Sean O’Malley knew exactly what he was signing up for when he agreed to fight at the UFC White House event.
UFC is set to hold its first-ever event at the White House, with fights scheduled to take place outdoors on the South Lawn.
And though there’s plenty of excitement around the occasion, UFC commentator Joe Rogan has raised concerns about holding fights in an outdoor setting. Joe Rogan has been vocal about his concerns regarding the event from the start.
When it was first announced, he questioned the timing and even referred to it as a gimmick, a sentiment that Donald Trump surprisingly echoed, though he tried to frame it positively.
O’Malley responds to Rogan’s comments in support of White House event
Rogan’s latest issue is with the decision to hold the fights outdoors. He feels that exposure to heat and weather could impact performance and lead to results influenced by factors beyond the fighters’ control.
Despite Rogan’s doubts, former UFC bantamweight champion Sean O’Malley, who is set to face Aiemann Zahabi at the event, doesn’t entirely agree. Instead, he’s spoken out in support of how things are being done.
“It’s definitely, it’s at the White House, so you’ve got to deal with whatever you’ve got to deal with,” O’Malley told MMAJunkie.
“It would suck to lose because of a reason outside of your skillset. May the best man win. If something plays a role because it’s outside and it affects the fight somehow, that would suck; it’s unfortunate, but none of us signed the contract thinking it was inside.
“We all know it’s outside, we all know what we’re getting into, maybe not to an extent, we don’t know all of what’s gonna happen, but we all know it’s gonna be outside and we’ve got to possibly deal with stuff. We all signed (the contract).”
The 31-year-old lives and trains in Arizona, where extreme heat is just part of daily life – though O’Malley hasn’t revealed whether or not he’ll make changes to his normal preparations.
This isn’t everyone opting for the status quo either – Ilia Topuria has reportedly added outdoor sessions into his training camp before his lightweight title unification bout against Arman Tsarukyan later this summer.
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