How a trip to Japan got Iowa wrestling’s Spencer Lee ready for the Olympics

IOWA CITY — There’s an alternate timeline of Spencer Lee’s wrestling career that could have ultimately played out.

Following a stunning loss in the 2023 NCAA semifinal to Purdue’s Matt Ramos to stop him from becoming a four-time collegiate champion, there was a case to be made that Lee had left everything out on the mat he could. Three NCAA titles, two Dan Hodge Trophies, a Cadet World title and a pair of Junior World titles had cost him him ACLs and deteriorated his knees to a point where Lee wondered whether he had anything left in the tank.

Lee has never been one for excuses. His “excuses are for wusses” quote following winning a title with no ACLs in his knees became a tagline for the Hawkeye wrestling program. But even he wondered if it was maybe time to step away.

Following that loss in March, Lee finally committed to taking his long-desired trip to Japan as an escape from it all.

“I just needed to not think about wrestling,” Lee said during a press conference Thursday.

Lee was a longtime admirer of Japanese culture. Not only for its dominant wrestling, but Japanese culture in its entirety. In Japan, he stayed in Tokyo while visiting Kyoto, Osaka and other major towns along the way.

“I really enjoyed the peacefulness,” Lee said. “Just to walk around and have a lot of time to think.”

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While he was wanting to avoid wrestling, he still made sure to meet up with an old friend in Takuto Otoguro, an Olympic gold medalist in 2021. The two met and became friends in the 2014 World Championships and stayed in touch throughout their careers.

When Lee spoke with Otoguro, Otoguro mentioned how hard it was prepare for another Olympics. Now that he had reached the pinnacle, what comes next was a big question. When Otoguro began training again after some time away, he told Lee he still loved it when they were in Japan, so he would try once again.

When Lee returned from his wrestling hiatus, he felt refueled, which is exactly what Iowa coach Tom Brands was hoping for. When Lee floated the idea to him, Brands and the staff “spurred” him to take some time to make the heart grow fonder.

“You’re fanning the flames,” Brands said. “Making him burn hot inside.”

Lee would then go on to perhaps look the best he has in some time, rolling through Senior Nationals to qualify for the Olympic Trials in December 2023, defeating the United States’ best at the Trials and then qualifying the 57-kilogram weight class for the US in Istanbul and going undefeated in that run.

Across the sea, Lee’s friend Otoguro failed to qualify for the Olympics himself, but told Lee he would be seeing him soon, making Lee realize the bigger picture of why it made sense to continue on.

“He messaged me and told me that he would be on the team in 2028,” Lee said. “For me it was like, ‘I get it.’ Just because you reached that pinnacle, it doesn’t mean you’re done with your potential.”

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Wrestler Spencer Lee meets with media ahead of his upcoming appearance in the 2024 Paris Olympics.

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Today’s version of Lee is a revival of what Lee was prior to all those knee injuries, before the stunning loss in his senior season. His time away in a country he longed to visit one day helped him realize there was still another level he was capable of reaching if he could find a way.

Now, Lee heads to his mother’s home country of Paris. He’s been practicing his French with the France wrestling delegation in Colorado to impress his mother and family who all were born and raised in France, all while working on his stellar par terre offense that helped him roll through the qualifying process. In total across Senior Nationals, the Olympic Trials and the Last Chance qualifier, Lee wrestled in 11 matches, outscored his opponents 107-25 with five technical falls and a pin in that time.

Ultimately, Brands’ prodding of Lee to take some time away paid off big time for all parties, but they are turning toward the next step of this process to try to win gold. A former gold medalist himself in 1996, he’s not trying to push Lee to emulate what he did, but rather to exceed what he accomplished in Atlanta 28 years ago.

Lee will be looking to Drake Ayala, Pat Lugo and Brandon Sorensen to help as training partners. At this point, current and former Hawkeyes training with the Olympians has become a tradition, like Lee did as a teenager with Daniel Dennis furing his Olympics run in 2016.

For Ayala, it’s a massive opportunity to build upon his successful sophomore campaign when he reached the NCAA finals. Having dealt with injuries of his own the past two seasons, he’s getting a shining example of what it will take to reach his pinnacle.

“He left a little undone as well,” Brands said. “This is part of that for him but there’s also an unselfish part of that as well. He’s the right guy along with Lugo and Sorensen to go with Spencer because of their relationship.”

Now the “zero hour” is upon Lee and the Hawkeye Wrestling Club, a term Brands borrowed from Dan Gable as they prepare to try to get Iowa’s sixth gold medal from the Olympics. Brands says he has no need or desire to place pressure on Lee ahead of the Olympics, but Lee’s urgency to get out and reach the pinnacle is at an all-time high in his career.

“You’re talking about a guy who’s a super high-octane competitor, you’re talking about a guy who gets up for the best events that are in front of him and here we are,” Brands said. “It’s time to perform.”

Eli McKown covers high school sports and wrestling for the Des Moines Register. Contact him at Emckown@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter at @EMcKown23