Before he became a two-division UFC champion and Hall of Famer, Cormier was an accomplished freestyle wrestler at the senior level, including making two Olympic teams during his wrestling career – 2004 and 2008. While Cormier ultimately did not compete at the 2008 Olympics due to medical issues, in 2004 he narrowly missed out on winning the bronze medal, a story he recounted to Aljamain Sterling on Sterling’s YouTube channel.
“When I lost in the Olympic semi-finals — I can go back to Athens, Greece, right now,” Cormier said. “If I close my eyes I remember losing to [Khadzhimurat] Gatsalov. I walked out of the arena because the semifinals were automatically wrestling for the bronze medal back then. I said to my coaches — John Smith, Kevin Jackson — I go [in a crying voice] ‘I don’t want to wrestle for third!’ I seriously was crying. They took me back to the house we were all staying in, and I’m in the room crying for an hour until I fall asleep. Then I’ve got to get up to go wrestle this bronze medal match. I’m literally complaining all the way to the tournament. But then when you get there you kind of get focused and you go wrestle.
“I’m winning 2-0, I end up losing 3-2 in overtime. Nine minute match, I lost with a minute left. I was up 2-0. He took me down and he turned me. A great wrestler from Iran named [Alireza] Heidari. I was sad. I was kind of sad like, I kinda wanted that medal a little bit.”
The Olympics are held under WADA drug testing rules, and the International Olympic Committee occasionally goes back and tests drug testing samples to accommodate for advances in technology. For reference, the 2008 Olympic Games had 50 athletes stripped for medals due to doping, and Cormier was holding out hope for his own chances to snag an Olympic medal after the fact.
“Then, they started going back and testing people,” Cormier said. “They started going back and retroactively testing these Olympic games. They went to ’08, mugs was getting medals. They went to ’07, mugs was getting medals. They went to ’06, mugs was getting medals! Everybody tested positive! I was sitting there when they got to ‘05, I was like, ‘One more year!’ [Laughs] I might have got second. I know a couple of these dudes were on steroids. That’s when I realized I really wanted that medal.”
“They stopped in ‘05! 2005 was the last year!” Cormier said. “I was so disappointed, bro. I was so disappointed. I was the UFC champion at the time, and I was like, ‘Please go back one more year!’ I wanted that bronze medal bad. I wanted it.”
Daniel Cormier is going to have a movie made about him one day and he should. A fascinating life. Man had a full and impressive career before he even took up MMA. Crazy to think MMA fans got the worst years of Cormier’s athletic life, and he still accomplished all that he did.
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