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UFC president Dana White revealed that the mission to make MMA an Olympic Sport is not on his priority list. Retired UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov is trying to convince the International Olympic Committee to add the sport to the Olympic program.
In an interview with the YouTube channel "The Schmo," Dana White talked about varied subjects, including his meeting with the retired champion next month. While the most likely point of the encounter will be Nurmagomedov's return to the octagon, other topics are being speculated, such as Nurmagomedov's Olympic objective.
Nurmagomedov is the first heavy name of the sport to declare that he is willing to commit to making it happen. There have been discussions about the inclusion of MMA in the Olympics for a long time; White himself has been in talks with the Committee before.
"We have been talking about that for 20 years. It is just not on the top of my priority list to get that done. It will be someday. I don't know if it [MMA] will be [an Olympic Sport] this year [about the 2020 +1 Tokyo Olympics]. Someday it will be. It should be already. It is not something I am running around trying to do," Dana White revealed. (H/T Sportskeeda for quotes.)
Last December, Nurmagomedov talked about his intentions of making MMA an Olympic Sport by 2028. The unbeaten lightweight champion believes that the sport's addition to the Olympic program would benefit both sides.
"The inclusion of MMA in the Olympics is one of my main tasks for the next couple of years; we are already working in this direction. I will have many meetings soon, including with the president of the Olympic Committee. We have a great chance of promoting MMA. If not in Paris, then in Los Angeles," said Nurmagomedov.
What are Dana White and Khabib Nurmagomedov discussing in their meeting?
UFC president Dana White and retired UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov are meeting this month in Abu Dhabi, in the same week of UFC 257.
The encounter has been gaining a lot of attention since Dana White has revealed plans of convincing the unbeaten champion of returning to the octagon for one more fight - Nurmagomedov has an MMA record of 29-0 and would be motivated to get that number to 30-0.
While Dana White and the fans wish that the retired champion would return to have his rematch with Conor McGregor, Nurmagomedov seems to be more interested in a bout with Georges St-Pierre. The latter is a wish from Nurmagomedov's father, who died in 2020 after COVID-19 related complications.
Other ideas speculated as possible subjects for the meeting are Nurmagomedov's Olympic effort and his newly-acquired fighting promotion Gorilla FC.
