Arguably one of the greatest American Greco-Roman wrestlers of all-time, Rulon Gardner has a new challenge ahead of him: he hopes to win season 11 of The Biggest Loser.
It's not the first challenge Gardner has faced. In fact, he’s shown himself to be a battle-hardened survivor against all odds in many situations, and this time, he’s hoping to apply that tough mentality to lose weight.
Wrestler Rulon Gardner Defeats Alexander Karelin at the Olympic Games
Gardner, a heavyweight in the 2000 and 2004 Olympic Games, is most commonly remembered for his gold medal performance in 2000. To win the gold, Gardner had to defeat Russian Alexander Karelin — a man who had not lost an international match in 13 years.
Perhaps even more impressive, no one had scored a single point on Karelin in more than 10 years when Gardner defeated him at the Olympic Games.
Rulon Gardner Wins Bronze at the 2004 Olympic Games
Four years later, Gardner returned to the Olympic Games in Athens and earned a bronze medal. At those Games, he left his shoes in the middle of the mat after his last match, symbolizing his retirement.
During his wrestling career, Gardner won three national championships, one world championship and the James E. Sullivan Award, given to the best amateur athlete in the United States.
Rulon Gardner's Stories of Survival: Snowmobile Accident, Motorcycle Accident
Gardner’s ability to persevere and survive has been equally impressive off the wrestling mat.
In 2002, Gardner was riding his snowmobile in Wyoming when the snowmobile plunged into the river. Unable to ride the snowmobile out, Gardner was forced to climb out of the river on foot. Once out of the river, Gardner had few options. Because the snow was four feet deep, he wasn’t able to walk very far or very quickly. He laid down under some trees and waited for someone to come rescue him.
When he was discovered 17 hours later, Gardner’s body temperature had fallen to 88 degrees Fahrenheit. He was rushed to the hospital, where he had to have toes amputated due to frostbite.
Somehow Gardner survived, but he was told he would never wrestle again.
But that didn’t stop him. In time, Gardner returned to the mat and again began training for the 2004 Olympic Games.
Also in 2004, Gardner was thrown from his motorcycle when he was struck by a car on the way to wrestling practice in Colorado Springs. He sustained no serious injuries and continued on his way to the Olympic Training Center for practice.
Rulon Gardner Plane Crash
After winning the bronze medal in 2004, Gardner again had another brush with death in 2007 when the plane he was flying in crashed into Good Hope Bay on the Utah-Arizona border.
Out with two friends in a Cirrus SR 22 airplane, the three men crashed into the 44-degree lake more than a mile from shore.
Gardner couldn’t swim, but he and the two other men managed to make it to shore where they huddled on the beach for more than 12 hours until a fisherman found them in the morning.
“I should be dead,” Gardner told me after the incident in 2007. “In fact, I should have been dead more than once. I wouldn’t call myself lucky, though. I just do the best I can when a situation arises.”
Olympic Wrestler on The Biggest Loser
After the Olympic Games, Gardner opened a health club with Justin Pope, his teammate on The Biggest Loser. When Gardner won his Olympic medal in 2004, he weight 286 pounds. At the 2004 Olympic Games, he weighed in at 265 after cutting weight from about 300 pounds, he said.
On the show, Garder’s weight loss journey begins at 474.
“The day after I won the gold medal at the Olympics I thought your life is over. You’ll never step on a scale ever again. (I’ll) live life and enjoy, take a year or two years off and enjoy” Gardner said in a Dietsinreview.com interview. “I allowed myself to really lose track of what I was doing and finally got to a point where I couldn’t look in the mirror. I couldn’t say you know what, you’re living this horrible, horrific lifestyle you need to change. The snack, all those years, the training was allowing me to be able to live those unhealthy eating habits and now they are finally catching up with me."
But Gardner is ready to make a change, and competing on The Biggest Loser is the first step in the right direction, Gardner said, even if he doesn’t win.
“I’ve already won in my life, so maybe it’s (someone else’s) turn,” Gardner said in the interview. “But there’s no way I ever quit on myself. I’ll tell you that much.”
So far, Gardner has proven that to be true.
Season 11 of The Biggest Loser on NBC begins Jan. 4.
Other Wrestling News:
John du Pont, Convicted of Murdering Olympic Wrestler, Found Dead
Sources:
- Personal interview, Rulon Gardner, February 2007.
- “Rulon Gardner, Biggest Loser Contestant.” Dietsinreview.com
Kristen Nichols - Kristen is a freelance reporter and copywriter covering Olympic and Paralympic sport for Suite101.com. Kristen's love of sport developed ...
