Ben Askren | Episode 2

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity and readability.

Jason Bryant

It's time for Stories from the Resilite, tales of triumph and tradition. Step onto the mat and into the moments that shaped wrestling history. It all comes to life on Stories from the Resilite. Here's your host, award-winning wrestling broadcaster, Shane Sparks

Shane Sparks

and welcome to Stories from the Resilite. Guest here today, familiar face, four-time finalist, two-time national champion, two-time Hodge Trophy winner, an Olympian in 2008 success in the cage. He's done all kinds of stuff, Funky. Ben Askren, and Ben, it is awesome to see you. How are you feeling?

Ben Askren

I'm feeling okay today, getting around, getting things done, started coaching again. Life's good.

Shane Sparks

NCAA championships in Cleveland. Your general thoughts on that tournament here in 2026 and who's a guy or two that especially impressed you? Yeah?

Ben Askren

Well, yeah, I've been doing these videos on the YouTube. It's fun because I was stuck at home too much this winter, so I would just flip on my phone to make a video. And people seem to be enjoying them, at least to a certain extent. Obviously, Mitchell, right? And all the AWA guys, junkyard dog I was watching. So I'm always watching them. I think, as anyone, I think I'm making a video later today about could Jack Forrest be one of the greatest ever. And while I think it's probably pretty early to comment on that, my general consensus is that's the distinct possibility. I think the story of the tournament was probably the freshman we had four freshmen national champions. I don't think that's ever happened. So, yeah, so it was, it was a lot of fun.

Shane Sparks

You look at wrestling Ben far different than I do. I mean, you have an acute eye for wrestling, especially when you look at a guy like Jack Forrest, who's amazing Scrambler. What is so impressive in the detail? What are a couple of things that he does that most people wouldn't quite grasp and understand and fully appreciate like you

Ben Askren

would, huh? Well, you know what's funny? I don't ever study anyone really closely unless I need to beat them because, because I'm coaching my guys, that's otherwise I just watch as a fan, like, I just, I enjoy it, and then if I, like, I said, Hey, we need to beat that guy. Then I'll go, really, like, study tendencies and stuff. So I haven't studied Jack's over really closely. I mean, just general observations. He's obviously very good in every position. He's very comfortable, pretty much anywhere that he goes, that doesn't ever seem to be in discomfort, even when he's, you know, say, like, the first Seidel match, when he was on his back, he just popped off right away. You know, it was like, if he wasn't so good off his back, which very, very few good people actually good at getting off their back, but he popped off his back like that. It was really, really impressive. A lot of guys in that situation, Aeron Seidel would have pinned he he's bringing the ball and chain tilt back, which, if you would ask me, that's our dog crap move. And the only other person I've known to use it well that I can think of at an elite level. Last, I don't know, 20 years we you already brought up was Anthony Robles, and he had the advantage of being a little more powerful than the rest of 125 because he was missing in extremity. But I can't think of anyone who's used that that regularly. You know, this last 25 years, I would say that I've been watching wrestling. So it's funny that he has brought that technique back. I mean, it was a technique that kind of everyone knows it, but no one can really do it at a high level. Yeah, so I think there's kind of probably a lot of things going on there. I think he's probably creating his own style as he goes. I think he really loves and enjoys wrestling and just gets, I guess him and Sergio Vega have an interview out about how they don't lift, which it's kind of an interesting topic. I want to go listen to it before I dig in and comment on it. And obviously you can't really argue with them, because, like, what do you argue with? They didn't lose any matches, and they were, you know, freshmen. So when you say, Oh, you're dumb, if you lifted more, you'd win more matches, like it was, that's not possible.

Shane Sparks

Yeah, really good interview. Check it out with Mark Bader on FloWrestling. Obviously, you've known Mitchell Mesenbrink his entire life. You wrestled for his father, John at arrowhead. You guys are business partners at Askren Wrestling Academy. Is what he's doing. Ben the level of dominance, he's won 54 straight this season, 27 and oh, 26 bonus point victories, 79 and one in his career in dominating fashion, has this surprised you a little bit how good he's been.

Ben Askren

You know what? I remember a conversation Mitchell before he left, and I said this before he left the second time, not the first time, and said, like, hey, because he was trying too much in love with folks, or, sorry, freestyle, I say, if you don't forget the rest of folks off the next year, you can be one of the greatest ever 100% 10, no doubt in my mind. So yes, at that at that point in time, I think I saw it coming for sure. Make that video about Jack's possibly one of the greatest of all time. I mean, Mitchell is gonna be an arguable second after next year, insanely high bonus rate. Oh, singular, sorry, singular. Loss was to an Uber elite David Carr who won multiple titles and has competed at the senior level. And you know, really, like, I know the Michael kellyander They beat, that's a really good wrestler. Larry Lockett, who is in his bracket, has already been an elite freestyle hauler. He didn't even place. Joey Blaze was an NCAA finalist at the weight below. So, like, you know they were. He's won some really tough brackets. So you guys by well, but again, by the time he left for college, the second time, he was already 20 years old or whatever. So I definitely saw him having elite level success at that point in time. But they still got to go do it right. There's absolutely no guarantee of them getting it done, and he's someone who's for sure, got it done. He's got to win 34 row to be my record, though, Shane and I don't think kale is gonna do me a favor by not letting him have that many matches. Now, one of the comments I'm gonna make, I don't want to steal all my thunder from my video later, though, you guys can finally ask him if they can YouTube.

Shane Sparks

I was just gonna ask you, Ben, where do you get the video? I was just gonna ask YouTube,

Ben Askren

is that, if you look at a lot of the past greats, like people who are, is they weren't coming to college nearly as ready. And I'll just, I'll go through a handful of them, right? And so most of their losses came early. So you look at a Lee Kemp, I believe he lost one match in his last three years, but he lost six his first year. But you look at myself, I lost eight matches total. They were all in the first two years. I didn't lose the last two years at all. If you look at Cael Sanderson or David Taylor, now they both had red shirt seasons, and if you go with those red shirt seasons, they weren't nearly what they would be later, right? So it even took them a year to grow. And now kind of where we saw three true freshmen national champions. So you're seeing that when kids come to college, they're almost immediately ready to compete at that level. I think there's a handful of reasons for that, which means, when we're talking about the all timers, the game kind of changes, because, you know, so we'll say even Kyle Dake, right? Kyle Dake took four losses first two years. And you know, there are a couple that were pretty good losses, but there was a couple that were, man, they were, they were all right, you know. And so, you know, even we'll say maybe 2015, maybe 20. I don't know. I don't know exactly what the cutoff date is, but kids are coming to college more ready than ever before, because they're exposed to really high level wrestling through the clubs and through the videos and through watching at an earlier and earlier age.

Shane Sparks

This podcast Ben is going to be kind of like a scramble with an Askren. And it was funny. I had Jake Herbert on, and that podcast will be coming out, and we talked about you, and he said, You know what, I was a pretty good Scrambler. I could scramble A to B to C to D to E to F. He said the problem was, Ben Askren could scramble all the way to z. So I'm gonna be all over here, kind of a scramble. How would you been? And again, these are, you know, powerful questions that probably can't be answered in in two minutes. But how would you describe the last 10 months. If you had a summit in my life, your life in the

Ben Askren

last 10 months? Well, I'm almost, let's see, May 26 went to the hot. 28th went to the hospital. June 28 was when I got the lung transplant. So, well, I don't remember that month, so I'm gonna say the last nine months I scramble. Huh? I don't, you know, it's, I just say, it's been a process. I've kind of, like, just did what I could do, and even now, I'm still doing what I can do. And sometimes, like, honestly, I feel like, the last two weeks, I've kind of been overdoing it to a certain extent. And I, you know, I thought I was maybe more capable, and I think, hey, looking forward, I maybe got to pull it back a little bit because I'm just not all the way ready for all the things I've been doing yet. And that's kind of, you know, he never done this before. He never, had, never had a lung transplant. Matter of fact, I think I only know one person who had a lung transplant besides me, and he was way, way older and relatively unhealthy. So it's like I'm learning all this stuff for the very first time. And you know, that's kind of been how it's gone, is I just try to do what I can do, and then sometimes I'm like, Oh, wow, I did way too much. Now I'm done, done for the next three days. But, you know, overall, it's one of those things where you get more gratitude for life. And I think, think I recognize I have a great life, and I really enjoy it, and I love it, and I went through something hard, but it's fine. I still have a great life, and I love it, and I'm grateful for every day I get

Shane Sparks

I'm sure again, we could talk about this for hours and hours and hours, but decades down the road, Ben, when you reflect on this whole process up to this point in your journey, since getting the lung transplants. Wow, what are one or two things that were so powerful that even you can't fully grip yet?

Ben Askren

Oh, well, if I couldn't grip them, I wouldn't be able to talk about them, you know, I would just say the you know, one of the things I think the hospital does, more than anything, is it gives you perspective, because, you know, you you or someone else surprised and fuck, man, Oh, pardon my language, Ben's been through a lot in the last year, and then, you know, that's, that's generally, probably true. I've been through a tougher year than the vast majority of people. And then, but then you go to the hospital, and, you know, you stay there for me, like, Okay, well, that person's ever gonna walk again? Or that person, that person, that person is not leaving the hospital, like they're gonna die, you know? And so you just, like, look at it on the scope. Or, you know, one time I met this other lung transplant guy, and I was in the hospital for, I think, 70 days. I he wasn't there for a whole year before his transplant, right? And then I have three kids, which that for sure makes it tougher. But they're kind of old. They're like, what, eight and 1012 now, eight and 1013 his kids were like, one in three and five. Like, could you even imagine? And so I think it gives you a really good perspective on, hey, life's tough. It could always be tougher. And like I said, I've gratitude that I'm still here, and I get to kind of pursue all my, you know, my ambitions and all my dreams, and, you know, I'm not, definitely not all the way healthy again, but I'm getting healthy enough to do most things I want to do on a regular basis.

Shane Sparks

I think organ transplants are just pretty darn cool. What do you think about I mean, you have somebody else living inside you do you know where your lungs came from?

Ben Askren

I don't know. I think in a year, I can then write a letter to them, and then they don't have to respond. So obviously, whomever I got the lungs from is no longer with us, so his family or their family, I'm assuming it's a male because of the size of the lungs, their family then gets to choose if they want to respond to it or not. Have you

Shane Sparks

thought about what you would would say to them? Oh,

Ben Askren

I'm gonna save that, and I'm not gonna cry on this podcast.

Shane Sparks

That's pretty that's just pretty cool. I mean, that is, I mean, I can't imagine. Yeah, I'm looking forward to watching that video.

Ben Askren

We're doing a documentary, actually, on the whole process. Amy had a family friend who is in, kind of in that business, and, you know, he kind of reached out, and we was going through the process, and it's been, it's really cool so far. So far. So I think, you know, I think my story can help inspire a lot of people

Shane Sparks

want to talk about your career at Missouri. Yeah, your your red shirt freshman year, Ben, we talked about a little bit earlier with some of these guys. I mean, you correct me if I'm wrong, you struggled. You struggled in that red shirt freshman year in Columbia.

Ben Askren

Correct 100% Yeah. So, I mean, yeah, I didn't talk about my redshirt year. Well, I said my first two years, right? I had all of my losses. I didn't have any losses after, right, after my first two years, my redshirt year was even worse. I'll have 10 matches that year. You know, I went out, I competed a lot, I had, I think I had almost 50 matches. That's why I don't want to say they build them different these days, but I encourage my guys to compete a lot. I think competition is a it's a place where you can go learn, right in the practice room. Obviously you can learn, but there's nothing more. There's no more teachable moments than you're going to get in matches when it really is on the line and really is on the line, it really matters. So as long as you can go out there and you kind of be like, non emotional about the win or loss part of it, if you just control the controls, then you're going to gain a lot from every single time you experience that competition. So that's something I encourage on my guys, and that's something I did myself, is I just went out there and I competed a lot, and every single time I tried to learn something, and I tried to get better. And, you know, it worked out really, really well

Shane Sparks

for me. When did scrambling really embed itself in your wrestling mind? Like, was there a moment that you had? Did you watch somebody like, how did that really come to fruition?

Ben Askren

Yeah, no, it was I, you know, I worked the guy named Mike Eierman a little bit. My freshman year, he had a few ideas, you know, that were really good. Some far ankle stuff. The it's kind of like a mcelraby move, the world's best on a move where you cradle them. But more or less it was like I started coming to the conclusion, and I'm not gonna throw it on the bus, but I could name like 50 wrestlers like this, where, if they just wrestle the most basic, simple style, you know, and listen, I want I encourage all my guys at basic skills. And if you came to AWA practice, you would find us mostly working on basic skills, you know, say, sprawl, shot down, block head, hang on, you know, that type of. Stuff. I just was not athletic enough on the most basic terms to keep up with most of the people around me, and so I wanted to win, so bad. And you know, I always say, there's always a way, and you just need to find a way. And so I started searching, and I loved watching wrestling. It wasn't nearly as easy. It wasn't nearly as easy to watch wrestling back then, but I was able to find enough of it, and I would just pick stuff up from other people. I would, oh, I saw this person do that. Let me try that. Let me see. Does it work with my style, you know? And then that's just kind of like how I would go through I would just go through film and just try new moves and just keep working on it.

Shane Sparks

Were you a college wrestling fan growing up, I know it wasn't as accessible as as it is now, but did you follow college wrestling growing up? And if you did, who are your favorite guys to watch?

Ben Askren

Yeah, I just Well I wasn't, because you didn't really have the capability of doing so. Man, I think when I was in high school, probably the only thing you could watch was, like, the NCAA finals on TV. Like there wasn't much, you know, I remember going to a handful of badgers dual meets, but No, we weren't like, you know, go to Big Tens or go to NCAA kind of people. My dad was a wrestler, but, yeah, it just wasn't nearly as accessible as it is today. So I did. I did not watch all that much. My first NCAA Tournament was when I went as a red shirt freshman. Was that Missouri and I was in Kansas City. I went to watch, and I loved it, but, but that was really it. And they said it was finding DVDs that people are, you know, the internet. Internet started becoming, it was a thing in 2002 but there was not like, there were zero live stream matches, right? And so you could find a handful of matches here or there that were obviously not live taped matches. You know, you'd be able to pick up on some things. That's kind of what it was for me.

Shane Sparks

When did you Ben really start to have self belief at the college level?

Ben Askren

Oh, well, I mean, I don't think self belief at the college level. I don't think at the college level or the early level, you could let you could let extraneous factors were, you know, worry you or bother you about your own belief in self. But I think the simplest thing is, and this is a controllable thing, is, what do you believe in? Like, you believe you're the best in the world. Now, some people believe that, but like, if I said, Hey, one of my 11th graders believes they're the best in the world, I'd say, we'll go prove it. And then most likely, if they're an 11th grader, it's a, it's a highly delusional thought, right? They're not going to go beat Well, maybe if you're Jack Forrest, but, you know, for the majority of them, but the first thing I can remember believing it was the fact that I was willing to work it hard, work as hard as anyone, right? And now that's kind of like even almost unprovable, but in my mind, I was working as hard as anyone whole time. And then, you know, another one that would come along is like, for a six minute window I can go as hard as anyone. And that one never got disproved either, because I never had anyone who wore me out. I wore a lot of other people out, and I had people who stuck with me, but I never had anyone wear me out to prove me that I was wrong. So it's like this small stuff like that, and then that adds up. And at the end of the day, you know, you can never control if you win or lose. I would say, Shane, if I put you on the mat with Mitchell Mesenbrink you can think you're gonna win all day, but you're getting your ass kicked 100 times in a row. Like, that's just what's gonna happen. But if you said, Hey, Shane, do you believe you can work as hard as you can in this match, or do you think you think you try as hard as you can? And the answer is yes, you can. And so that's kind of the things I was more concerned about. Then am I going to win every single match?

Shane Sparks

How did you battle self doubt?

Ben Askren

You know what? I'm autistic, and I didn't really think about it much for real. I'm so serious. I my and my wife, she's She could probably hear me. She's over, over, that way, somewhere. Yeah, honestly, I just thought, I mean, I lost so many matches in my life. I lost, I don't know, many, many hundreds. Like, I just really wasn't, Guy says about competition earlier. I really wasn't, obviously, when I was in the match, I wanted to win the match, and if I lost, I was sad that I lost the match. But then it was like, Hey, what did I learn from this? And then I would move on, and I would just keep trying to get better. So I wasn't really overly concerned with the wins or losses in the match or the defeat or the failure. It was just like, just keep getting better. That was all I was really concerned about. And so as long as I could hit that metric of I'm gonna try as hard as I can, and I'm gonna keep trying to get better, then that's not a failure. That's not, there's no doubt about that. Like, I know I'm gonna try.

Shane Sparks

Were you always like that?

Ben Askren

Yeah, as long as I can, you know, I kind of thought that's how everyone was. But then, you know, as I get older, I realize that's, that's not how everyone is and but I try to coach in that manner as well, because what good does worrying do? Yeah, there's just a really good saying, but I'm not, I'm not gonna get it right? It's, I'm, like, you can worry all you want, but you're just gonna be in the same place. You know? It's like, it doesn't actually do anything. You need to go take action. And so, like, Why waste my time on worrying about something? Because it's not actually gonna do anything. So let's just, let's just take, if there's somebody gonna take. Action on I'm gonna go try to take action on it. And if then there's not that I'm not

Shane Sparks

I take things from everybody I pay attention to on social media, friends of mine, people I look at from afar. You're one of those guys. Ben, my favorite thing on social media. There's a couple things I love to watch. I love watching Doug Schwab talk to his guys. I love watching that, and I love Mental Mondays that you do. I mean, I got my mom. She's 71 years old. She loves Mental Mondays. I mean, those Mental Mondays because you can take those Mental Mondays you do and apply them to your life. It doesn't. It's not about necessarily the wrestling. I want to ask you this, what is your favorite mental Monday or two that you've ever done. Are there a couple like these are the ones you gotta watch, must listen to, Mental Mondays

Ben Askren

over the rest. They're all they're, first of all, they're all over the place. Because I, you know, I've done some on Instagram, I've done some on Facebook, I've done some I did some on YouTube. So I've kind of them all over the place. I would say that you're the ones that got the most traction and and they weren't different. They were absolutely not different. Were the ones I did after my incident last year. And I think, I think a lot of people thought, hey, you know, he has an easy life. He's really good at this, or he's talented or skilled or whatever, and so it's easy for him to say this, and then when I almost died, and I can barely stand up and I'm saying the exact same things. It has a little bit different meaning to people. And, you know, I think I showed people that I am who I said I was, you know. So, you know, that's kind of what I think about, that I could say, I would say most popular, or number one, most difficult, or number one question I get all the time. It's always the same. And it's funny, because as many times as my athletes have heard this from me, I still had a few that struggled with it at the high school state championships. And it's some form of there's many forms of the same thing. I wrestle really well in practice, but not as well in matches. I wrestle really well in the small matches, but then at the big matches, I struggle, you know, some form of that, right, essentially. And the problem is, they're making one match different than another match when they need to, need to say, it's a wrestling match. There's a mat, there's a referee, there's a one opponent. It's not like, sometimes I rather wrestle one person, and sometimes I wrestle five. Not how it goes down, you know, it's, you know, you versus one person. That person's always roughly your age and your weight, same thing every single time. So there's this good analogy in one of the books I and I was, I'm blanking, I need to go look it up. Except told the story a few times recently, so I feel bad not quoting the book. But essentially, there's a two by four on the ground, right? And, you know, the coach says, hey, I'll pay someone 20 bucks to walk across. And every single person raises their hand, yeah. Their hand, and then there's a two by four on top of some ladders. He says, Okay, I'll pay everyone same 20 bucks to walk across that one. And they're like, Nah, I'm good. I'm not gonna do that, right? But the moral of the story is it's the same two by four. So I had two of my kids that were living it was fun. They both texted me like it was right after Grand March, probably within five minutes of each other, you know? And they said, Man, I'm feeling really nervous. And I said, Hey, it's the two by four story. You remember that one, right? It's still a wrestling, man, it's still an opponent. And then I told one of my other kids that I coach, that's that was more chill. I said, Hey, man, go find these two. They need someone to talk to. You just, just go. You only just just go hang out with them, just like, go tell them some jokes or something. And they did it, and then both the kids got they both competed really well, and they both won. So that's kind of probably the most common one, is that, and that's, you know what? Honestly, most of these people are getting magnificent most of the mental issues that kids experience are from their parents, 100% and so, but that that is the number one issue.

Shane Sparks

What were your parents like with you?

Ben Askren

Yeah, you know, it's funny they were, it turns out to be that they, I don't know that they had a strategy or plan with my kids. I have a strategy or plan because, you know, I work with so many other kids, and I read about this stuff all the time. I don't know that they had a strategy or plan, but they they modeled a really good, strong work ethic. And I, you know, I think, and this is one thing, I think my dad, just like, really encourages us to compete hard, and he wasn't. And then about age 12, he did step back for me, which was that was really important for me. These kind of, kind of, like, went away, drove me to wherever I needed to go and took me, but he wasn't like he wasn't in the corner, he wasn't telling me what to do. Because there's always this really hard time when every boy becomes a man, and every boy decides they're gonna become a man at a different age. And if you've realized this yet, right? Some are super mature, and at 14, they start suddenly they're talking to an adult. Some of them, it takes a lot longer. Obviously, with my kids, I would prefer that that happens. I want them to become more mature, mentally and emotionally at a younger age. But for men, specifically, there becomes an age when their dad's not going to tell them what to do. Now, Shane, this might have taken you till you were 36 at least. No. Haha, but you usually, I would say it's somewhere between like 13 and 16. Is probably a general age of right? If we're the dad's really, really bossy about what the kid's doing. It'll be fine while they're younger, but then as they age, their and their dad stays bossy, there's going to be a lot of right, this going on. And so my dad stepped away. Not all areas of life chain. I'm 41 and if I'm if I'm hitting that nail into a board, but I'm like, do it this way. I'm like, Yeah, I've nailed it a billion nails at this point. Like, I know how to do it. Shut up. But, you know, so like, dads aren't always, not bossy. But as far as wrestling was concerned, he stepped away, and that helped me immensely, because I know we would have butted heads big time if who, if he would have kept that up and that that's a really big one for young men, is it needs to be their own pursuit. It needs to be their own journey. And that's even me as a coach. I don't try to force anyone to do anything. I need them to want it more than me, and then I'm just someone who helps and guides them along the way,

Shane Sparks

there was a really cool video that you did a couple months back the bronze boot talking about your dad going to work. It was, it's one of my all time favorite videos I've ever seen, ever and knowing you, it was especially cool. But what is your favorite piece of content that you've ever put out.

Ben Askren

Oh, man, that's a tough one. I mean, I guess I would be partial to the Mental Mondays, because I think those are pieces of content that really help people I've, you know, had, obviously many, many people tell me that, you know, it does seem to be, you know, I put out a bunch of videos about the NCAAs, and people seem to enjoy watching those more than say I'm at the Monday. But for me, I like the things that can help people, you know, the pieces that kind of that can people really enjoy from a funny perspective, the Rocky montage video I did. Now, if I would have won, it would have been all time promo. I lost eye roll. That was a really good that was me, John Broughton. John Still works with ocean. Yeah, he's great. Yes, no, if he still films a lot for Penn State. But so that was a Me and him creation. It was just one day I was trained for that boxing match. And, you know, it's Wisconsin, so we got like 10 inches of snow or something. And I don't even remember why. I just said, John, come over with film on a Rocky montage, and and we just started doing it. And then it was, I mean, nothing got like 10 million views or something. It was really good. And if I would have won, I think it would have been an old timer.

Shane Sparks

You look at your life Ben, I mean, it is interesting times a million, but I mean, off the top of my head, obviously, you've wrestled in four NCAA finals. You've wrestled in the Olympics. You fought George, I mean, the epic, you know his flying knee. You got Jake, Paul. I mean, you have done some, like, big time events. What has been like? Well, like, what's been the most fun, regardless of the result? I mean, what's just been like, just the most unique, interesting, where you look back and go, Man, that was wild.

Ben Askren

Well, there's a lot of them, um, I mean, the most meaningful are absolutely my wrestling wins, whether, and honestly, this is whether it's like, my it's like my first high school state title, or my first NCAA title, or making the little big team, some of the wrestling wins, they would, they would, everything else would pale in comparison to those from a meaningfulness standpoint. Now, like, cool or fun. I, you know, I don't know, like I obviously, I literally enjoyed fighting, and the favorite part of the fight, the one I missed the most, is the walk to the cage, because you've already got all the work done, and now you get to go do the fun thing. And, you know, some people, and this is where, you know, go back to that competition comment I made about mental Monday, is some people, some people view that as like, oh my gosh, this is so stressful. I got to compete. I always view that as like, that's the reward. That's the reward at the end of the path, like I did all this hard work, and now I get to go compete like I earned this, you know. So the walkouts that was always fun. I mean, the Jake Paul thing was so ridiculous. I don't even remember this, but it's during Corona ish, yeah, we rented the damn Atlanta Falcon stadium, and there was, like, I don't know, 800 people in there or something. It was like, you know, and then, you know, Justin Bieber opened for me, like, you know, that was like, new dog

Shane Sparks

was there too, I think, right,

Ben Askren

oh my gosh. That like, so that was, we was weird, super weird, you know, I obviously, as a coach, kind of, like, maybe almost parallel to those moments of my own where I accomplish something, watching my athletes accomplish things that they've been striving for for years. That's that's such an amazing feeling. Yeah, I've been lucky enough to have a lot of them.

Shane Sparks

One thing I did not have on the bingo card in 2026 was you and Jorge Masvidal getting together? He came for your baptism. Like, how did this? How did this all happen?

Ben Askren

Well, he started saying, like, and, you know, he means it. He started saying that I inspired him from just the way, you know, I guess he was down on himself, or just kind of getting lazy a lot after his fighting career and maybe feeling sorry for himself a little bit. And you know, then he sees me get up after almost dying and just getting after it every day. And he said that. He said that was really inspirational to him. So then there was, you know, talk of maybe getting together at some point, yeah. And then we're doing this movie, and someone reached out, and he said, Yes, and then that was that he came up. We hung out a couple of times. And you know, we evolve as you had mutual friends over the course of time. So Tyron Woodley was here also, so it was good. I said that I kind of knew this would be the case, but we have a lot more in common than we have different. He's a he is. And there's some one things I think he may be underestimating, underestimated about me in the beginning, but now he respects like, like I'm a scrapper. I'd love to scrap like I'm so I took Max Gonzalez down yesterday. Hey, Max Gonzalez, that took you down. So I got my first real takedown on a real athlete yesterday. Don't worry. Like, 45 seconds. That's all I got in me right now. But I love to battle. Or, you know, when Mitchell would come home from college, I was healthy, and we could just put 30 or 40 minutes on the clock and just wrestle like I love the scrap and he does too. He thought I wasn't real scrapper. Because there's some guys I'm not gonna I'm not gonna make this a controversial podcast. There's some guys who like winning. There's a big difference between like winning and you like scrapping. Like winning means I'm better than you, and I can go win because I'm better than you. Scrapping means I don't care who you are. I don't want to get down, like, whether it's wrestling or fighting or Jitsu, like, I want a good old fashioned battle. And honestly, if I could just steamroll you. I'm not really fulfilled by that, like, I don't really enjoy that. So, yeah, so we had a lot in common. It was, yeah, it was a nice, fun time,

Shane Sparks

just based on on the way I believe. Ben, I'm a Christian, and through this whole journey of yours, I think by far the greatest thing was, you, you know, finding God. Yeah, tell me about that.

Ben Askren

Well, I'm still, still diving deep. I try to read the Bible every day. I got so many questions. Shane, I could fill the next four hours with questions I got. I don't think anyone has got all the answers, of course, or at least no humans will say, yeah. It was just that it was kind of a longer process of, I went to church with my wife for 16 years. You know, I started off where I wasn't really fond of or in favor of, I don't know what you want to say, Christianity. And then the more I, you know, paid attention and read and learned and knew, the more I was in favor of it. I thought, hey, this is great. But then there's still that, like, hurdle to get over of, yeah, I really believe this. And, like, I can't pinpoint exactly what it was I I woke up, and the first handful days are fuzzy, and I just, you know, I don't know I felt it enough. It was all the people praying for me, or I don't know if something divine actually happened. I can't say that for sure, but, yeah, I just, I felt it, and so I committed to it. I did the baptism, and now I, you know, since then, I've been digging in, reading the Bible, reading a lot of religious books, trying to talk to my friends who I think have really good perspective, and trying to just figure it out. So I can be the best. I can be

Shane Sparks

fantastic Stories from the Resilite with Ben, askren.

Ben Askren

Ben, you know what the toughest one is for me?

Shane Sparks

Sure, free will,

Ben Askren

okay, because it's interesting. So it's like, okay, well, if God put us here, and you know, once he put us here, how much of what we're doing every single day, does he actually control and or care about, like, Does God care about which type of cereal you had this morning? Shane, I don't God type of product you put in your hair. I don't think he does, but it's so but, you know, so then it's like, Okay, those are small things. So it's like, Does God care how we treat people? And like, now, when I would say, yeah, that's pretty big thing, probably, probably, of course, but you know, then it's like, we, I mean, it's funny, we sort Mitchell mesmery Talk about how God has a bigger purpose in his life, where it's bigger than the sport, but it's like, so Does God care that we pursue excellence in sport, you know, or is it maybe that that gives us an outlet to become the best versions of ourself, you know? And so that's why we should pursue it. So, yeah, I know the idea of, you know, God put us here, and he gave us free will, and how exactly are we supposed to use and pursue that?

Shane Sparks

A tough Yeah. I mean, I'm Ben you are so much deeper than I am and not. I'll tell you what I do just, just something kind of along those lines, as far as pursuing excellence in whatever it might be, I always pray during the national anthem of a broadcast, every national anthem, and it's the same prayer. And in that prayer, in that prayer, I just ask, I ask for because I'm a little intense, I ask for a calm and a focus, and I ask that God allows me to use my abilities the best I can to His glory, like that's, that's, I kind of keep it simple. I'm not overly deep.

Ben Askren

Aren't you violating some rules there because I thought they were supposed to be a separation of church and state can't break during the national anthem there, right?

Shane Sparks

Yeah, it's a great time to pray. It's a great time. It's just a good time to pray. I always, you know, it's just prayer is great, man. I mean, I gotta, I need it. I mean, I just told you I'm looking forward to getting back. I mean, it's no excuse, with the travel schedule, I got to do a better job and to dive it back into the Word. And it's just, it's just good for me. I've always, I've always compared it to like a gas tank. You know, I got a 16 gallon tank, and it gets empty, and I got it. I got to refuel, and that's where I go. But I just, I think it's awesome. Ben, so that was just really one more religious

Ben Askren

question, since we're going there. The second one, this is pretty much, it's very related to free will, right? So, you know, I wasn't a Christian for a long time, and now I am, and I hear a lot of people say, like, oh, I prayed about that, or I prayed about that, which then speaks to the free will of, are you doing it? Is he giving you free will to do on your own, or does he know, essentially giving you permission or telling you what to do? And so, you know, like, when I when I wake up and I read the Bible, and the Bible says, do X, Y or Z, well, let's just pick some. Let's pick some easy ones. Don't lie, steal or cheat, right? Those are pretty universal commandments. And so you think God wants to have to tell you that every single day and remind you of it? Or do you think he'd rather just do it once and then have you not lie, steal or cheat? What do you think

Shane Sparks

the first thing that comes to mind Ben is, since we're talking wrestling as well. I think it's almost fundamentals, like, I think, I mean, I'll speak for myself on this Ben, I fall short every day, like I need to be reminded every day. I mean, I really do. I mean, it's kind of like again for me, some of the Bible stories I heard for the first time when I was five years old. They still are very powerful to me, and I'm 50. Like, it's just, I just, like, I'm kind of, again, I say this because I'm being serious. Like, I like fundamentals, like fundamentals every day, and reminding myself of those principles every single day. I need them all. I need them every day. So that's how I would answer that. What do you think?

Ben Askren

Well, I think, as a coach, I if I could tell Shane Sparks go finish single like that way, and now I gotta tell him 200 times I'm actually Aiden Sinclair just called me. I tell Aiden Sinclair something once, and it's not done, you know, like, it's freaking awesome. So, you know, I think his preference would be that he's able to guide us, give us free will, and that we follow Him, follow the word as harmoniously as possible, right? That doesn't mean we're not going to fail. We're not going to get it off the straight and narrow sometimes, but I think the the better we can attempt to as humans on our own, to follow the word because he's told us what he wants, the better off it's gonna be. But I don't know that's not You're right. It's not a final answer. It's just me thinking through this as I'm going through this the first time.

Shane Sparks

Well, I just, I know this Ben, I love the way that that you've been used. I think it's awesome. I mean, I know it hasn't been easy for you, but I know you've made a big impact. It's just great. It's great. So keep it, you know, keep it going. Brian Smith, one of the all time great coaches. He's been he's had a legendary career at Missouri. What's the most impactful conversation you ever had with him?

Ben Askren

That's a great one, probably the one, probably one of the ones. Shane, this has been 24 years, 25 years now where, you know, one of the ones, where he convinced me to go there, and he's so, you know, one of the big things his he didn't have a lot to sell back then. They weren't any good, and he sold me on the vision of how they were going to become good, and the way they were going to do it. And there was something about that that I just really enjoyed, and I bought into. And then, you know, the great thing for him is he was a man of his word, and it came to fruition. And, you know, obviously I helped him get there, probably faster. But I think even without me, I think he was going to have. Up in one way or the other, because I wasn't there. I was there seven years total, and it continued to have an immense amount of success after me. And right it took me, well, I didn't send them. Jake Rosholt goes, Wait, who's older? Rosholt. Mark Mocco. Now I always forget these guys ages.

Shane Sparks

I'm gonna say Rosh. Dick. Ross

Ben Askren

was one grade above Michael. Okay, that was the first guy that was probably 2017 with the first guy I sent him. So there, you know, there was a significant period where I had almost no impact on the program whatsoever. I wasn't there, I wasn't sending guys there, I wasn't doing anything, and they still crushed it. So, you know, he was able to follow through on his vision of what he's going to do with the Missouri Program. And he's done an amazing job. So I would say most impactful conversation would be one of the ones, because there was more than one, where he convinced me to go to Mizzou. Obviously, I had a great time there. I met my wonderful wife there, and, you know, I met so many lifetime friends there, so that, yeah.

Shane Sparks

What makes Coach Smith such a winner?

Ben Askren

What makes Coach Smith such a winner? Hmm, I would say, because there's a lot of answers this, right? I would say, I mean, the beginning that I'll tell you, one things he told me about is, like, the standards that he was going to hold the program too, and that was, you know, one of the things I bought into was, hey, this guy is going to hold this program to these standards, even though the program's kind of down here right now, the standards are up here. And if, if ables, everyone's able to buy into those standards, and the program is going to make a jump, which is what happened. So I would say, you know, he really held true to so many standards for such a long time, but how we are going to do things? You know, one simple one, and it seems so stupid, but it was kind of indicative of just how the program was ran. Is you've been there, right to the Hearnes Center?

Shane Sparks

I have Yes,

Ben Askren

so all the athletes take the stairs, they don't take the elevator. And that's like, it's like a dumb one, right? But it's, it's, it is. It's indicative of, we're gonna do things the hard way. We're doing things the right way. And you're not special to start. It's not the story. Athletes don't get to take the elevator. No, no, no, they have to take the elevator, right? So that, that type of thing where he's just saying, Here's what the standard is going to be, and we're going to hold true to that. And then, you know, like you guys go research it. But you know, there were some really good athletes. They got kicked off the team while I was there because they weren't willing to abide by the standards.

Shane Sparks

One of my favorite things with him is, and again, it's, it might appear that it's just little and I'm not saying it wins you wrestling matches in itself, but I think it's part of that tiger style culture is the the bios, they all got a shirt and tie on, and I just think it looks cool.

Ben Askren

That's funny, because obviously, well, I did, I did it every year, but I would never do it again. They're making me wear a tuxedo for the Hall of Fame thing. I'm thinking about protesting. We'll see.

Shane Sparks

You gonna wear the flip flops?

Ben Askren

Well, listen, if I might, I think you know what? There's such a tradition the National Wrestling Hall of Fame, and it's something I wanted for a long time, so I'll buy by the tuxedo, but I am gonna wear my flip flops. Have you worked on the speech? Oh no, that's what? Three months away, still something to that effect. So no, honestly, it's only three minutes. So like, that's actually, like, I get on freaking youtube and i blab for eight minutes. I'm like, oh my god, that was eight minutes, and I feel like it was so short. So like, in three minutes, I feel like all I can do is like, thank people. You know, it's like, what am I gonna do in three minutes. So I have not started working on that. Three minutes is a very tiny window to talk for. Obviously, wrestling has been insanely impactful for my life. That's my inspiration on a daily basis to continue to grow asking wrestling Academy, because I know not only so I'll say wrestling and good coach, good coaches that care about people how much impact they can have on a young person's life. So that's kind of like my inspiration. So probably center around that is probably what I would guess.

Shane Sparks

What does that honor mean to you? And I mean, when you got that phone call, what? What was that like?

Ben Askren

Yeah, it was, it was amazing. I don't say it is, you know, it's, it's the elite of the elite. It's not, not even every division one NCAA champion gets in there is probably a, actually, a vast percent that don't get in there. I think my contributions to wrestling, I kind of took a unique path, right? Because a lot of people in there are just, they wrestled in high school, they wrestle in college, they wrestled internationally, and then they went coach, or some version of that, you know. And my contributions are, obviously, I had success in high school. I had success in college. I did make the Olympic team, but I didn't place, you know. And honestly, sometimes I think they give them a little too much weight and value. But then, you know, I went. On, and I was in the wrestling media on FRL, and I, I went out and I fought, and I brought a lot of attention to the sport of wrestling. Then, you know, my brother, I and John, we founded Askren Wrestling Academy, which is the biggest wrestling Academy in America. And now we, you know, now we have this next generation of we have a handful of legends that we're putting out here. So I think my contribution has been kind of in many ways. So, you know, I guess I appreciate that they appreciate that, if you could

Shane Sparks

show your kids two or three of your matches from your career, what two or three would you pick? And why would you pick them? Definitely the Jake Herbert one

Ben Askren

that was an elite match. Because Jake, I'm glad Jake spelled it out. He just didn't have as many steps in the scrambling arsenal, so I was always able to catch him on the last one that he had, right? So I caught him over and over again in that match. That was definitely one, honestly, and a fun one for my freshman year is in the quarterfinals. I had a crazy match against Brad Dillon, and I ended up putting on his back, and I think it's the only overtime match my whole career. I put him on his back to in 12 to seven in overtime. That was a really good one. And then probably my first high school state final. Because, you know, that's again, something that every young kid I know. Probably the first one I went to was, I don't wanna say fifth grade. So, right? So I'd been looking forward to that for six years. Lost in the finals. My freshman year was I was devastated by it, and then I came on, and I put on a masterful for performance. I beat this senior who was undefeated. I beat him 20 to eight, and I think I got that was back when we had to work for the takedown point Shane, before they made him three. But I believe I had 10 takedowns in an escape for a 21-8 victory. Maybe there was two back points. Maybe it was nine takedowns a two-point nearfall for one

Shane Sparks

and one point escape in your college career at Missouri, you were a pinning machine. You were getting a lot of slaps of the Resilite. What pin is the most memorable for you and your career.

Ben Askren

What pin is the most memorable? Well, you know, I don't want to say what I don't get enough credit for. I don't want to be greedy here. One of the things that I think is the most impressive thing that I've ever done. No, I would literally put this in number one chain. I pinned 19 people in a row, and I put 18 people in Rowan in the first period, and nine of those were all Americans. Twice in there was Keith Gavin, who was a national champion, and no one's ever to my knowledge. Dan Gable pinned 25 in a row, actually, very few, though I looked back, none of those were the first period Greg, because he would cry him out. He also got nine minutes. That's not fair. Dan, I only got seven minutes. So that was one that I feel like I don't get credit enough credit for, is pinning 18 people row in the first period. Because at this point in time, very few people get 18 pins in a season, let alone 18 in a row in the first period.

Shane Sparks

I feel like Ben. I just looked at my face up in the monitor, and I could feel my jaw dropping you and 18 guys in a row in the first

Ben Askren

period, yes, including including Vegas and Scuffle both first period. That might be the most I would have tied Gable, but I was two lackadaisical at the CMSU Open, there was a freshman from OU I thought, Oh, he sucks. I'll pin him. So I had, I had four pins around the first period, then I only beat him 19 to eight. But then next, with the next week, at the Mizzou Open, I had him first round, and I'm like, This dude's dead because I didn't pin him last week. I was mad about it, and I will, and I pinned him, and then boom,

Shane Sparks

then we're rolling. That is a stat that I will be dropping numerous times on television broadcasts. Yeah, incredible. 18 pins. Roy Ben, who is your Mount Rushmore wrestling.

Ben Askren

Well, you know what I just said? I said we're gonna have to, we're gonna have to somehow redo this, right? Because, well, I guess first of all, we're talking American. We talking anyone.

Shane Sparks

Give me two mountains. Give me your Give me your Americans, and then give me anybody. We'll give you two months.

Ben Askren

Well, you know what? For an American perspective, there's a couple things that I feel like. I think Tommy Rowlands and I did this when we did a podcast, which is many moons ago. Number one is there was a long period in American wrestling history where we were not having a lot of not having a lot of success, and now it seems like everyone's winning world titles. I think as a country, we became a lot better and or there's there are certain geopolitical reasons why the world has gotten tougher or easier over the course of the last 60 years. Number two would be from a college perspective. You know you look at like a Lee Kemp, who lost, I think everyone but one of his matches as a true freshman. I mean, number one, had he red shirted, he only would have lost one match ever. Number two, if he was in a scenario like we have today, right, maybe he would have been more prepared when he stepped into the college ranks. So I think that's kind of like, I'm kind of beating around the bush, right, but it is important to factor all those in a gun to my head. I would probably say American is only four, probably Cael Sanderson, John Smith, Jordan, Burroughs and Kyle Dake. You know, four is not really enough, because then you leave off, you know, Gable, you could obviously have an immensely strong argument for, you know, Kyle Snyder. You'd have a very strong argument for, you know, you have more and more guys having immense amount of success. So I would probably go with those four internationally. You know, I said you could barely watch college wrestling, like you can find you still to this day, you can find, like, two Sergei Beloglazov matches, right? Like you can't find anything that's that old. But you know, you probably say Sadulaev, Saitiev, maybe, Burroughs, probably. And then, you know, there's other guy's name from Russia that won, like nine. Was it Yordanov? No, he was Bulgarian. I'm blanking,

Shane Sparks

yeah, Valentine. Yordanov was, was that's who was? Zeke Jones used to wrestle in the early 90s.

Ben Askren

Hold on. The most world titles wrestling. I can't think of the name, but, oh, it says it's in WWE. No, I love talking about damn WWE. All right. All right. Next question, and I'm gonna get this answer, Well, I'm gonna answer the next question

Shane Sparks

I was going to ask you after the Mount Rushmore question, who is the most underrated in your opinion, ever, and you talked about Lee Kemp. Lee Kemp's career was amazing. I think when you talk about a guy that doesn't get enough credit, to me, it's Lee Kemp all day, and twice on Sunday,

Ben Askren

he, for sure, gets forgot about.

Shane Sparks

Who's the guy that you think is really under appreciated, besides Lee who we just talked about anybody else that maybe in your era, Ben, where it's like this guy was really, really good and doesn't get the

Ben Askren

you, you know, you should have told me, Ben, you need to be prepared with all your wrestling history when you, when you came to this, we're just scrambling.

Shane Sparks

Ben, I told you, we're just scrambling.

Ben Askren

It was under appreciated. Yeah, I, you know, honestly, I would probably pick someone from that. We'll say 96 to 2012 era, because that was when America was not having a lot of success internationally, huh? Who would I pick? I mean, yeah, I don't know. I'm gonna hold that question. I'm gonna hold that thought.

Shane Sparks

Also, okay, did you find the Russian you're looking for? Oh, it's by weight.

Ben Askren

They don't even the most I'm or maybe I just suck. He's an internet trying to think he was a bigger guy. Okay, I see a scroll down to the bigger guys. Let's see All right, you better ask another question, because we don't

Shane Sparks

want to leave what.

Ben Askren

That's I'm thinking, okay, there you go. Okay, keep going. Let's do

Shane Sparks

this in the book that you wrote, what, what part of the book did you enjoy the most?

Ben Askren

Well, I got, I'm an author two times now, huh? So, I mean, I enjoy. So the first book, I was bordering coronavirus, like everybody was, and, you know, I convinced a friend, Chuck Mendenhall, to do it with me. And that was, that was a fun process, I would say, the psychology book. And it's one of those where it's, like, a hard book. So, like, from a commercial standpoint, it hasn't done overly well. We've sold, you know, quite a few, but not something where you're like, oh my gosh, you know, I'm a New York Times bestseller, or anything to that extent, you know. But getting my ideas out there, and the kind of idea of a mental mind where hopefully these ideas help a lot of people, that's kind of, you know. So I really, really like that book a lot.

Shane Sparks

If you could redo one match in your career, which one would

Ben Askren

you want back? Oh, the Olympic one, for sure. That's easy.

Shane Sparks

Okay, what

Ben Askren

take the fight that would take the muscle at all once. Okay, okay.

Shane Sparks

That would have been fun to watch. I mean, just didn't happen. I mean, he got you early, and it is what it is what it is, but that would have been fun to watch. I mean, you guys really go at it. What else

Ben Askren

I think of was Arsen Fadzaev. He won, like a world titles, okay, got me searching through the world champion.

Shane Sparks

They've had some hammers. What's, um, what been was the, I like asking this to elite people, what was the biggest threat to your excellence?

Ben Askren

Hmm, I don't know. I never really thought about it. My wife said, Girls, which man is not as distracted by women a little bit, right? That That is insane. Defeated. It's undefeated. And I read the old Old Testament, Old Testament, there's, there's plenty of men who are way, way worse than I way too distracted by women making bad decisions, anger and God, like, I guess, women tempting men. That's undefeated. Yeah.

Shane Sparks

No, no doubt about it. Let's see here. What else do I got for you?

Ben Askren

You kind of, mean, I know what you got. We're gonna talk about RAF this weekend. Shane, you're making your day.

Shane Sparks

But this won't air before that. It won't talk about

Ben Askren

her excited for it, or what

Shane Sparks

I'm really looking forward to it. I mean, I'm a guy. Ben, I just love wrestling. I love broadcasting. So, you know, give me a wrestling, Matt, couple guys wrestling in the microphone. I'm good, you know, so I'm just, I'm hoping, you know, I mean, they have momentum, yes, I mean, we've seen people attempt this in the past. So, I mean, I'm, I'm excited for it, looking forward to it.

Ben Askren

Yeah, absolutely people attempted to pass tutoring. You know what? When I heard these guys talk about it for the very first time, which is almost a year ago now, because I actually saw I was the first athlete to sign in May of, yes, 2025 I thought these guys might really have something, because I listened to many others. So I've been part of a couple that failed, and I listened to many others who were going to try and thought, these are terrible ideas. And when I heard these guys, I'm like, they got their shit together, and so it's actually taken off faster than what what I would have anticipated, right? I didn't think it was gonna take off this fast. I mean, it's really blowing up. So hopefully we can keep the momentum going with some great matches and a great show this weekend.

Shane Sparks

Yeah, absolutely. I'm looking forward to it. I know you're the rules analyst, so I'll piggyback off of that. Ben, what is if I gave you the magic wand? You know? What's a rule or two? We'll talk folk style wrestling, especially with the championships. Just wrapping up, what's the rule or two that you wish would happen?

Ben Askren

Well, freestyle, we got rid of grounded, which, that was the number one thing we Yes, that was Bing. You need to do. You know the why? It's situational and never gets called into drive me up the wall, Shane and and to me as someone who understands what's happening in wrestling match, it's so obvious as to see what's happening. And I can describe to you how is it easy and obvious to see is when the top person right in a bottom top scenario, reference position pushes the bottom person out of bounds. I think that should be stalling immediately and every single time. And the way I say, because people say, Well, how do you do the bone goes and run it away? And to me, it's really obvious, if the top person is trying to push their feet will be behind their hips, because that's the only way you can push something right. Think about push think about pushing a sled or pushing something. Your feet are going to be behind your hips. If you're trying to hold something, your feet are either underneath your hips or in front of your hips. And there is no you cannot push anything with your feet in front of your hips. It's totally Shane. You can go try it. You should get up right now. Try to push something with your hips. It's not going to work. Not gonna work, right? So to me, it's so obvious. So honestly, the first time someone does that, stalling immediately, and I think that would fix so many top and bottom situations, it would just be, it would be amazing. It could happen right away. It's obvious. I just described how we could tell. It's obvious. Now listen, you have some of these idiot coaches. They're like, No mother, go. It's like, shut up. We can see, like, I know exactly what was happening. His feet were behind his hips, which means he's pushing. If your feet are behind your hips, you can't pull literally, by definition, you can go, try pulling something. Your feet behind hips, ain't

Shane Sparks

gonna work. What's your take on a push out in folk style. I used

Ben Askren

to not be in favor of it, but I've come around to being in favor of it. Stalling is called very poorly. And Christian powers actually put out a tweet, which I agree with. And that's in freestyle. The out of the bounds is assisting the off as a person in scoring and in folk style. And this is one where, if they actually called the out of bounds as it's supposed to be called properly, maybe I wouldn't be saying this. But the one that happens, it happens so much. Shane, now I must say this, then I think you'd be like, Yes, I'm so enjoyed by that as well. The offensive person is on attack. The defensive person hops their way to the edge, and right when they get to the edge, they turn and face and act like they actually want to wrestle, but they know, they know safety is it's right over there, right? So they act like they're not trying to get a bounce. It's like, no, no, no. You went right to the edge. You know exactly what the hell you're doing that should? I don't care if you didn't go all the way out, I'm gonna call you for stalling and

Shane Sparks

especially Ben with a three point takedown, if I'm up by two, if I'm up by two or 30 seconds, I mean, I'm going to the edge. I mean, I'm definitely going to the edge. And I I, I used to be and I still like really good edge wrestling. I appreciate good edge wrestling. The problem is there's

Ben Askren

not enough of it, but good edge wrestling. Shane only to Christmas. Right? It only punishes offense. Because think about, once you get, once you get to a certain place, at the edge as well, just complaining about, so if you think about a four, four directions, right? Okay, if the defensive man puts it on the edge, I can't circle around this way. I can't circle around them this way. I can't drive through them, because all those things put me out of bounds. So the singular, the only thing that I can do is pull them back towards me. And when you do that, as the offensive man, you're vulnerable to them grabbing your wrist. You're vulnerable to every ankles, you're vulnerable to a lot of things. And so you are. You're helping, significantly helping the defensive person in that scenario.

Shane Sparks

I agree. I agree. What do you think about mat-side weigh-ins?

Ben Askren

WANs? Uh, I don't. I don't hate them at all. You know, it would, it would. The only thing that it would be hard on it from an is, actually, from a, like, a broadcast production standpoint, would be that if someone misses, then you don't get a match, which, like, Hey, if you're the NCAA Finals, what if, like, two dudes just miss weight, and now we only have eight instant finals like that would be so weird, you know, so But besides that, I would be in favor. Obviously, when you have 500 kids at you tournaments, it would be challenging to do it, you know, all that many times. But yeah, that would probably be

Shane Sparks

couple more for you. Ben, what are you most passionate about within the sport? I mean, what? What topic can come up in wrestling? That'll take you zero to 60 in 2.1 seconds.

Ben Askren

I'm looking on my window. I just realized, Amy, this big old tree just fell down. How annoying is that? Dang it. I want big old trees, right?

Shane Sparks

I had a humongous tree fall down in my place last June, humongous oak tree, over 100 years old. I came home, it was laying in the backyard. Thank God nobody died for real. This is crap. Sorry.

Ben Askren

I got distracted by this tree I just literally saw for the first time. What was the question again? What? What is

Shane Sparks

something within the sport that just fires you up, like great debate? What do you think is like a debate within the sport that you'll you'll die on the sword for?

Ben Askren

I don't know. I mean pushing is not offense. How about that? Okay, okay. Where does it mean you're being aggressive? To me, offense, offense, or being aggressive requires some form of risk, right? So people who just push, that's not offense. You gotta, gotta actually go do something.

Shane Sparks

Ben, what is the most interesting part of your journey?

Ben Askren

Oh, God, I don't know. I have no idea. I don't know it's all, it's all been pretty interesting to me. I mean,

Shane Sparks

I'm trying to think of it myself, like, what do I think it is? I mean, I just, yeah, I mean, you have literally interested in, you've been involved in so many situations. I mean, you talk about ups, downs, in betweens, really good stuff, really challenging things you've kind of kind of covered it all, yeah, let me ask you this. Ben, let me ask you this, if you could, if you looked at your professional career, yeah, and maybe you alluded to this in some of the those big matches and some of the events you've been in, if you could relive for whatever reason. One of those days, which one would you relive?

Ben Askren

Oh, for sure, the wrestling ones, those are the most meaningful.

Shane Sparks

Which one you get one day

Ben Askren

I'm making the Olympic team, because that's the pinnacle of American wrestling, and something that I've been training for for a decade.

Shane Sparks

If you could go cross country, I might have asked you this one time before. I love this question. You can go cross country in a in a car, you know, three day trip, coast to coast with three living people that you've never met, never met that you've never met, three living people you've never met who you're going with. Tell Amy. I said, Hello,

Ben Askren

she's quite disappointed as well. Three people I've never met. Well, I picked Dave Schultz. Never met him. Her. He's interesting, good conversation. We can talk about wrestling, Satoshi Nakamoto. I never met him, although I don't know that's a natural person. Could be a group. Not sure who knows. Hmm, author Donald Trump in there, because he's just he would be hilarious to having a car for

Shane Sparks

speaking of cars, Ben, has the driving gotten better? I mean, are you doing a better? I mean, you are the worst driver I've ever been in a car with in my life. Pretty happy. Shane here,

Ben Askren

bro, I my truck was having issues, having issues last fall, and I told the freak. Before dealership. Hey, I'm pretty sure here's what the issue is. I don't think about ours, but this, this thing seems problematic, and they told me no, and I paid for a whole bunch of other repairs, right? Well, it still gave me issues, and Tuesday, I took it in. So then I had to go. I had to go to, we're buying a building at Wausau for our next restaurant Academy. Now you go up there. So I rented a Tesla because my buddy couldn't stop talking about full self drive, so I ran a Tesla. How was it? Okay, well, I'm gonna tell you that, but first, while I'm driving on Wednesday morning, they call and tell me, oh yeah, we missed this thing. Your whole engine's done is $12,000 so I'm like, okay, whatever you can, you can have the car, you know, like, so, like, I'm selling it to them, so now I might buy a Tesla. Well, here's the thing about full self drive. It was annoying as shit, because you're gonna drop Well, so here's my buddy says, Yeah, I, you know, I put full self drive on, I put Netflix right in front of me, and I just chill and I go to my son's football games or whatever. Okay, so, like, I don't like watching movies. I want to do some work. That's what I want to do. So I have all this work play. I got, like, a handful of things I want to do yesterday. So I get in the car, I put full self drive on, and I got a list of things to do. So I pull out my book, and I start, you know, read through my list, and what am I do? And it starts buzzing me. And so it has a camera, and it watches your eyes to make sure your eyes are watching this. That's what I heard, and I'm thinking, Well, if you're driving, why do I need to drive? That's dumb, like, if this thing thinks it's so good that it can drive, why do I need to pay attention? Because if I didn't trust you enough to drive, I'm clicking a button and it's full self driving. Then I trust, I trust it's gonna work. And right, the reviews to this point is it's better than human beings. So yeah, I trust it to get me where it needs to get me safely. But yeah, so then after three times, it just turns it off. So then if you then I stop, and the next time I get it, it's almost like you guys sit like a prisoner. You gotta just sit like, just like I got on the watch, so I was sitting there, and then the one time I went to change the radio buzz me, turns it off, and it's like, oh, this is so annoying. Like, you know, if you have full self drive, it's full self drive. Don't make me look at the road. Let me do my work or whatever I want to do. If you're taking responsibility, taking responsibility, whatever

Shane Sparks

happened to that Prius that used to drive around that was all cracked up? You had the stickers all

Ben Askren

over the place. I just, of course, but

Shane Sparks

300 feet away. So that's still going,

Ben Askren

well, it's not going it's sitting on my disc golf course. So okay, okay.

Shane Sparks

I mean, that's, I remember when you pill pulled up once your mom and you and me were going to a Mexican restaurant. I've never been so scared driving in my life, honest to God. Ben, I thought it was the end for me, Ben, final question for you. Final question, how do you want to be remembered?

Ben Askren

I don't know that's for other people. That's honestly, it's one thing people talk about legacy and stuff that's for other people to worry about. I'm gonna do the best I can every day. I'm gonna do right by as many people as I can do right by. And how other people want to remember me is up to them.

Shane Sparks

Well, Ben, it's been a lot of fun. Great to see you, and looking forward to Crossing Paths, but appreciate the time you have an amazing story. Thank you.

Ben Askren

Thanks, buddy. See ya.