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Some first encounters you never forget. For me, meeting wrestling legend Wayne Baughman for the first time was highlight.
Prior to that moment I had heard and read plenty of stories that backed up Baughman's status as a legend in the sport. Baughman is one of four wrestlers listed in Mike Chapman's book Toughest Men in Sports and his own book - Wrestling On and Off the Mat - is a wrestling classic.
Having read Baughman's book cover-to-cover twice prior to our meeting I felt compelled to send him a note telling him how much I enjoyed it. I also told him I had lent in out to several of my friends. He sent me back a handwritten note telling me not to loan it out because he needed to sell more copies. (He was kidding, I think).
When Baughman brought his Air Force squad to wrestle at the West Regional in Cedar Falls, Iowa in 2000 I took full advantage of the opportunity to introduce myself to one of my sporting heroes. As I approached him to sign my book I thought I had made a mistake because one his wrestlers was about to compete. Instead, he spent ten minutes talking to me and missed the first two periods of his athlete's match. I knew then that he was different from most.
Since that time I've used Wayne Baughman and his expertise in every way imaginable. Any time I needed an interview he was there. Whenever I needed to learn more about a wrestler from the past about he'd help me out. All I needed to do was give him one lead question and he would give me a solid hour of uninterrupted commentary - and I loved every minute.
Recently, after 50 years devoting his life to wrestling, the former NCAA champion from Oklahoma announced he was retiring as the head coach of the Air Force Academy effective July 31. It was finally time for Baughman to step away from the sport he doesn't love.
"How can you like something or have fun with something that requires so much pain and sacrifice," Baughman told me on more than one occasion. "Cutting weight and punishing your body wasn't really all that fun to me."
But it was Baughman who could never completely walk away from the sport. As a wrestler and a coach, Baughman has done it all. From 1963 through 1972 he made three Olympic teams, eight World teams (including a freestyle/Greco-Roman double in 1965), and won 16 national titles (he never placed lower than third at a national event). He is also the only person who has won national championships in the four recognized wrestling styles (collegiate, freestyle, Greco-Roman, and Sombo).
Immediately following his retirement as a competitor in 1972, Baughman coached three World teams in a row and was named the head coach of the 1976 freestyle Olympic team. Then, in 1976, he began 27-year tenure at the Air Force Academy.
Despite all of his accomplishments in wrestling, it's the praise of his peers that speaks loudest for Baughman. John Peterson, a gold medalist at the 1976 Olympics, calls Baughman a man of great integrity. Peterson speaks with reverence about the time Baughman stood up to the AAU when the "committee" questioned how well John and his brother Ben would do at the Olympics in 1972. (Ben and John eventually won a gold and silver medal respectively). Five-time world medalist Larry Kristoff calls him one of the classiest guys he's ever met and wrestling icon Dan Gable calls Baughman "one tough dude".
"He probably doesn't know how much I watched him," said 1972 Olympic champion Dan Gable. "Because of where I was at in my career, I was looking for wrestlers with a similar mindset. When I was at some of these camps where Baughman was involved, one way or the other I was scouting him out because he was somebody I was drawn to.
"I just think of a guy who strapped a pistol on his side and walked to the top of the highest mountain in Colorado. I'll never forget back in '68 at a training camp, for some reason he had a pistol strapped to his side and he hiked up that mountain. That was one of the workouts we had to do one day and he went through that workout pretty easy."
Baughman has also shown his resolve outside of wrestling. His list of undertakings in other sports is mind-boggling. He's finished the Leadville Trail 100, a long-distance foot race at an average elevation of over 10,000 feet, twice. His meager training schedule consisted the same 4.7 mile route six times a week (an average of under 30 miles a week) while most runners were putting in 100 mile weeks with a 30 mile long run. Weighing 195 pounds, he was the heaviest competitor to finish the race at the time.
The former wrestler also completed several triathlons, including the Hawaii Ironman, finished the Pikes Peak marathon, and hiked all 54 14,000 foot peaks in Colorado. He entered a winner-take-all Toughman contest in Pueblo, Colo for a chance at $1000 and he thought it might be interesting to give rodeo a try (both bull and bareback). His other athletic endeavors include short stints in swimming, fencing, handball, volleyball, rowing, canoeing, shooting, luge, badminton, racquetball, tennis, golf, and slew of other sports.
"There's tough wrestling specific and then there is just tough," said J Robinson, a teammate with Baughman on two World and one Olympic team. "When your life spills over into other things you do, I think it gives you a different kind of toughness because you're not just one dimensional in wrestling. Baughman is just tough. He just is. He's a warrior. That's the way I would sum him up.
"If I was a Roman soldier fighting in a line I would want Wayne Baughman right next to me on my right hand side. He'd be there for the duration hacking and slashing his way through. That's the kind of guy you want. He's dependable, he's loyal, and he's a great person."
One of the great stories that both Robinson and Baughman like to tell is when they were at the International Military Games in Turkey in 1972. Robinson had reached the finals and was wrestling a Turk with Turkish referee. In the spirit of FILA, Robinson was involved in what Baughman considers one of the worst hose-jobs he's ever seen.
The match ended with Robinson losing after several "questionable" calls, a slew injury timeouts by the Turk, and some clock management at the scorer's table. When the Turk was awarded the victory, Baughman protested the match and got into a shoving match with the official, which led to a personal escort out of the stadium with an automatic weapon placed in his stomach.
Robinson showed his displeasure by giving the fans an internationally known gesture involving a finger. The favor was returned with a series of bottles and other projectiles being thrown at Robinson and Baughman.
"He was always there," said Robinson. "Wayne Baughman - and there aren't a lot of people you can say this about - if you needed someone to stand behind you, I would have no doubt Wayne Baughman would be standing behind me the whole time giving me everything he could give.
"I think if I called him up today and said I really need you I think he'd be here. I would be very shocked if he wouldn't."
As for me, I plan on making sure Wayne Baughman is always there because I don't believe for a second he is done with wrestling yet.
Kyle Klingman is the associate director at the International Wrestling Institute and Museum. He can be contacted via e-mail at
kyle@wrestlingmuseum.org
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