Tenacious is a word that describes me. I began wrestling as a freshman and was immediately placed on varsity, the only reason being we had a small team and there was nobody else. It was a long, hard season with many more losses than wins. In the summer following my freshman year I faced my pivotal moment when I attended an intensive wrestling camp in Reno, Nevada. It was the John Smith Intensive camp that lasted two weeks. I was slaughtered by the more experienced and more athletic campers that attended. All of the failure that I had endured during my season and during the tough moments of the camp made me reconsider my character and I made the choice to fight even harder.

There were three intensive practices everyday as well as a weight training session and intensive morning runs. Each practice lasted for two and a half hours and it was mostly live wrestling or live drilling. I was not in shape enough for the camp and my body hurt with every movement but, I fought every practice against every opponent. There were opponents that would beat on me for the entire time but I never backed down. I fought to the point of puking, then I fought after I was done. I earned the respect of every person I wrestled because of my work ethic. That ethic was only brought about by the mass amount of failure that I had endured.

My first wrestling season played a big part in the way that I approached the camp. I was wrestling kids that were much larger than I because I was a chubby kid at the time. I was not only beaten but often brutalized by some very sadistic opponents. All of this failure made me make the choice to always attack. During every match I was forced to be as vicious as possible, even when facing opponents that far out classed me. I had to make the hard choice to always attack to survive the matches. I approached the camp the same way. I had lost thirty pounds from the previous season and I was ready to start wrestling kids my own size but I lacked the experience that these kids had. Every success that I had came from a dozen failures.

When my character was challenged I asked myself why somebody would push their body to the limits. The act of exerting that much work and effort can often not even pay off. The only answer that I could come up with was because that means that we have some small control over our futures. When we can push the limits of our bodies to another level, we are breaking through barriers set by nature. I accept that my failures forced me to make the choice to work fanatically but I also accept that I might have found my way to the same work ethic because I truly believe in this pursuit.