Armagh GAA boss Kieran McGeeney has earned Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt status after training with Conor McGregor's coach John Kavanagh.
Kavanagh announced the success on social media, showing a picture with McGeeney and two others who were also presented with their belts.
McGeeney trained with Kavanagh in the art of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and is now officially an expert in the combat sport.
Read more: NI martial arts gym educating young people about health and fitness
The 2002 All-Ireland winner is recognised as one of gaelic football's greatest players and has become one of its most-respected coaches.
But the Armagh man has developed a passion for mixed martial arts having first come to Kavanagh's Straight Blast Gym when manager of the Kildare football team.
“I’m probably coming here for six or seven years,” McGeeney explained back in 2016. “I was looking for something for the Kildare boys to do in pre-season. Contrary to popular belief, I’m not a big fan of the gym and weights and stuff like that. I can bore you to tears.
“I came here and some wee small fella basically handed my ass to me over an hour. I was just fascinated by the whole idea that somebody could just dominate you like that.
“I suppose the biggest thing you learn when you come here is that you might have thought you were good, that you could look after yourself, but you soon find out that you can’t.”
Kavanagh recalls first meeting McGeeney when the Armagh boss booked a private lesson, reports the Irish Mirror.
He told the Hop Ball podcast: “My first meeting with him is he booked a private lesson with me and I had no idea who it was and a few guys were elbowing me and were like ‘You know who that is that you’re going to train with and I didn’t.
“Well, I knew by the end of that hour, trust me on that. I usually have a drill that I do with people that by the end makes people tiresome quite quickly if they’re not used to it.
“Even if they’re fit in other areas it is a wrestling drill that I know how to cheat on and other people don’t if they don’t know how to do it so they’re usually very inefficient at it and you’ll blow a gasket in five minutes or six minutes. I did it with him for just under 40 minutes and ‘I said okay. I’m done’.
“We very quickly started training, I’ve basically trained him pretty much every day from that day on for the last decade and I’ve got a huge amount out of him.”
Bellator fighter Peter Queally has told how Kavanagh once used McGeeney to test out his mettle.
"I remember him being very dismissive of me," Queally remembers after reaching out to Kavanagh for training.
"I didn't take no for an answer. He told me to come up on Monday night and I did. I have a cousin who is an actor, Michael Sheehan, he's actually on [Irish soap opera] Fair City. He was training there at the time. I was all excited.
"Michael told me Monday night was his advanced jiu jitsu class. I was like, 'oh'.
"Kieran McGeeney, this Armagh [Gaelic] footballer, was training there at the time and he was good at jiu jitsu. At the end of the night I was wrecked and ready to pack up and John said get back on the mat and points at McGeeney.
"I'll never forget that 10 minutes. It was the most horrific 10 minutes of my life. I cannot describe to you how bad it was.
"There's one thing I can vividly remember. Kieran was on top of me and I'm not messing, he started putting his hand underneath my rib cage and I am not messing, his hand was inside my body.
"He was pulling on my ribs. I thought I was going to break my ribs and I was going to tap, but I didn't. I couldn't bring myself to do it. I kind of knew what was going on, even though John didn't say anything, it felt like a big set-up."
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