Conor McGregor has responded to allegations that he “took powerful, banned drugs” during his recovery from a fractured tibia and fibula, claiming he wasn’t aware of what he was taking.
“If you’re gonna ask what I was on, I don’t even know. I don’t know. I don’t want to know,” McGregor said on “The Ariel Helwani Show” Tuesday. “All I want to know is what’s gonna get me back to my f–king feet? To be able to play with my children in a normal capacity again? And that was it.”
The comment comes five days after The New York Times reported the UFC fighter took performance-enhancing drugs, which were supported by his surgeon, Dodgers and Rams physician Dr. Neal ElAttrache, throughout his leg treatment.
The report also stated McGregor left the UFC’s USADA testing pool in 2022 and didn’t return until late 2023 after requesting a therapeutic use exemption.
Officials overseeing the drug-testing program believed he did so to “exploit a loophole,” per the report.
“The whole thing is strange to me. You have an injury like that, you’re not gonna walk again. The objective should be to get that athlete, that fighter who’s given his life, his limb, his livelihood for the entertainment of the people and for the profit of the company, it should be, ‘get this man back on his feet,” the 37-year-old McGregor said.
“And that was not the case — not with the UFC, but the former body that was there prior [USADA.] And I find that strange, and I find that wrong.”
ElAttrache told the Times that he recommended specialists in bone healing, but not the treatment itself. McGregor broke his leg during his last UFC fight against Dustin Poirier in 2021.
The doctor showed support for McGregor, though, saying the UFC had banned many drugs “necessary to medically treat various conditions which occur in people.”
ElAttrache also said cases like McGregor’s are why the “therapeutic use exemption application exists.”
The UFC star never got the exemption, though, as the relationship between the UFC and USADA ended after 2023.
The mixed martial arts promotion company now oversees its own anti-doping program in conjunction with Combat Sports Anti-Doping (CSAD).
That move had nothing to do with the McGregor situation, the UFC said in a statement supporting the Irish fighter released on Tuesday.
“This narrative is a continued attempt by USADA leadership to misrepresent the facts surrounding UFC’s unilateral decision to terminate our agreement with them and instead choose to partner with a far more competent, organized, and sophisticated testing group comprised of Drug Free Sport, Combat Sports Anti-Doping, and SMRTL laboratories,” the statement read.
The CSAD placed an 18-month suspension on McGregor in October after three missed tests within 12 months. It was backdated and concluded in March.
The UFC said the former featherweight and lightweight champion has been tested 12 times in 2026.
He was the “most tested athlete during this time.”
McGregor is set to make his return to the octagon against Max Holloway on July 11. It will be the Irishman’s first fight since the injury and loss to Poirier.