Mat Awareness

In this episode of the pod we talk Olympic Trials and Triller Fight Club. There's even a guest appearance on this one! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Is this the end of the podcast? --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Tristan Moran was a 2X State Champ in high school and went on to have a very successful career for the Wisconsin Badgers. He's not only a really good wrestler, but he takes pride in his cooking abilities and consider's himself the best gamer in wrestling. It was fun diving into those topics. Check it out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Trent Hillger is a 2X All American wrestler for the Wisconsin Badgers and he's only a junior. He has a big year coming up in a weight class filled with many different styles of wrestlers. Trent was also a 3X State Champ for Lake Fenton high school. In this episode we cover the Badger preseason, how loaded heavyweight is in the NCAA right now, and his performance at Senior Nationals. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

In 2019, the name Anthony Echemendia became a household name in the wrestling world. That year, he went undefeated as a senior and won a state championship, and then at Fargo won freestyle AND greco national titles. The reason no one knew about him until then is because he came from Cuba. In this episode, we'll cover what it was like being in Cuba, the struggles he faced during his journey to the United States, and what life is like for him living his dream at Ohio State. Mat Awareness Shirts: https://tdpclothing.com/collections/mat-awareness-gear/products/ma-tee --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Anthony Ashnault was an UNDEFEATED 4X State Champ in the state of New Jersey as well as a National Champ for Rutgers. Tune in to hear a deep conversation about transitioning from high school to college, hear about Mobbin Media on Rokfin, and a cuppa other fun topics. It was a pleasure talking to Anthony and I look forward to seeing the match between him and my man Tyler Berger! Also -- huge shout out to Cam Kramer for the podcast art the last couple of episodes!! Check out his pics at: https://camkramerphoto.smugmug.com --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Myles Amine of the University of Michigan is a 3X All American and took 5th at the World Championships in 2019 in Kazakhstan for his family's home country of San Marino. On this show we talked about competing at the world championships, some differences he noticed during his redshirt year while studying and training with foreign wrestlers, and this episode also features a guest appearance. You'll have to tune in to find out who joins the show... Enjoy! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Jack Medley wrestles 125 pounds for the University of Michigan. Not only is he a very good wrestler, but he's spent a lot of his time running throughout the quarantine, so it was fun to hear from him about how he ended up doing not one but TWO marathons during the quarantine. On this episode we get into what preseason in Ann Arbor has been like, Jack's running career, and a couple of other questions at the end. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Tyler Berger is coming off an awesome victory over another great wrestler, Joey McKenna. He tells us his thoughts on the Wrestling Underground event and what it was like getting into the cage to wrestle. We also get into his tweet about Jason Nolf (the Penn State Wrestling legend), why he did it, and the stuff people said to him after tweeting it and after the finals match that year. And lastly, we get into his 100 mile walk with Eric Schultz (197 pounder for Nebraska). Yes, they literally went for a 100 mile walk. Also, make SURE you stay till the end for a LEGENDARY call out to Anthony Ashnault. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Getting gas is a boring thing that everyone that drives a car has to do, so there's no one better to fill up with than the Covelli Center LEGEND himself Gary Traub AKA Gas Tank Gary. He's the Blue Collar Legend, The People's Champ, America's Heavyweight, whatever you want to call him. He trained over the summer with chickens and at a car dealership, you can't help but love this guy. Shirts are now available at https://tdpclothing.com! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Dave Malecek was a 2X State Champ at Osage High School, an All American at UNI, and is currently the head wrestling coach at the University of Wisconsin - La Crosse. During the recording of this episode, I heard some of the greatest wrestling stories of all time including so many legends like Dave Schultz, Mark Schwab, John Oostendorp, and so many more. If you're a wrestling fan, you're gonna LOVE this one. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Ross Needham was a 2X All American and 4X Academic All American for the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. He now serves as the Head Assistant coach at UW-La Crosse. He's quite a personable guy, and has a just as interesting wrestling career as you'll find out in the show. We go pretty in depth into his career, but one of my favorite parts of this episode is hearing his philosophy on parenting wrestlers, which is phenomenal. He's quite a character, check it out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

You might not recognize the name Cole Schrupp, but you've probably seen some of his work before. He's made countless awesome videos for the Gophers as well as many other teams, and one of his videos on youtube even hit over one million views. They're good, real good, and I'm always inspired by people that were the first one's to evolve their craft - and that's exactly what he did with wrestling videography. Great humble guy and I really enjoyed this conversation. Check out one of his most popular videos below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xzf5aws9Lhg&t=280s Speed Energy by WinnieTheMoog Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5879-speed-... License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b... --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Wesley Schultz is quite a character, but also a very successful wrestler and an even better friend. He grew up in Sun Prairie, and attended multiple colleges including Rochester Community Technical College, Iowa Lakes Community College, and UW-La Crosse, and he breaks down why he ended up in so many different places on the show. Tune in and I think you will appreciate our National Treasure Wesley Schultz by the end of the show. Music: Speed Energy by WinnieTheMoog   Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5879-speed-...   License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b... --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Bebeto Yewah started wrestling VERY late in the game, which is one of the many reasons his accomplishments are so impressive. As the title says, Bebeto was a 2X National Champ, and a 3X National Finalist for UW-La Crosse. He also ended up making the world team for his home country Cameroon where he dropped a close match to a 2X Bronze World Medalist which unfortunately ended his tournament. Bebeto talks about his high school career in Michigan, tells the story of how he ended up at UW-La Crosse, how he trained with Franklin Gomez over the summer after his freshman year, and tons more. Make sure to listen to the full episode to hear a CRAZY story about when he went to Egypt to wrestle towards the end of the show! Music: Speed Energy by WinnieTheMoog Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5879-speed-... License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b... --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

I thought it would be fun to switch around the format of the podcast, and do a recap episode with John Broughton who made his SECOND appearance on the show! We discussed what we liked and disliked about FloWrestling's event, as well as some of our dream matchups that we would love to see happen at future events. I think David Taylor and Sadulaev are near the top of the list! Man we can't wait for NCAA and Olympic level wrestling to begin again. Enjoy the show! Speed Energy by WinnieTheMoog Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5879-speed-... License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b... --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Albie McKinney is currently a professional MMA fighter with a record of 14-6, and was a national runner up for UW-La Crosse. Putting those accolades aside, Albie is an amazing human being that has overcome a number of obstacles in life. I'm not going to get into the details because it would be a disservice to have anyone but him tell his story, so tune in and be prepared to hear about a man that came out on top of some very dark times. Speed Energy by WinnieTheMoog Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5879-speed-... License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b... --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Connor Boike is the CEO & Founder of WrestleBoutique, like the title says. The coolest thing about him isn't just the fact that he's grown WrestleBoutique into one of the most high end wrestling brands to date, but the fact that he's done that and he's only 22 years old. It was really cool hearing his story, how he got the idea for WrestleBoutique, and listening to the highs and lows of the journey. He has tons of cool shoes and other products coming out, so be sure to check out the WrestleBoutique website. WrestleBoutique Website: https://wrestleboutique.com/ I also got some new intro music! Speed Energy by WinnieTheMoog Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5879-speed-energy License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Kollin Moore is a 4X NCAA All American for Ohio State, and was the undefeated number one seed going into NCAAs this year before it was cancelled. He's an absolute badass and a phenomenal wrestler, and it was great hearing the behind the scenes stories about the teams during his time at Ohio State.  --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Grant Zamin is someone I've known for a while now, and he's one of the hardest workers I've ever met. Grant went from never placing at state in high school, to earning All American honors in 2019, and going into the 2020 NCAA tournament as the number one seed, before it got cancelled. He was also undefeated to division 3 opponents during the 2020 season. Tune in and you'll pick up some good stuff! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Tune in to hear the crazy story of how "Sebby The Sloth" blew up in the wrestling world last year. By listening, you'll also get to know the behind the scenes guy, Lenny Merkin, who is a Greco phenom himself. He shares some great stories about building up Sebby, like how he turned a prize he got at a fair into an international wrestling icon, and also shares a bunch of his interesting stories from traveling overseas in the midst of his Olympic redshirt the past year. Check it out and please leave a rating and review if you enjoy it. Thank you listeners! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Nate Jackson is a great guy doing so many different great things and I sincerely enjoyed having him on. For those that don't know, he's a current senior level athlete at the NJRTC, a wrestling coach at Princeton, and had a successful college wrestling career himself finishing with two All American honors and over 100 wins. Anyways, we talked about the actions he's been taking with BWA as a response to what is currently going on in the United States, and how everyone can serve in helping fix our countries problems. We also talked a lil wrestling, training, matchups, ya know all that good stuff! I hope to do another podcast with him sometime and dive into his wrestling career a bit more, but thought that this was necessary to talk about right now and I wanted to get it out there ASAP. BWA Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bwassociation_/ BWA Survey: bit.ly/BlackWrestlingA Huge S/O to Nate for coming on and doing his part to make this world a better place for everyone. Now let's do our parts with him. (me included!) --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

On this episode you will learn about Nazar, and the struggles he faced to get to where he is today. He came from Ukraine not knowing much English, and ended up winning 3 national titles for UW-Oshkosh, and made it look easy. This conversation really humbled me and made me grateful for how easy my life has been, and I am very excited to share it with you guys. Enjoy the show! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

During this interview I learned a lot about Evan Wick, and one thing that really stuck out was how analytical he is in thinking about wrestling which made it fun asking him about future probable matchups towards the end. We also talked about tons of other random stuff like who would win between Tristan Moran and Seth Gross, sushi, deep sea fishing, and oreos. Check it out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

John Broughton is the behind the scenes guy for a variety of stuff that you've probably seen before and never realized who made it. For those that don't know, he created the first wrestling meme page ever that has over 100,000 followers, he's Ben Askren's vlog guy (he's literally walked out and cornered him at a UFC), and he's made countless of amazing wrestling highlight videos of many of the world's greatest wrestlers working for TrackWrestling. The craziest part isn't just that he's done all of this stuff, but he's accomplished all that and he's only 22 years old! If you've never heard of John, you must listen to this one! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Most people in the wrestling world know a little bit about Kyle Conel and his NCAA run in 2018. In this episode, we touched on a lot of topics I don't think many people know about, like his wrestling career before college, the experience he had at Penn State, his favorite video games, and a variety of other random things. I loved getting the chance to talk to him as he's very honest, down to earth, and has a good sense of humor. I think you guys will really enjoy this one! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Donald McNeil suffered a spinal injury during a greco match in the summer of his sophomore year. To put the severity of the injury into perspective, roughly ten thousand people suffer from an injury like this each year, and only 77 come out with fully recovered. After his injury, he was hearing terms like paraplegia tossed around him in the hospital. In this episode, he elaborates on the injury, the rehab process, and what it felt like having wrestling success after such a life changing event. One of the most inspiring wrestling comeback stories I've ever heard. Be sure to give this one a listen. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

I talked with Jude about everything from what it's like knowing David Taylor on a personal level to how he grew the HMA podcast (with Sam Herring) into something huge at just age 15. Super cool interview and we covered lot of fun topics, check it out and please leave a review if you liked it. Thanks! Go check out his stuff @ hmawrestling.com! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Eric Barnett is a 3X Wisconsin state champion from Hortonville High School (high school record of 185-3), and is currently the 125 pounder for the Wisconsin Badgers. Eric was very successful early on in his career so he talks a lot about what he did to stay motivated and make sure he didn't end up burning out. He also talks a lot about his transition from high school to college, and gives some great advice and insight for kids that are planning on wrestling in college. I really enjoyed catching up with Eric and think you'll enjoy what he had to say as well. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

Check out my interview Cam Sykora! He was a 5X Minnesota state champ, and went on to wrestle for a year at SDSU , before transferring to NDSU. At NDSU he was a 4X NCAA Qualifier, and most recently was the 2020 Big XII Champ at 133 pounds. It was awesome getting to know Cam a little bit and hear him reflect on his career, be sure to give it a listen! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

On this episode of the Mat Awareness podcast, your host Adam Gusky sits down with Taylor Venz to talk about everything from life in quarantine, to taking ice skating lessons as a young kid, and doing stadium stair workouts. Enjoy! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support

On the first episode of the Mat Awareness podcast, Gas Tank Gary answers some questions including how he got started wrestling, to what it was like wrestling Kyle Snyder as a freshman. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/matawareness/support