Conor McGregor has been keeping a level-head as he nears his UFC return this July, and even addressed some of the personal issues he’s had to overcome since his last octagon appearance during a recent interview.
McGregor most recently stepped into the UFC octagon back in 2021 for his trilogy match with Dustin Poirier, which resulted in a TKO loss caused by the Irishman breaking his leg. He had his return match scheduled for 2024 against Michael Chandler, following the pair coaching opposite one another on season 31 of The Ultimate Fighter, but unfortunately the match did not come to fruition because of another injury.
Now, ‘The Notorious’ will make his long-awaited return on July 11th at UFC 329, where he will square off with Max Holloway during International Fight Week 2026.
Since his trilogy match with Poirier, McGregor has faced charges linked to multiple assault cases involving separate women, one of which was dropped all together, while the other two resulted in the Irishman facing no criminal charges. In recent months, McGregor has seemed to heal from these experiences and says he is on the right path in life now, with the former two-division champion claiming he is ‘reverting to an old version’ of himself.
“Fame has its pitfalls,” McGregor told Paramount. “You better move carefully in this world, for sure, probably even more so now. I’ve taken a lot of lessons in my life, and it’s just about self-discovery. Studying yourself. Learning yourself. Learning triggers. I find myself even now still in a fight with an old version of me or old ways that don’t serve me and new ways and a new version of me, the new me so I still find myself in this balance. Right now.
“More as a human. I went through some treatment, I done a lot of self-reflective work on myself. Internal work and it was outside of this bubble that we find ourself now when I return to the fight game.”
“On my immediate return to this game and the cameras and even this now, I found myself reverting to an old version of me,” McGregor explained. “I had to kind of remind myself, hold on, I just had to reflect again and say I’m different now. I’m a different person. I’ve put in work.
“At 27 years of age, I had the game conquered,” McGregor said. “Two-weight world champion, I had the Floyd [Mayweather] bout, boxed off, I was only 27 years of age. I had the game wrapped up in a blink. What more was I to do? I got lost. I got lost in it. Made some mistakes off of that and that’s it. You’ll always come home if you truly love something, you’ll always come home.”
(h/t MMA Fighting)