16

I first came across José Aldo in 2008, when he began to make a name for himself with the now-defunct WEC promotion. He was only twenty-one at the time, but he was already being earmarked as a future world champion, and it was easy to see why. By 2015 he had become the pound-for-pound best fighter in the world, and arguably the UFC’s most dominant champion. He had only ever been beaten once in his career, as a raw nineteen-year-old.

So it was a big deal when, as part of the tour promoting UFC 189, José Aldo came to Dublin. This was one of the modern greats of mixed martial arts, an icon, and he was coming to my home town to promote a world title bout against one of my own fighters. With the benefit of hindsight I can now appreciate how significant that was, but it’s not something that really registered with me at the time. Then, he was just the next opponent. The final hurdle between Conor and the very top.

Unlike some of Aldo’s previous opponents, we didn’t make the mistake of putting him on a pedestal. Another reason I wasn’t getting carried away by Aldo’s presence in Dublin for the Irish leg of the UFC 189 media tour was that I wasn’t even sure if the fight was going to take place as scheduled. A couple of days had passed since Conor hurt his knee while training with Rory MacDonald in Canada. We still weren’t sure how serious the damage was. I had spoken to Conor on the phone, and the bad news was that his knee was painful and swollen. The good news was that he was certain it wasn’t as serious as the ruptured anterior cruciate ligament he’d sustained against Max Holloway in August 2013. But I wasn’t convinced. If the injury really were serious, I would expect Conor to be in denial about it.

Conor didn’t tell anyone else about the injury until he returned home to Dublin. Once the media obligations were out of the way, we could decide on our next move.

According to the UFC, over 70,000 fans applied for tickets to attend the press conference – the final one on the media tour – with José Aldo and Conor McGregor at the Convention Centre in Dublin on the afternoon of 31 March 2015. Unfortunately, the venue only catered for 3,000 so there were a lot of disappointed fans. The lucky ones who managed to get inside the building certainly seemed to enjoy the occasion. Conor was given a hero’s welcome while Aldo received an extremely hostile reception. I watched it all on TV back at the gym. Aldo looked like he had reached breaking point as Conor gave it one last push with his antics, which included snatching the belt again. I couldn’t help but think that there were people looking at this from all over the world, none of them aware that the fight these guys were promoting might not even go ahead because of the state of Conor’s knee. At the same time, I was slightly reassured by how he was able to jump around the stage like a maniac.

‘I actually think it’s fine,’ Conor told me when we eventually got together. I was keen for him to have a scan in order to discover exactly what the problem was, but he was reluctant.

‘Let me figure this out,’ he said. ‘I don’t think this will need surgery. I can get by without it.’ Given that he was about to begin a training camp for the biggest fight of his life, Conor wanted to avoid being operated on. Having to do so would immediately have forced the postponement of the fight and he was convinced that such a move wasn’t necessary.

By now, Conor had mentioned the injury to Dana White, who recommended that Conor visit a clinic in Germany which specialized in stem-cell therapy. As a sufferer of Ménière’s disease, Dana had undergone stem-cell treatment at the same clinic and found it to be very effective. Conor took his advice. He flew straight out to Germany and was given stem-cell injections into his knee. Within a few days, he was back in the gym.

‘It feels good,’ he insisted. ‘It’s not perfect but it’ll get better over the next few weeks of training. Let’s do this. I’m ready.’

And that was that. We were going full steam ahead for the biggest fight in UFC history in spite of a knee injury the seriousness of which was unclear. I still wanted Conor to have a scan. If we needed to push the fight back a few months, so be it. But he was adamant. There was no telling him otherwise. All I could do was take his word for it and devote myself to the task of preparing him accordingly.

Conor had plenty of physical therapy, and more stem-cell injections later on at a clinic in Los Angeles. As I observed him in training, I began to agree with his assessment that he could get by without surgery. What he needed was rest, but we didn’t have the time for that with a world title fight on the horizon. Conor was able to train hard, but his mobility was restricted, which meant that his wide array of kicks was limited and he couldn’t really do any wrestling at all. I was kind of okay with that. When the Aldo fight was first announced, I wrote in my column for The42.ie that I believed Conor would win inside three of the scheduled five rounds. That was a modest prediction: I could honestly picture Conor getting the job done in the first. I thought he was capable of getting an early knockout, so wrestling wouldn’t even have time to come into the equation. My belief in Conor’s ability gave me peace of mind that we could get through this despite the injury.

The situation reminded me of something former world boxing champion Steve Collins once said to some of my guys when he visited the gym: ‘I’d rather be 75 per cent physically ready and 100 per cent mentally ready than 100 per cent physically ready and 75 per cent mentally ready.’

That certainly applied to Conor, because there was no doubting that his psychological preparation was spot on. There wasn’t a single question in his mind about wanting to proceed with this, so the best thing I could do as his coach was get fully behind him. But I’d be lying if I said there wasn’t any concern. As we prepared to launch the training camp, I had no idea how things would unfold.

Because this was our first world title bout, we wanted to leave no stone unturned in preparation for 11 July. The stakes had been raised so it felt like things needed to be done a little differently. We made the decision to spend the ten weeks before the fight in Las Vegas – the idea being that we’d become completely acclimatized to the heat and the time zone. By fight night, the place would feel like home.

The day before we left for Vegas, I was in my office at the gym when Orlagh walked in and handed me the phone: ‘This is for you.’

‘I’m really busy at the moment,’ I said. ‘Who is it?’

‘I think you want to take this call. It’s Royce Gracie.’

When Orlagh handed me the phone, I couldn’t believe it was actually Royce on the other end of the line. I was speechless for a moment before I could actually utter a greeting.

‘John, hello,’ he said. ‘My name is Royce Gracie, I’m from the Gracie family.’

‘I know exactly who you are, Mr Gracie. You don’t need to introduce yourself to me.’

It turned out that one of Royce’s private students was in Dublin and needed a gym to train in. Naturally I was delighted to be able to accommodate him.

‘While I have you on the phone,’ I said to Royce, ‘I can’t allow you to hang up without telling you that you’ve basically given me this life. I saw you when I was a terrified nineteen-year-old kid who didn’t know where he was going or what he wanted to do, but when I saw what you were able to do, it changed my life. I really can’t thank you enough. You’ve given me an amazing life. None of us would be doing what we’re doing now without you stepping into that octagon.’

He just laughed and told me that we’re all standing on the shoulders of his father. He wouldn’t accept the credit.

That was an amazing phone call to receive, especially just before departing for our biggest fight yet. Without Royce Gracie, I wouldn’t be where I am today. For him to send one of his students to me was one of the biggest compliments I’ve ever been paid.

We secured the use of a luxury, seven-bedroom, 12,000 square-foot house in a private gated estate in Vegas for the duration of our time there; Conor christened it ‘The Mac Mansion’. It was a big commitment for me to leave Dublin for two and a half months and I knew it would be challenging to lead a world title training camp on one side of the world while running a gym on the other. If there was a faulty toilet in the changing room back at SBG, I would get a call about it.

Conor wasn’t the only SBG fighter preparing to fight in Vegas. Throughout the week leading up to UFC 189, the Amateur World Championships were also scheduled to take place and four of my up-and-coming fighters were set to represent Ireland. Sinéad Kavanagh, James Gallagher, Frans Mlambo and Kiefer Crosbie joined Conor, Artem Lobov, Owen Roddy, SBG wrestling coach Sergey Pikulskiy and myself at the house. Tom Egan flew in from Boston too, and Gunnar Nelson joined us later on. Gunni was ready to return following his loss to Rick Story, and a fight against John Hathaway – the man who’d defeated Tom Egan in Dublin back in 2009 – had been booked for the UFC 189 card. Owen, Tom, Sergey and I focused on coaching. As wrestling coach, Sergey was extremely limited in what he could do with Conor due to the injury. Nevertheless, he used his expertise to prepare him in that regard as well as he possibly could. A former member of Moldova’s national wrestling team, Sergey had become a key element of our coaching ticket since joining SBG in 2008.

Artem Lobov was also gearing up for something big, having been selected to compete on an upcoming series of The Ultimate Fighter. At the Mac Mansion, we had a lot of like-minded people under the same roof working together, each with a target to aim for. It made for a very productive training environment.

Eager to play my part in ensuring that everybody remained on track for the duration of the training camp, I decided to subject myself to a strict diet. My nutrition is pretty good anyway, but here it became extremely rigid. It was all geared towards fostering a world champion mentality. Even Conor said it gave him a boost to see me rowing in behind him in that manner. To maintain a sense of discipline, we pinned a list of house rules to the door of the refrigerator. One of those was that no processed or sugary foods were permitted. Everyone in the house adhered to it.

In a house full of determined individuals, I felt everyone learned and improved substantially over the course of the ten weeks. We all made big leaps forward, myself included. But that doesn’t mean that people didn’t get under each other’s skin from time to time. There was definitely an element of cabin fever at various stages, which I suppose is to be expected in a situation like that.

A lot of fun was had, too. We cooled off in the pool in the mornings and enjoyed barbecues for dinner in the evenings. Everyone chipped in with the preparation of the food – one person marinaded the meat, another took care of the salad, someone else would set the table, and so on. It all contributed to creating a family vibe, which was important when we were all so far away from home and for so long.

The build-up to Conor’s fight with Aldo was generating an unprecedented amount of coverage for an MMA bout, and almost every social media post from those of us in the house seemed to be turned into an article by the media. The output of one Irish website in particular seemed to consist entirely of events inside the Mac Mansion. You’ll never believe what Conor McGregor ate for breakfast today, click here to find out … that sort of thing.

I’m sure the pictures and videos we were sharing online made it seem like we were having the time of our lives, but they only captured the brief highlights of each day. For the most part, it was mundane and it was boring. Apart from the few hours that were spent at the gym each day, we were stuck in the house for almost the entire ten weeks. On a few occasions we tried to arrange to do something together away from the house, but it never happened. For example, on the way to or from the gym, someone might spot a billboard advertising one of the shows in Vegas: ‘Let’s go and see that on Saturday night.’ It was usually Artem who ended up responding: ‘Yep, let’s add it to the growing list of shit that we’re never going to do.’

I guess there were just so many people there that it never really suited all of us to get up and do something at the same time. While one group might be in the mood to go out, another preferred to rest and recover from training, and vice versa. Getting Conor out of bed for anything other than training is no easy task either, so that also didn’t help matters.

This was my first experience of coordinating a training camp for a world title fight. I suppose I made the natural assumption that longer is better. But, as I came to realize in the latter stages, ten weeks was a little too long. It became difficult to sustain the intensity in training and the guys were getting a bit agitated towards the end. It was another lesson learned. No matter how long you’re involved in this, or any other, sport, you’ll never master it entirely. Anyone who claims otherwise is just not being honest.

Because the house was in a gated community, it was safe enough for us to keep the doors unlocked. But we were located at the back of the estate, and kids would often show up on the other side of the perimeter walls and shout Conor’s name, hoping to catch a glimpse of him.

On a random Tuesday afternoon, we were chilling out at the house when the front door suddenly opened and a loud, distinctive, familiar voiced filled the hallway and living room.

‘Ah … so this is what a world champion training camp looks like. Why is nobody lifting weights?’ the visitor laughed.

Holy shit! It was Arnold Schwarzenegger. He had met Conor before, through his partner Heather Milligan, the physical therapist who had played such an important role in Conor’s recovery from the ACL injury. Arnie was in Vegas and decided he wanted to stop by to show his support. He’s a very cool guy and it was incredible to be paid a visit by someone of his stature.

Over the course of this journey, meeting people like Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone, Jean-Claude Van Damme and Mike Tyson and discovering that they’re huge admirers of Conor has been quite surreal. I am a child of the eighties, and these guys were all heroes of mine. Now they’re fans of a fighter I train. It’s crazy.

Around the time he first met Tyson, Conor had been thinking about buying a Lamborghini. Mike gave him some financial advice: ‘If it depreciates, rent it. If it appreciates, buy it. That’s all I’ve gotta say.’

Cristiano Ronaldo also got in touch with Conor after he wore a pair of the football star’s CR7 brand underwear at the weigh-ins for the fight against Diego Brandão. When I look at Conor, even now, I still see the same guy who first walked into my gym all those years ago. But stuff like that does serve as a reminder that he’s now a global superstar.

Midway through the training camp, I had to leave for a few weeks for Mexico City, where Cathal Pendred claimed his fourth straight UFC win, against Augusto Montaño. When I left, I was concerned that the routine we had established at the house in Vegas would collapse in my absence. The drill was that at 8 p.m. every evening, we all left together to go and train at the TUF gym, where The Ultimate Fighter is filmed. There were two reasons for training at night: because UFC fights take place at night, and because of Conor’s body clock. We put the work in at TUF for a number of hours before heading back to the house, usually around 1 a.m. But while I was in Mexico, everyone just started doing their own thing: 8 p.m. quickly became 8.30 p.m., then 9 p.m., 9.30 p.m. and so on. From what I was told, that had a detrimental impact on the mood in the house. That little bit of structure had kept us on track and given everyone a sense of purpose.

Conor wasn’t too bothered. He’s the type of person who can get up at any time of the day or night and decide that he wants to train. From my experience, most fighters favour routine. They like to know the what, where and when of their training schedule. Conor is an exception. There’s no pattern whatsoever to his desire to train, but the problem is that not everybody can function according to his body clock. On some evenings while I was away, it would get to a stage where it was so late and Conor still hadn’t emerged from his bedroom that the guys would assume that he wasn’t going to train that night. As they settled in for the evening to watch a movie, prepare for bed or whatever else, a message would then come down from upstairs: ‘We’re leaving in ten minutes.’ That wasn’t ideal, and I think everyone was relived when, with just under four weeks to go until Conor’s fight against Aldo, I returned to Vegas and re-established the status quo.

When I got back, I also discovered that the guys hadn’t been sticking to the strict dietary rules we had put in place. We used a minivan to transport us to and from the gym, and there was an outlet of In-N-Out Burger on the route. I hopped into the van one day and found a burger wrapper on the floor underneath one of the seats. I couldn’t believe it. I asked for an explanation and Tom Egan admitted that they had slipped up, but it was ‘a one-off’. But James Gallagher was a little more honest: ‘Ah, we’ve been going all the time. Sorry, coach.’ I pulled Conor up on it later.

‘What’s going on with the burgers?’ I asked.

‘We only went once, I swear,’ he claimed.

‘James said you’ve been going there most nights.’

‘All right, fuck it, we have, but that’s the end of it now. Honestly. No more.’

While I was in Mexico with Cathal, news emerged from Brazil that there had been some confusion over a drug test that had been administered to José Aldo. In early June, a tester from the Drug Free Sport lab, Ben Mosier, had seemingly been prevented from collecting a urine sample from Aldo at his gym in Rio de Janeiro. The tester, under instruction from the Nevada State Athletic Commission – who would be overseeing the fight in Las Vegas on 11 July – was challenged by a police officer who was a member of Aldo’s gym. The police officer told the tester that he didn’t possess a valid visa to carry out his duties in Brazil. Aldo’s camp got the Brazilian MMA Commission involved, and the sample was collected by them the following day instead. According to the NSAC’s report, the police officer had confiscated Mosier’s passport, and the Brazilian tester asked Aldo for a picture and an autograph after collecting the sample. It all sounded like a very bizarre situation, but there wasn’t much we could do about it. Conor had been tested a couple of weeks earlier while he was attending UFC 187 at the MGM Grand. A tester pulled him aside and Conor gave both blood and urine samples. It was as straightforward as that. They’re called random tests for a reason. Being given twenty-four hours’ notice is not random. When one of my fighters is subjected to a drug test, they do so without asking for paperwork or anything like that. We don’t see the need to complicate what should be a simple process.

As a team, we take a hardline stance against performance-enhancing drugs. I believe there is a culture of PED use in certain gyms and certain parts of the world. There seems to be a pattern of guys from the same teams or countries being caught in recent years. It must be something that becomes a topic for discussion in the changing room. I know for certain that if somebody broached the subject with anyone in SBG, they’d be absolutely shredded. Of course, the coach has an important role to play in establishing that type of environment. It’s something I’m very serious about. My first wave of fighters and I have been so vocal in our opposition to the use of PEDs that the younger guys coming up know it’s not even to be considered. But if you’re in a gym where there’s a different attitude to it, it’s probably only a matter of time before you get sucked in.

A week before the aforementioned incident with Aldo’s drug test, the UFC announced strict new rules to combat PEDs in the organization by bringing the United States Anti-Doping Agency on board to police it. I believe that a lot of fighters who were previously using banned substances have since been forced to stop taking them as a result. Fighters don’t take drugs because they want bigger biceps. It’s all geared towards allowing them to work harder in training. A typical rhythm for a clean fighter might be to train hard for two days, then go easy on the third day. But with the benefit of PEDs, fighters were training hard three times a day, every day.

It has never happened so far, but if one of my fighters were to come to me, curious about sampling PEDs, I’d be absolutely devastated. It would almost be like being dumped by a girlfriend. I’d feel like I had failed as a coach in setting the kind of environment where it’s never even thought about. If you’re not good enough to train without drugs then you shouldn’t be training at all. At SBG, you either fight clean or you go elsewhere. Thankfully we’ve never had to implement it but we have a zero-tolerance policy when it comes to drugs. And that goes for every single person in the gym.

With just over two weeks to go until the fight, Conor’s knee was approaching 100 per cent again and we were glad to be coming to the end of a long training camp. The final two weeks are just about keeping the body fresh and loose, so we weren’t going to use them for any last-minute cramming of the wrestling drills that he had missed out on over the previous couple of months. That wasn’t a concern for me. He was looking so good that I was fully confident of an emphatic win against José Aldo.

One morning, Dana White and Lorenzo Fertitta arrived at the house. They’re both based in Vegas – maybe they were just stopping by to see how everything was going? That’s what we hoped. But the look on their faces suggested that there was bad news in the post.

‘It looks like José is out,’ said Dana. ‘His rib. It seems there’s a fracture.’

Fuck! Here we go again. We were well used to having Conor’s opponents withdraw by now, and we were always relaxed about a change of opponent, but this was different. Other guys can be easily replaced, but not the champion. We wanted that title and the only way to get it was by beating Aldo.

Dana and Lorenzo explained that it would be a few days before there was clarification. Apparently Aldo was undergoing medical examinations to discover the extent of the injury so he hadn’t yet officially pulled out of the fight. But it wasn’t looking good. We began to discuss alternative options.

Part of me wondered if this was a good opportunity for Conor to pull out too, given that he had also been carrying an injury. But that idea was never going to get off the ground. Thousands of fans had already paid a lot of money to travel over for the fight. It was a massive pay-per-view event for the UFC too. Conor wasn’t going to let that fall apart. Whether it was Aldo standing across the octagon from him or somebody else, Conor was going to be fighting at UFC 189.

As Dana and Lorenzo began to explore replacement opponents, I knew who I wanted to avoid. Conor had virtually no wrestling drills in the bank during this training camp, so the worst-case scenario here was a fight with Chad Mendes. An NCAA Division 1 All-American wrestler, Mendes was as good as they came in that department. Without any injury problems, I’d have no issue with Conor facing Mendes. But this was one time when he could be a bit of a banana skin. Mendes was ranked as the top contender in the division, so his name was obviously in the mix. Another possibility was Frankie Edgar. Nate Diaz’s name was also mentioned, but Diaz seemed unlikely because he was a lightweight and the UFC were keen to keep this as a featherweight bout. Their plan was to put an interim title on the line in the event of a confirmed withdrawal from Aldo. The final say on a new opponent ultimately rested on their shoulders, but Conor let them know that he was ready for anyone they chose. It didn’t matter to him.

The confusion surrounding Aldo’s involvement in the fight dragged on for a week until I eventually received a call, eleven days out from UFC 189, from Dana. It had been confirmed. Aldo was definitely out. His replacement? Chad Mendes, of course.

It was around midday when the call came through, which is approximately dawn in Conor McGregor’s time zone. I went upstairs and knocked on Conor’s bedroom door until I was answered by a grunt from inside. I opened the door.

‘Aldo is out,’ I said. ‘It’s Mendes.’

Conor opened one eye, muttered, ‘They’re all the same,’ then went back to sleep.

He wasn’t perturbed by the fact that the goalposts had been moved. I wasn’t so relaxed. Against novice strikers, Mendes fancied himself as a boxer. But against Conor his game plan was going to be to look for the takedown and win the fight on the ground. A wrestler of his calibre was very capable of doing that. Conor’s knee was much better than it had been, but his mobility was still very restricted. His sprawl and takedown defence are usually excellent, but that wasn’t the case now. There wasn’t much we could do in eleven days to prepare for the guy with the best takedowns in the division.

As I’ve noted, we don’t train specifically for opponents, but that’s not to say we don’t take a look at them. With this change of opponent, we had gone from facing a kick-boxer to a wrestler. Aldo and Mendes occupied positions at either end of the MMA spectrum. I believed Mendes was a serious threat but, given time to process the situation, I was glad we were going ahead with the fight. When Jon Jones refused to fight Chael Sonnen as a last-minute replacement for Dan Henderson at UFC 151 in 2012, the entire event fell through. We couldn’t allow that to happen again on our watch.

We had anticipated a massive following in Las Vegas for UFC 189 fight week, but absolutely nobody expected the numbers that actually turned up. There must have been at least 10,000 Irish people in Vegas for the fight. For such a small country, we certainly know how to make our presence felt. It doesn’t matter how long we’re in this game, I don’t think that support will ever not be overwhelming. There have been times when Conor has been finding the weight-cut tough, wondering whether it’s all worth it, but then you show him a video of fans around Vegas chanting his name and it reminds him of how big this really is.

‘Look at these guys, champ,’ we’ll say. ‘They’ve spent their hard-earned money to come all this way to support you. Let’s put on a show for them.’

It’s little things like that which give him the extra push when times are tough.

Over the past couple of years, I’ve heard so many stories from fans who say they feel like they’ve been given a new lease of life by the success of Conor and SBG as a whole. They may have been down in the dumps, struggling in life, but seeing what we have achieved on a global stage has made them proud to be Irish. It has inspired them to embrace life and make the most of every day.

The sacrifices they make to attend the fights are unbelievable. They’re spending every penny they have just to be there. There have been plenty of times after fights in the US when Irish fans have told me that they have to go straight back into work once they get off the plane after the overnight flight home. It’s remarkable dedication. We could never truly express just how grateful we are for the support.

A few days before the fight against Mendes, I was walking down the strip in Las Vegas when somebody stopped me to ask for a picture. While it was being taken, a big group of Korean tourists came over for pictures too. I must have taken at least twenty with each and every one of them. When they all had a photo, one of the tourists turned to me and asked: ‘So, who are you?’ I guess we haven’t quite cracked the Korean market just yet.

People sometimes ask if having so many fans on our side adds to the pressure. The reality is that when you’re preparing for fights, particularly at this level, you’re just too busy to even let that enter your thoughts. It doesn’t happen and we can never allow it to. If the coach is nervous then the fighter will be too. A novice might pull you aside before a bout to go through the game plan again for reassurance because they’re a bit tense. They just want to hear you say: ‘You’re going to be okay. We’re ready for this.’ But I’ve never had that with Conor. By nature, we’re both very relaxed.

That the prize was an interim belt instead of the undisputed title may have detracted slightly from claims that UFC 189’s main event would be the biggest UFC fight ever, but the final few days before the show certainly had the feeling of something huge and unprecedented. For the first time ever, the UFC decided to open up the entire MGM Grand Garden Arena for the weigh-ins. Over ten thousand people were there to watch Conor step on the scales. Two and a half years earlier we could barely draw a thousand to watch him fight.

As expected, the staredown between Conor and Mendes was heated. It had been another taxing weight-cut for Conor, so he was a little bit narky. Mendes, on the other hand, seemed to be on a high. He had stepped in at short notice in an attempt to capitalize on a huge opportunity, for which he’d be paid more money than he had ever earned before. He had nothing to lose and his demeanour reflected that.

Before the weigh-ins, much was made in the media about an altercation Conor had in the hallway of the arena with Mendes’s teammate Urijah Faber. The truth was that there was very little to it. They engaged in a bit of playful grappling, and it irritated Conor because he was already cranky from the weight-cut. But there were no hard feelings. It was just a bit of handbags. If you don’t like Urijah Faber, there’s probably something wrong with you. I think he’s one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet and I know Conor feels the same.

I’m not sure if I’ll ever experience a more hectic day as a coach than 11 July 2015. That night, Conor was going to compete for an interim world title. I also had two other fighters on the UFC 189 bill. John Hathaway had to pull out of his bout against Gunnar Nelson, so Gunni was going to take on Brandon Thatch instead, while Cathal Pendred – just four weeks after beating Augusto Montaño in Mexico – had stepped in as a short-notice replacement to fight John Howard.

But my duties for the day began even earlier, because the finals of the Amateur World Championships were scheduled for that afternoon at the Flamingo, just up the strip from the MGM Grand. Frans Mlambo and Sinéad Kavanagh had both made it to the last stage of their respective divisions after a successful week. Sinéad unfortunately came up short in the women’s featherweight final, but Frans looked superb as he became the men’s champion at 145lb. That gave us a good start to the day as I prepared to make my way across town for UFC 189.

Fight day for Conor involves – as usual – a late rise from bed, probably just after midday. He’ll have a meal at lunchtime and again at around 4 p.m. Between the weigh-in and the fight, you want to eat the kind of food that your body can turn into fuel right away: meat, fish, pasta, rice and mashed potatoes. Slow-burning carbohydrates such as vegetables aren’t much good. Eat what you can’t eat while cutting weight, basically. After the two meals, Conor will have something small, like a banana, at 6 p.m. or so, and then it’s time for him to head to the arena.

I had stayed at the MGM Grand instead of the Mac Mansion the night before the fight, and with Cathal slotted in early on the card, I was already at the arena by the time Conor arrived. His recovery from the weight-cut had been smooth and he had slept well. That’s always music to my ears. At that point, I feel like my job is mostly done. Now it’s just time to fight. Some people place a bit too much importance on what’s going on in the corner during a fight, but there’s not really a whole lot involved. Sometimes I’ve received a lot of praise for things I’ve contributed during fights but, in my mind, it’s not going to change the outcome. Maybe you can provide a little bit of guidance and it’s comforting for the fighter to know that their coach, someone they know and trust, is there for them. But there’s not much more to it than that.

When Cathal took on John Howard, he was aiming to become the first fighter in UFC history to win five fights within the space of their first year with the organization. Unfortunately it wasn’t to be as he was edged out on a split decision. It was bitterly disappointing for the entire team in the SBG changing room, but we’ve learned over the years on smaller shows never to allow one result to dampen the mood. The fighters know what’s expected of them as teammates. Regardless of the result, when you return to that changing room you grab your bag and go, allowing colleagues to focus on the fights that are still to come. That might sound cold or callous, but it’s the same when they win. They’ve all experienced both sides of the coin and they appreciate it when someone else does it for them. Cathal wished Gunni and Conor all the best, and then he was gone. As always, we’d all get together again later in the evening once business was taken care of. That’s the policy and it has been from the very start.

When Gunni was rematched to face Brandon Thatch, people said we were crazy to accept the fight. Thatch is a big, devastating striker and Gunni needed to get back to winning ways after the disappointment of losing to Rick Story. But the old Gunni was back during the warm-up and he submitted Thatch in the very first round. The fight lasted just under three minutes, but that was enough time for Gunni to remind the world of what he can do. It was an immaculate performance.

Then it was Conor’s turn. There were people all over the world tuning in to an MMA fight for the first time in their lives, which summed up just how big this was. But the atmosphere in our changing room was incredibly laid-back.

There were a lot of celebrities in the arena for the fight, including Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mike Tyson, pop star Bruno Mars and Neymar, the Brazilian footballer. I also bumped into Anthony Kiedis, the lead singer from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, in the corridor.

‘Hey Coach Kavanagh, how’s Conor feeling?’ he asked. ‘Big fan of you guys. Good luck!’

That was amazing, but I knew there was somebody else in our changing room who’d appreciate it more than I did. When I told Chris Fields, who was there as a warm-up partner for Cathal, he ran out and went looking for Kiedis, screaming like a teenage girl at a One Direction concert. Chris is a huge Chili Peppers fan so this was a big deal for him.

Conor didn’t have a clue who Anthony Kiedis was. When Chris came back in, Conor asked: ‘Who’s that? Guns N’ Roses or some fella, is it?’

Conor likes to warm up for his fights with Artem. You almost have to restrain him as the walk-out approaches, like a dog on a leash. It’s become a bit of a running joke that Artem has left his best fights in the changing room when he’s getting Conor ready.

Then there’s a knock on the door from one of the UFC’s staff. It’s time. The security guys come in to walk you out. You hear the crowd – for each fight they get louder but it’s just a soundtrack of background noise. As UFC commentator Mike Goldberg said: ‘It’s like a rock concert in here.’ But all I hear is the same silence that always allows me to focus on the task ahead. Sinéad O’Connor’s haunting voice is carrying Conor to the octagon. It’s an iconic moment, reminiscent of the spectacular walk-outs that became synonymous with boxers like Prince Naseem Hamed during the 1990s. Even when we appear in the arena and it seems clear that the vast majority of the crowd is on our side, the colour of the occasion doesn’t become a distraction.

Going into this fight, there was little doubt in my mind that Mendes would be successful with his takedowns. His ability as a wrestler, coupled with Conor’s lack of work in that area over the past few months, meant that it was inevitable. Our game plan was focused on what would happen when the takedowns came. There was no need to panic when it happened, because Conor had the jiu-jitsu to take care of himself on the ground. We focused on making sure that the action on the ground was always busy and active, which would prevent Mendes from grinding out a boring decision over five rounds.

Just as Conor was about to enter the octagon, we had our customary embrace and I said, ‘All day,’ which he repeated back to me. The message was that Mendes might get his takedowns, but that’s okay. Conor could go for as long as was necessary to get this win. When Artem, Owen and I took our places in the corner and Mendes began his walk to the octagon, it really hit me that we were about to face the best wrestler in the division without sufficient preparation. Oh well, I thought. There’s no turning back now. What will be, will be.

Part of our strategy was to target Mendes with shots to the body, and that worked well from very early on. Going to the head too enthusiastically against a small, stocky wrestler like Mendes would be a recipe for disaster, as he’d see that as an invitation to change levels and hit big takedowns. We knew the takedowns were coming, but we didn’t want to invite them. When aiming for the body, if the opponent does level-change, there’s always a chance of connecting with the head instead. Conor used his eight-inch reach advantage well and the shots to the body also helped to take the wind out of Mendes’s sails. Each one that connected drained a little more gas from his tank.

Conor didn’t seem to be showing any ill effects from the knee injury until midway through the first round. Mendes shot for his first big takedown and Conor wasn’t able to sprawl as well as I knew he was capable of. However, there was no sense of panic. This was exactly what he expected. When Mendes secured that takedown, two things went through my mind. First of all, what an absolutely beautiful takedown! Secondly, I thought that it had to take a lot of energy for him to pick up a big guy like Conor and dump him on the ground like that. Just over two minutes into a potential twenty-five-minute fight, he invested a lot in that manoeuvre physically. If you watch my guys, they tend to get small takedowns against the fence because I like to focus on the most efficient way of moving. This one looked great, but it took so much effort that he needed to make it count. Conor was comfortable with Mendes in his guard and, even though he ate some shots, he was back on his feet just seconds later.

Conor continued to control the fight on the feet but another takedown for Mendes with just a minute remaining was probably enough to give him the first round on the scorecards. Still, we were very satisfied at the end of that first round. Mendes already looked exhausted, whereas Conor – in spite of a deep gash over his right eye thanks to an elbow from Mendes – looked fresh.

‘Let’s stick with the long shots,’ I said, encouraging Conor to work the range, although I wasn’t keen on the spinning kicks he had been using due to the risk of being taken down. ‘The left kick to the body is beautiful and the straight to the body as well with the left hand. He’s very tired now.’

When the fighters returned to their feet for round two, Mendes was breathing heavily while Conor beckoned him on with a maniacal smile on his face. Conor hit Mendes with some beautiful shots early in the second round and it seemed like a stoppage might be on the way if things continued in that vein. But Mendes countered with a takedown with fifty seconds on the clock. Mendes spent the next three minutes in top position on the ground but Conor maintained a strong guard. At one point he landed a flurry of devastating elbows to the top of the head, which Mendes protested as illegal shots, but referee Herb Dean was quick to let him know that they were fine. One of the cameras cut to me at that point and I was laughing because that’s exactly what we had worked on as a means of staying active if Mendes was on top. I felt it would be a suitable tactic to make Mendes uncomfortable on the ground, and that proved to be the case. The ideal scenario for Mendes was to hang out in guard, but Conor’s success in countering with the elbows would eventually force Mendes to rush a guard-pass attempt. With forty-five seconds left in the round, he stepped over and tried to advance the position. However, that’s a scenario Conor has spent a lot of time on in the gym. As Mendes sought to lock in a guillotine choke, Conor slipped out using a move we call ‘The Heartbreaker’ and, all of a sudden, they were back on their feet.

It’s easy for anyone to say, with the benefit of hindsight, that they knew what was coming. But when Mendes failed to make anything from that sequence on the ground, I was certain he was done. The look on his face suggested as much too. As soon as they were upright, Conor went to work with some beautiful combinations. To give Mendes credit, he was unbelievably tough and kept battling as he was being hit with big kicks and punches. But he was on borrowed time. He eventually went down under a left cross from Conor and the stoppage came with three seconds remaining in the round.

In the corner, I leapt to my feet and breathed a huge sigh of relief. Conor’s injury hadn’t been made public so nobody was aware of how truly significant this win was for us. He had taken on a dangerous opponent at short notice without being at full capacity, yet still emerged victorious. As Conor climbed on to the octagon perimeter to celebrate with his team, I was a very proud coach. There were tears of elation. Conor was more emotional than I had ever seen him after a fight and I think we all felt the same. The world hadn’t seen that side of him before. Conor is always supremely confident, but he knew he had been at risk facing a guy like Chad Mendes in those circumstances. The risk had paid off and it felt really, really good.

The team and Conor’s family gathered in the octagon as Dana White wrapped a UFC belt around his waist. Margaret McGregor beamed as she embraced her son, the interim UFC featherweight champion of the world. That phone call she made to me back in 2008 had paid off for us all.

‘I just honestly want to say thank you to my team, my family, everyone that has come up with me, because it’s a tight, tight circle,’ said Conor in his post-fight interview in the octagon. ‘People since day one are here with me now, I just want to thank everyone that has been with me.’

The undisputed title would have to wait for another day, but there was now a UFC belt coming back to Ireland. It took a while for that to sink in.

Afterwards, I went backstage to find an empty room so I could carry on my tradition of taking a few private minutes to myself after a fight. The first room I went into seemed to be hosting a little private party for the likes of Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mike Tyson, Dana White and Sinéad O’Connor.

‘John, come in, have a drink,’ Dana said. But I politely declined. I needed a chance to let it all sink in before getting the party started.

When we did get stuck into the celebrations, that first cold beer in ten weeks was perhaps the most satisfying thing I’ve ever consumed. We had a lot of fun for a couple of days, making the most of the rare opportunity to check out the bars and nightclubs of Las Vegas. In one of them I ended up having a little wrestling match with Artem Lobov because he refused to leave! When there’s beer and dancing involved, Artem can’t be stopped.

By the time we headed back home to Ireland, however, attentions were already beginning to turn to a featherweight title unification bout. We had a belt, but the one in José Aldo’s possession was what we had been chasing from the start. It was time to resume that pursuit.