Wrestler urges kids to press for success
By Michael Wamble Daily Herald Staff Writer
Former Olympic champion and current World Wrestling Entertainment star Kurt Angle told students at Naperville’s Madison Junior High School Wednesday to be passionate about setting goals.
Seventh-grader Jamaal Redmond knew enough to listen to a guy who weighs 220 pounds and can Angle Slam him.
“He’s so strong, “Jamaal said while holding a scrap of notebook paper with Angle’s autograph. “He almost broke my fingers when he shook my hand.”
But it was the strength of Angle’s message – urging students to passionately pursue excellence to achieve their dreams – that stuck with kids like Jamaal.
It helped that in Angle’s case, passion and hard work helped him overcome obstacles when he broke his neck just weeks before the 1996 Olympics. Wrestling in pain, he still won the gold.
Before a rededication ceremony of Madison’s physical education facilities, Angle talked about making the transition from amateur to professional wrestling and why some athletes turn to steroids and human-growth hormones.
After achieving his Olympic dream, Angle said it was hard to transition from amateur wrestling where you “just go for the pin “to professional wrestling, “where people watch it for the story.”
“It was hard for me to turn off the natural instinct that I’d developed over 18 years, “he said.
He called the WWE “the most brutal thing I’ve ever done, “running off a litany of injuries he sustained over five years.
Angle said he avoided temptations such as steroids. Competing in the Olympics, he said, he was tested every other month for drugs.
Still, he understands why some athletes, including baseball players, might take steroids or human-growth hormones.
“I blame it on the fans. They want to see the freakish (home run) numbers, “Angle said.
“It’s like with Mr. Olympia -when they went natural, business went down, “Angle said. Then guys “became big, huge 300-pounders and everybody came back.”
“With (Mark) McGwire and (Barry) Bonds putting up numbers like that, everybody’s going ‘Yeah,’æ “Angle said. “Now, you’re not going to get numbers like that again. You’ll be lucky to see 40 home runs.”
Entertainment, Angle has learned, drives many sports, including his own.
“We’re Hollywood stuntmen that put together wrestling matches that people can watch and be inspired, “he said.
Looking at the junior high’s facilities, Angle said he was inspired by the kinds of athletes it could produce.
“We didn’t have anything like this in high school, “he said.
The jewels of the training center are fitness machines designed by STRIVE, a company that makes weight- and muscle-training equipment especially for kids.
“We were the prototype, the first in the country to get this, “said Phil Lawler, a physical education teacher and director of the PE4LIFE Institute. “And it was donated to us.”
What excited Lawler about Angle’s visit, he said, is that “he didn’t let roadblocks get in the way of his success.”
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