Monday, May 12, 2003 | 9:32 a.m.
Super heavyweight Greco-Roman wrestler Rulon Gardner's comeback hit a snag Saturday morning at the Las Vegas Convention Center.
"I got greedy," said Gardner, who lost to his training partner in the semifinals of the U.S. National Championships.
At the end of more than 3,400 junior, senior and veteran matches during four days of wrestling, senior freestyle ace Cael Sanderson was content that he didn't pull out of the event.
Heavyweight freestylist Kerry McCoy was happy he shelved plans to retire a few years ago, and 163-pound freestylist Joe Williams had secured his third consecutive national title Saturday night to continue a tribute to his late brother Steve.
"Everything I do, and everything I accomplish and achieve, I think he's there and he notices," Joe said. "I think he's happy for me."
Steve Williams, who won two junior college national championships, died last year from asthma complications.
"Anytime something like that happens to a person or a family member, it's going to motivate you," said Joe, a 28-year-old Chicago native who wrestled for legendary coach Dan Gable at Iowa.
"So, yeah, it always drives me. But I have to go out and 'rassle,' and worry about myself and what I have to do. In the back of my mind, it's there. But I don't try to focus on it."
By winning, McCoy, Sanderson and Williams escaped from the U.S. National Championships with invaluable byes for the U.S. World Team Trials in Indianapolis next month.
The next six finishers will take part in a round-robin tournament for the right to wrestle against the newly minted national champs from Las Vegas.
Then the World Championships for freestylers will be in New York in September and the world's elite Greco-Roman wrestlers will battle in France in October.
Stephanie Murata, who had the longest-running skein of U.S. National Championships with seven at 121 pounds, was upset by Tela O'Donnell in a semifinal Saturday morning, then O'Donnell dropped Tina George, of the U.S. Army, in the final.
Military figures were guaranteed of at least one title Saturday, when Army sergeant Dremiel Byers went up against U.S. Air Force senior airman Corey Farkas in the Greco-Roman top-weight finale.
Keith Sieracki of the Army won the 163-pound Greco-Roman crown, but losses by Glenn Nieradka (Army, 132-pound Greco), Philip Johnston (Air Force, 212-pound Greco) and George dropped the military to 2-4 in title matches.
In the span of 10 hours, Farkas had a chance to defeat the two men who have won six National Championships, the past two World titles and the 2000 Olympic gold medal.
He beat Gardner in overtime, when Gardner attempted to flip him but Farkas ended up dropping on Gardner for two points and the victory. Byers held off a docile Farkas for a 3-0 victory and the title, an outcome that Gardner predicted.
Gardner, rebounding from a February 2002 snowmobiling accident in which he lost the middle toe on his right foot to frostbite, sat in a media row with the heavily bandaged foot resting on a chair.
After the event, Gardner walked out of Hall N1 and said his third-place finish served as a major wake-up call in his quest to defend his gold medal at the 2004 Olympics in Athens.
Farkas, Gardner's regular training partner at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo., sounded like Gardner's biggest fan.
"If he were to quit wrestling today, he has done everything he can do -- world and Olympic champion," said Farkas, 28. "He still is and always will be one of the greatest wrestlers in the world. I can only get better wrestling someone of that caliber every day."
McCoy, winner of his fourth U.S. championship in a row at 264.5 pounds, had designed his retirement for the end of the 2000 season. Then it was announced that the '01 national event would be in New York, in September, so he kept going.
That tournament was canceled because of the Sept. 11 tragedy, and then the U.S. pulled out of the '02 World Championships in Iran. The Worlds in New York in four months, then Athens, are now in McCoy's cross hairs.
"I just made my mind up to try to go out there and dominate everyone," said McCoy, 28. "Fortunately, I came out on top. This is huge. The younger guys, they're coming out there hungry. They want to make names for themselves.
"Just a few years ago, I was in the same situation, competing against older guys. (Young guys) have nothing to lose but everything to gain, so they tend to go a little bit harder. You always have to be on your 'A' game."
Constantly being on his "A" game has worn on Sanderson, who won wide acclaim by going 159-0 at Iowa State from 1999-2002. In 289 matches as a high schooler and collegian, he lost only three times.
He earned a spot on the U.S. World Team last year, only to stay home because of the State Department's strong advisory against traveling to Iran because of threats of violence.
Sanderson's father, Steve, said Cael, needing a break, was thinking about not coming to Las Vegas five or six weeks ago. That changed, Steve said, when Cael regained his wrestling appetite after a few workouts.
"There's just so much pressure, from the last two years and at Iowa State," said Steve Sanderson.
Cael, 23, grudgingly accepts his celebrity, pining to spend more time at home in Ames, Iowa, with his wife, Kelly, and "just mowing the yard." He hardly smiled after defeating Lee Fullhart.
"You have to get motivated to go through this whole process again, to go through this tournament," Sanderson said. "Freestyle is a different game than college wrestling. It's all a learning experience, and I'm just getting started. I'm looking forward to all the beatings I can take."
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