DETROIT – Adam Coon has had ups and downs on his road to the Olympics, but now, he’s finally made it.
The University of Michigan wrestler won the 130kg Greco-Roman this past April, securing his heavyweight spot on the U.S. Olympic team.
Coon has been trying since 2016 to make it to the games. He couldn’t make it in 2016, so he tried again in 202. That year he ended up winning at the Olympic trials but couldn’t go due to his weight class not being represented.
“That made it very difficult to come so close twice and not go,” said Coon.
But after those failures, finally a breakthrough.
The Fowlerville native earned his spot, and now the weight of not making it is off his shoulders.
“It’s a title that can never be taken away. I’m very excited to finally have it,” said Coon. “To have earned that title, it’s just, it’s wonderful.”
When he missed out three years ago, Coon got out of wrestling and into another sport.
“After the 21 didn’t work out the way I wanted it to, I decided that this might be a good opportunity to try my hand at football,” he said.
Coon tried out for the Tennessee Titans and played professionally for them, but the mat stayed on his mind.
“I had fun with the experience, but I decided that it was ultimately time to come back to wrestling,” he said. “I had some unfinished business.
That decision and dedication led him to his Olympic dream, in a wrestling style that’s a bit different to what he was used to in college.
Coon wrestled freestyle and folkstyle, which allows for leg attacks and tripping. In Greco-Roman, the style he’s competing in the Olympics, leg attacks and tripping are not allowed.
“I cannot use my legs to trip… I can’t grab their legs, any of that type of stuff. So, it’s all waist-up wrestling,” said Coon.
He can now use his pro football experience to his advantage. The training he learned from football, and being able to see how other sports train, is helping him with his own training in wrestling.
His sports resume is impressive, and his next chapter should be too, thanks to a degree in aerospace engineering.
“I kind of envision I’ll be sitting at a desk, and I want to be able to say to myself that I lived out my athletic dream,” he said. “I always tell people too, while my knees still work, I’m going to be an athlete.”
Until the day he’s behind a desk, Coon plans to leave it all on the mat, with a medal within sight.
“My goal is to wrestle the best that I absolutely can. I want to see exactly how good I am on the stage,” he said. “I want to see to what level I can compete.”
Coon said it would be great to bring home a medal, but either way, he gets to wrestle on the greatest stage of the sport.