Free Foxcatcher: The True Story of My Brother's Murder, John du Pont's Madness, and the Quest for Olympic Gold by David Thomas, Mark Schultz Page A
Authors: David Thomas, Mark Schultz
year there.
CHAPTER 5
Creating an Aura
T he summer after our season at UCLA, Dave and I tried out for the Junior World Team, which trained at the US Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Neither of us had a car, and the only way we could get there was to hitchhike. Over the first hundred miles, we picked up about ten different rides. Then a woman pulled over to the side of the road and when we told her where we were headed, she said she could take us the rest of the way.
After training camp in Colorado Springs, we traveled to Brockport, New York, for the Junior World Team Trials. Dave and I weighed in for the trials at 165 pounds—the first time I had weighed as much as he did.
The team’s head coach, Bill Weick, was a high school coaching legend in Chicago who been head coach of various US international teams and had been on the coaching staff of the 1972 Olympic team. Coach Weick later coached three Olympic teams in the 1980s, including teams for which Dave and I competed. He became one of my favorite coaches and corner men.
Coach knew that Dave could win Junior Worlds at 163, so he told me to try out at the next weight class up, 180.5. I agreed before learning that would mean I’d have to beat Ed Banach to make the team. Ed was a sensational wrestler who had redshirted his freshman year at the powerhouse that was the University of Iowa. In fact,Ed’s older brother, Steve, and his twin brother, Lou, also signed with Iowa. Their coach was Dan Gable, probably still the most-recognized name in all of wrestling. As a wrestler in high school and college, Dan had a 181-1 record, and he won gold at the 1972 Olympics. By the time he had retired from coaching at Iowa in 1997, Dan’s teams had won fifteen national championships and he had coached 152 All-Americans. If Dan signed you to wrestle at Iowa, you were very good.
Finding out I would have to beat Ed drained me psychologically. My body started feeling tired. I think when a person knows he will have to go through an intense experience, his body starts conserving energy by getting tired. I knew I would have to conserve as much energy as I could. For the week or week and a half leading up to the trials, the only time I got out of bed was to eat and practice.
Ed and I wrestled best two-out-of-three matches to make the team. I got up on him 7–0 in the first match and he came back to beat me 12–11. Then he beat me pretty bad in the second match.
Dave easily won at 163, but Coach Weick wanted to see what Dave could do at the next weight up and switched Dave and me. Dave beat Banach handily, and I won at 163, so both of us made the Junior Worlds team. But it bugged me that my brother had beaten Ed and I hadn’t. I looked at the two of us, and there was no comparison in our builds. Physically, I should have been the one beating Ed, but Dave beat him and I couldn’t figure out why.
•
The night before the team was to leave for Mongolia for the Junior Worlds, a group of us went to a bar. I met the most beautiful girl in the world there. Or at least as beautiful as Dave’s girlfriend,Veronica, who had sought Dave out after Dave had defeated her boyfriend, a former World Cup champion, in a local tournament. But the girl in the bar had an ugly friend with her who wouldn’t leave us alone. Dave stepped in and took her off away from us. That’s what I call taking one for the team!
The girl I was with took me to her apartment so we could make out. I couldn’t believe my luck in meeting this girl, but we left for Mongolia and I never saw her again. However, the fact that I had been able to make out with a girl that was as beautiful as Dave’s girlfriend was a real confidence builder for me. Dave had a disarming confidence around girls, especially after the success of his high school wrestling career. It hadn’t been easy for me to talk to girls growing up, but that began to change during my first year of doing the college scene.
The day before we
CHAPTER 5
Creating an Aura
T he summer after our season at UCLA, Dave and I tried out for the Junior World Team, which trained at the US Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Neither of us had a car, and the only way we could get there was to hitchhike. Over the first hundred miles, we picked up about ten different rides. Then a woman pulled over to the side of the road and when we told her where we were headed, she said she could take us the rest of the way.
After training camp in Colorado Springs, we traveled to Brockport, New York, for the Junior World Team Trials. Dave and I weighed in for the trials at 165 pounds—the first time I had weighed as much as he did.
The team’s head coach, Bill Weick, was a high school coaching legend in Chicago who been head coach of various US international teams and had been on the coaching staff of the 1972 Olympic team. Coach Weick later coached three Olympic teams in the 1980s, including teams for which Dave and I competed. He became one of my favorite coaches and corner men.
Coach knew that Dave could win Junior Worlds at 163, so he told me to try out at the next weight class up, 180.5. I agreed before learning that would mean I’d have to beat Ed Banach to make the team. Ed was a sensational wrestler who had redshirted his freshman year at the powerhouse that was the University of Iowa. In fact,Ed’s older brother, Steve, and his twin brother, Lou, also signed with Iowa. Their coach was Dan Gable, probably still the most-recognized name in all of wrestling. As a wrestler in high school and college, Dan had a 181-1 record, and he won gold at the 1972 Olympics. By the time he had retired from coaching at Iowa in 1997, Dan’s teams had won fifteen national championships and he had coached 152 All-Americans. If Dan signed you to wrestle at Iowa, you were very good.
Finding out I would have to beat Ed drained me psychologically. My body started feeling tired. I think when a person knows he will have to go through an intense experience, his body starts conserving energy by getting tired. I knew I would have to conserve as much energy as I could. For the week or week and a half leading up to the trials, the only time I got out of bed was to eat and practice.
Ed and I wrestled best two-out-of-three matches to make the team. I got up on him 7–0 in the first match and he came back to beat me 12–11. Then he beat me pretty bad in the second match.
Dave easily won at 163, but Coach Weick wanted to see what Dave could do at the next weight up and switched Dave and me. Dave beat Banach handily, and I won at 163, so both of us made the Junior Worlds team. But it bugged me that my brother had beaten Ed and I hadn’t. I looked at the two of us, and there was no comparison in our builds. Physically, I should have been the one beating Ed, but Dave beat him and I couldn’t figure out why.
•
The night before the team was to leave for Mongolia for the Junior Worlds, a group of us went to a bar. I met the most beautiful girl in the world there. Or at least as beautiful as Dave’s girlfriend,Veronica, who had sought Dave out after Dave had defeated her boyfriend, a former World Cup champion, in a local tournament. But the girl in the bar had an ugly friend with her who wouldn’t leave us alone. Dave stepped in and took her off away from us. That’s what I call taking one for the team!
The girl I was with took me to her apartment so we could make out. I couldn’t believe my luck in meeting this girl, but we left for Mongolia and I never saw her again. However, the fact that I had been able to make out with a girl that was as beautiful as Dave’s girlfriend was a real confidence builder for me. Dave had a disarming confidence around girls, especially after the success of his high school wrestling career. It hadn’t been easy for me to talk to girls growing up, but that began to change during my first year of doing the college scene.
The day before we
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