,” Kavanagh told Ariel Helwani. “He’s asked me to basically lay out a program between now and June of how we’ll ramp up our training. He’s showing up again. He’s back in the gym most mornings, early. And he’s just having fun with it. I got a bunch of messages after [UFC 322] on Saturday night. He wants to fight everybody. But certainly, he wants to get on that [White House] card.”
McGregor hasn’t fought since breaking his leg badly against Dustin Poirier in 2021. He was set to fight Chandler at UFC 303 in June 2024 but a broken toe derailed that one, and then the ever-distractible Irish sports star spent the next year gearing up for an Irish presidential run that never got going.
There’s always been questions surrounding how serious he is about putting in the hard work for a UFC comeback … and whether the UFC is really eager to book the last two fights on his current contract. McGregor gates are some of the biggest gates in combat sports, so will TKO let him fight at the White House where less than 5000 can watch? Especially with McGregor asking for $100 million?
“How it works from a management point of view, I don’t really get involved in that,” Kavanagh said. “But from a training point of view, he’s already tasked me with putting together a team of suitable training partners. We’ll do some of it in the gym, some of it in his house. So he’s fully locked in that we’re gonna be making the walk in six, seven months.”
“If it’s Conor’s choice, he’s in. I don’t know how it’ll work with the UFC. I don’t know.”
Kavanagh also confirmed that Michael Chandler is still their pick for an opponent.
“Chandler’s not being quiet about wanting to be that guy,” he said. “I think I think the match-up makes sense. I think it’d be a fun one. I think they have a bit of a spark between them. They’ve done some stuff together before. It’d be a fun fight week, press conference, all of that. Style wise, that kinda shorter, stocky wrestler? He’s faced a few of those in his in his day.”
So what’s different about this situation versus all the other situations where McGregor has seemed tuned in to getting a fight? We’re approaching ‘Charlie Brown with the football’ levels when it comes to Mac comeback talk, but Kavanagh sees something new in his star pupil these days.
“He had a bit of a kind of a spiritual awakening, a bit of a journey,” Kavanagh claimed. “And it’s a bit of a different vibe with him.”
