Artem Lobov reveals he turned down $1 million payday from Conor McGregor for playing key role in creating Proper 12 Irish Whiskey

Conor McGregor has made a lot of money fighting in combat sports, but even those millions pale in comparison to the money he's made off his Proper 12 whiskey business. It turns out he owes that business idea to his good friend and training partner Artem Lobov.

In a new interview with talkSPORT, Lobov revealed:

"A few people know, but this was actually my idea. I was the person who came up with the idea to do a whiskey for Conor.”

Lobov went on to describe how McGregor was considering doing an Icelandic vodka with Thor Bjornsson, 'The Mountain' from Game of Thrones. When McGregor asked Lobov for his advice on the deal, Lobov suggested he consider doing his own Irish whiskey instead.

Conor McGregor asked him to investigate the idea and Lobov ran with it. He said:

"I went on and met all different whiskey distilleries. I called some and met some in person. I did my research and put a beautiful deal together. Once the deal was ready, I went to Conor and I said, ‘Conor, I have the deal ready for you. This is going to be a billion-dollar deal, no messing here.’ I’m not sure if he took me seriously or not at the time with the billion dollars ... We continued working on it and as you can see it was a massive success. I’m really happy to see that and I’m really happy to be a part of it ... Conor offered me $1m but I turned it down, I didn’t accept it."

Conor McGregor has made hundreds of millions of dollars off Proper 12. The most recent big money deal related to the brand came in April 2021, where 'The Notorious' and his team sold their majority stake in the brand to Proximo Spirits for $600 million. Artem Lobov refused to tell talkSPORT whether he was in on that part of the deal, but promises all will be revealed in an upcoming book.

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Artem Lobov is releasing a autobiography on his life in MMA alongside Conor McGregor

Artem Lobov's interview with talkSPORT was part of a big announcement: that 'The Russian Hammer' would be releasing a biography. Lobov wrote on Instagram:

"PROPER 12 was and still is the biggest deal that I ever came up with, it is incredible to see the success that it has achieved in such a short time! Link to full interview is in my story. The complete story along with many other incredible stories from my life, will be published in my book, coming at the end of 2022/beginning 2023, written by the one and only Petesy Carroll."

Lobov's combat sports career saw him fight across the UK and Europe before making it to the UFC. He also played a pivotal role in kicking off the resurgence of bare-knuckle boxing. As one of Conor McGregor's closest friends during the Irish superstar's rise to fame, there'll definitely be a lot of interesting stories for him to tell.