By Claire Corrigan
Mullingar student Daniel Forde, 20, and a group of his friends, managed to blag their way into $10,000 seats at the Conor McGregor v Khabib Nurmagomedov fight, which took place earlier this month.
The DCU student and his friends hoodwinked staff into letting them into the VIP area of UFC 229 in Las Vegas, and even managed to slip their way into a backstage area, where they rubbed shoulders and took selfies with people like UFC boss, Dana White.
This is not the first time the lads have pulled off such a feat. Last year, for the Conor McGregor vs Floyd Mayweather fight, which was also in Vegas, the lads managed to bag seats worth $80,000 each and have continued to run rings around the security teams since.
Relied on accessories
When talking to Topic this week, Daniel said the lads came prepared this time and relied on accessories rather than sheer brazenness to gain entry. “We brought ear pieces, clip boards and suits to make sure we were well dressed. On Thursday, which was the day of the press conference going on in The Park MGM, we went there to suss out what people were wearing. There was a media check-in place, so one of the lads spotted someone’s name on the list and came back a while later and said that was his name and got two media wrist bands.”
After a quick Photoshopping session, the lads printed out three more “media wrist bands”, gaining them entry to the media section of the press conference. “After that we got backstage and got to meet Dana White, President of the UFC, and some of the fighters, including Dominick Rojelio Cruz.”
The next day came the weigh-in and the six students put a plan in motion to get past VIP security. “There was a media area as well as a VIP area and a check-in for that. We were planning ahead the whole time because we knew that five of us couldn’t get in together. I spotted an Irish lad wearing a Celtic jersey and he showed me all his VIP credentials and I took photos of everything that I’d need and knocked together replicas using Photoshop again.
He said the six students used the media wrist bands and VIP passes interchangeably during the weekend to access different venues. “We got into the VIP section and I was sitting beside Brian Ortega, Justin Gaethje and Claudia Gadelha.”
Saturday came – the big fight – and the lads knew that this was going to be their toughest challenge yet, and when Daniel was stopped by security, he thought his luck had finally run out. “Three of us went in using the VIP passes and the other two went in as media. I went up first and showed them my pass. Then when I got in. I was asked for a wristband, which I didn’t have and was told I would have to go back outside and check in.” However, luckily for Daniel, a member of the security team decided to offer him a band to save him the trouble of having to enter again, and he was on his way to the VIP section where he was reunited with his friends. “Then it was just a matter of getting better seats. We just kept waving our VIP passes around as if we were meant to be there. We had to split up again but we very close to the action and I was in the front row. They have tighter security in the Lane Club than the T-Mobile arena in Las Vegas.”
Daniel added that he and his friends managed to blag their way into the VMAs last April, which was held in New York.
“We also got into Ed Sheeran twice and The Rolling Stones earlier this year.”
