Jordan Burroughs: “Being an Olympic champion isn’t a burden, but I want to win”
Jordan Burroughs may be 35 years old, but he is still a box office name in the world of freestyle wrestling.
After failing to medal at Rio 2016 and missing out on selection for Tokyo 2020, some questioned whether the Olympic Games London 2012 gold medallist in the men's 74kg still had what it took to make an Olympic podium.
Burroughs answered those critics in emphatic fashion, sealing consecutive World Championship titles in the non-Olympic weight division of 79kg in 2021 and 2022.
As such, the New Jersey native doesn’t feel he has anything to prove to anyone, and doesn’t feel the pressure to live up to expectations.
“Whether I win another match or not in my career, I feel like people who have watched me wrestle understand exactly what I bring to this sport,” Burroughs told Olympics.com.
“I've won six world championships, an Olympic gold medal. I've been to multiple Olympics and I'm still one of the best wrestlers in the world - even at 35 years old with four kids at home.
“That's not easy to do for anyone. So, I think with all that being said, I would like to win, but I don't think that [being an Olympic champion] is a burden at all. I think it was more of a gift than anything, it changed my perspective on myself and how I view the world. It really spurred me to continue to win because it moulded me as a champion and it solidified me as someone that people recognise as a champion.”
Jordan BURROUGHS
How Jordan Burroughs channels painful losses
Burroughs goes into the notoriously challenging US Olympic Wrestling Trials as the No.1 seed at 74kg in the challenge tournament.
Four-time world champion Kyle Dake, who defeated Burroughs at the last trials before going on to win bronze in Tokyo, will pass directly to the best-of-three final at Penn State, Pennsylvania, having secured an Olympic quota for Team USA at the 2023 World Championships.
Despite agonisingly losing out to Dake last time out and having his nine-year streak atop US wrestling at that weight ended, Burroughs embraced those feelings of hurt, rather than ignore them.
It speaks volumes of Burroughs experience that, despite having the social media handle @alliseeisgold, he understands that learning from losses and focussing that energy in a positive direction is as important as winning.
"You want to feel it. The right thing is to feel it and then fight it. Not to ignore it or avoid it, which I don't think is the proper way of dealing with emotions,” he continued.
“Because when you bottle up all of this negative energy, it'll either build resentment or it'll be unleashed on someone or something. I think if we can learn to feel the wide array of our emotions and feel every mental state that the world throws at us, but learn how to combat it, that would make you the most powerful.
“I can be sad for a moment and then dust myself off and get back into good posture. I can be rattled or be shaken and then get back to a place where I'm settled and comforted.
“You’re in a kind of dark place for a couple of days where you're wallowing in self-pity, you're uncomfortable, and you're bummed about everything that's occurring. But I think you finally get to a space where once that sadness wears off, you start to look at it with realism and say, ‘OK, what did I do wrong? What improvements can I make? How do I get back to a place of feeling confident in my abilities and reverse my fortune next time?’”
Jordan Burroughs reacts after being beat by Kyle Dake in their Freestyle 74kg finals match on day 2 of the U.S. Olympic Wrestling Team Trials at Dickies Arena on April 03, 2021 in Fort Worth, Texas.
Comparison - at least to others - is not something Burroughs is interested in. After all, he has one of the greatest wrestling CVs of all time.
However, winning gold at London 2012 fundamentally changed his life, and set the bar at where he feels he belongs in the sport.
His only focus now is to recapture that golden feeling.
“When people set expectations for you, you want to often live up to them so that's what I've been trying to do from the moment I jumped off the podium in 2012 in London. I've wanted to try to win again,” he said.
“And that's moulded the way that I live my life and what I eat, and how I train, how I take care of my body, to how I treat the people around me, is all because of what happened in London.
“I want to win a gold medal. I want to win the gold. That's the only thing on my mind is winning gold medals. And I'm prepared for anything, but I want to win.”