COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo.—Rulon Gardner didn’t need to star on a network TV show to discover that his weight had spiraled out of control. He didn’t need to plop onto a scale that flashed 474 pounds. What he needed was an eye-opening reality check, a depressing yet humbling glance at himself.
“The only way you’re going to be accountable is to look in the mirror,” said Gardner, the former Olympic Training Center wrestler who had gone from a bone-crushing, two-time Olympic medalist to an out-of-shape slob with a love for fast food and late-night snacks.
Of course, Gardner shook his head in disgust at what he saw—an unhealthy mound that was “the size of a small truck,” he joked. So he embarked on a life-changing mission, not only to lose weight (he has dropped about 175 pounds the past seven months) but to win back the fighting spirit that propelled him to Olympic glory and a heaping pile of riches.
Now that Gardner checks in “right around” 300 pounds, and now that criticism has eased from his midseason exit from the NBC hit “The Biggest Loser,” and now that he’s eating right again and working out on a daily basis, he’s back in the wrestling room at the OTC, determined to regain his form in Greco-Roman to compete at the 2012 London Games.
Gardner, 39, of Logan, Utah, has made four trips to the OTC since he grew serious about wrestling in April, the same month he left “The Biggest Loser” citing “personal reasons,” without a final weigh-in to gauge his progress over 16 weeks. He knows where he stands—14 pounds heavier than in 2000, when he beat Russian Alexander Karelin for Olympic gold, and 35 pounds heavier than in 2004, when he retired after winning a bronze.
OTC coach Steve Fraser is helping Gardner improve his cardiovascular conditioning, and Gardner has been doing battle with OTC resident Dremiel Byers, a 2008 Olympian who is favored for a berth in London. Gardner won’t compete at the world championships in September in Istanbul, setting up a possible return at the Sunkist Kids International Open in October in Mesa, Ariz. The U.S. Olympic trials are in April in Iowa City, Iowa.
“As long as my body is healthy, I think I have a realistic chance,” said Gardner, who will train at the OTC for 11 days next month during a Greco-Roman national team camp. He conceded, “There are limitations that I have. I need to make sure my body can withstand the daily in and out of training. If that happens and I’m healthy, I’ll make a run for it.”
If anybody can succeed in a longshot Olympic comeback, it’s Gardner, whose resiliency has been tested too many times to count—in four marriages; in the 1990 death of his only daughter in a car accident; in a 2002 snowmobiling mishap in which the middle toe on his right foot was amputated; and in a 2007 plane crash in a lake on the Utah-Arizona border.
And if anybody is capable of pulling another historic upset at the Olympics, it’s Gardner, a massive underdog against Karelin, who hadn’t fallen in international competition in 13 years and hadn’t given up a point in six years, having claimed the previous three Olympic golds at super-heavyweight. Plus, it doesn’t faze Gardner that he would be 40 in London.
“You can compare me to other gold medalists that are afraid to put themselves out there,” said Gardner, a 2001 world champion who operates a health club in Logan and travels the nation as a motivational speaker. “I’m out there with nine toes. Failure doesn’t scare me. If you go out there and give everything you’ve got, and prepare yourself, and open your mind and your expectations, and you don’t win, you have nothing to be ashamed about.”
Gardner burns as many as 7,000 calories—monitored by a device that he wears on his left arm—in a day’s worth of workouts, and he’s awfully cautious about what he puts on his plate, save for an occasional dinner at one of his favorite Brazilian steakhouses. His blood pressure is better, along with his heart rate and his skin tone. He just has to shed roughly 20 more pounds to get within shouting distance of the heavyweight limit of 264.5 pounds.
Perhaps most important, Gardner must overcome “these guys that have nonstop wrestled for (the past) seven years. They seem to have the inner-muscular strength. They seem to have the ability I don’t have anymore. Seeing them have it and me not have it, it makes you realize, ‘I’ve got a lot of work to do.’ I’ve got to make up for what I don’t have.”
Still, Gardner boasts a confident mindset.
“Some people look at life being half-empty,” he said. “I’m looking at it as an opportunity and next year being a chance to redeem myself after allowing myself to lose focus of what mattered. . I look forward to the challenge at hand. Why can’t I go out there and accomplish it? Why can’t I reach my pinnacle?”
———
Information from: The Gazette,
