Jon Jones has shared his reaction to the shock defeat that Ilia Topuria suffered against Justin Gaethje at the UFC Freedom 250 event in June.
Ilia Topuria had been tipped as the major favorite going into the first defense of his lightweight championship reign after he won the title from Charles Oliveira.
The 29-year-old UFC star, who captured the lightweight title in 2025, had an undefeated 17-0 MMA record going into the Justin Gaethje fight at the White House.
However, Gaethje defied the odds and emerged as the new lightweight champion after a hard-fought encounter with Topuria in their UFC Freedom 250 main event.
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Jon Jones on how Ilia Topuria has handled his UFC Freedom 250 setback against Justin Gaethje
Ilia Topuria was a bloodied mess when he took his seat on his corner stool after the fourth round of his thrilling clash with UFC star Justin Gaethje last month.
But the ex-featherweight and lightweight champion did not return for a fifth round in the UFC Freedom 250 showdown after his corner pulled him out of the fight.
Gaethje secured a sensational TKO win at UFC White House, and the 37-year-old American finally captured the title that had eluded him in his MMA career.
Jon Jones has admitted that Topuria has already “realized” that he did not put on his best performance and has tipped him to bounce back from his defeat to Gaethje.
“Ilia’s going to be in a good position,” he told the Red Corner MMA YouTube channel.
“He has faith. He has a strong team and that’s a lot of what it takes. He has a work ethic. I think he’s honest with himself.
“Ilia and I, we share the same agent and we were talking about him earlier today and [from] what I heard was that he’s humble, that he is honest.
“He realized that he just didn’t perform well. And I think that’s the number one step of getting back into the ring in a healthy way.
“It’s the guys that make excuses that’s when it’s hard to come back and win that rematch.”
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Jon Jones tells Ilia Topuria not to fall into the trap other UFC fighters have
Jones said that Topuria cannot fall into the same pitfall as other UFC stars by not being ‘honest’ with himself about his performance.
“Guys who just say, ‘You know what, I could have done better. I could have done more,’” he continued.
“Honesty with yourself is the key to MMA. Knowing exactly who you are, what you’ve done, what you haven’t done.
“You can’t lie once you get in that cage. What’s real will come to the light.”
Jones has not fought inside the MMA octagon since his successful UFC heavyweight title defence against Stipe Miocic at UFC 309 at Madison Square Garden in 2024.
It’s currently unclear if Jones will ever return to the Octagon after his retirement announcement, and a quick U-turn resulted in a falling out with UFC CEO Dana White.