Ohio State Legend, Olympic Gold Medalist Kyle Snyder To Join Nittany Lion Wrestling Club
What’s that quote about dying a hero or living long enough to see yourself become the villain?
Ohio State wrestling all-time great, three-time NCAA Champion, and Olympic gold medalist Kyle Snyder is coming east. He announced Thursday that he will join the Nittany Lion Wrestling Club, Penn State’s freestyle affiliate, which it shares a practice facility with.
“The simple truth is I need to get better, In order for me to fulfill my obligations as a member of Team USA and as a defending Olympic champ, I must give full effort and take complete responsibility for the process,” he wrote in a statement on Twitter. “This decision isn’t to suggest that one program is better than the next, but this taking advantage of additional thinking and incorporating that into my wrestling.”
Snyder is leaving the Ohio Regional Training Center, the Buckeyes’ affiliate, and where he trained during the last year since graduating to join the NLWC. The decision comes after Snyder took third at this fall’s World Championships.
With the NLWC, he will now train for the 2020 U.S. Olympic Trials under the tutelage of a fellow Olympic champs Cael Sanderson and Jake Varner, as well as the rest of the Regional Training Staff, which consists of Cody Sanderson, Casey Cunningham, Mark McKnight, and Eric Thompson.
Snyder will compete in a room that already includes Nittany Lion greats Bo Nickal, Jason Nolf, and David Taylor as well as current stars like Mark Hall, Anthony Cassar, and Roman Bravo-Young.
If Cassar wrestles at 97 kg, he and Snyder could potentially go head-to-head in their pursuits of a ticket to Tokyo next summer. As a returning member of Team USA, Snyder has a bye until the best-of-three finals to determine who will represent their country in the Olympics.
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