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August 25, 2004 4:57 pm

Gardner leaves shoes, wrestling legacy

By BRYCE MILLER

Gannett News Service

ATHENS, Greece - A bronze medal ensured, 265-pound, barrel-chested Rulon Gardner sat down like a child and fumbled to untie the laces on his size-13 shoes.

America's athletic icon from the 2000 Olympics said it without saying a word: He was retiring.

When Gardner placed his shoes on the mat at Ano Liossia Olympic Hall on Wednesday after beating Iran's Sajad Barzi 3-0 for a bronze medal, the United States' most storied Greco-Roman wrestling career ended with one of the sport's most emotional traditions.

``As a wrestler, you start putting your shoes on the floor like a little 4- or 5-year-old kid,'' Gardner said. ``I took them off as a 33-year-old kid.''

Gardner said he told U.S. national coach Steve Fraser 20 minutes before the final match that he would leave the sport that made him a household name in America and beyond.

The youngest of nine children from a farm family in tiny Afton, Wyo., Gardner stunned Alexander Karelin for gold in Sydney, ending the Russian's 13-year unbeaten streak.

Karelin was in the crowd Wednesday as Gardner fell in the semifinals to eventual silver medalist Georgiy Tsurtsumia of Kazakhstan 4-1 in overtime.But as Gardner bowed four times to each section of the applauding arena, sans shoes, the moment had become about much more than the color of the medal around his neck.

``Today I'm a wrestler,'' Gardner said. ``Tomorrow, I'm a husband - and hopefully a good one, at that.''

Gardner said he and his wife, Stacy, will move near Logan, Utah. He plans to coach as he sees where the tides of Olympic celebrity take him.

``You don't really picture yourself as a celebrity when you're on the wrestling mat, down there sweating on each other,'' he said.

The end of the storybook would have placed Gardner with a second gold medal, but Tsurtsumia, 10 years his junior, fought through exhaustion to spoil the ending.

At the two-thirds mark of the match, with the score tied 1-1, Tsurtsumia showed continued signs of fatigue and was implored at least five times by the official to return to the center of the mat after clock stoppages.

Gardner and Tsurtsumia began overtime in the clinch, when the referee places opponents together, chest to chest, to lock hands on the back of the other. The first wrestler to break his locked hands must make an immediate and successful offensive move or the other is awarded a point.

Though Gardner clearly was fresher heading into overtime, the Kazakhstan wrestler found one last push as they tumbled to the mat.

Officials ruled Gardner's back had been exposed, awarded Tsurtsumia two points, and gold had turned to bronze.

``One mistake,'' Gardner said. ``It was probably a difference of three inches for me to stopping that, no problem, compared to losing that move.''

Gardner's post-Sydney life has been retold around the world.

In 2002, a snowmobile accident left him stranded in the Wyoming wilderness. The life-threatening situation cost him a toe on his right foot, along with difficulty feeling sensation in other toes on the foot.

Fraser and Gardner each admitted Wednesday that his wrestling mobility had been hindered since the accident.

``His balance isn't the way it used to be,'' Fraser said.

The United States previously had won 13 Greco-Roman medals at the Olympics. The most, four, came in the boycotted 1984 Games - with golds going to Jeff Blatnick and Fraser, the wrestler turned mentor to Gardner.

Since 1984, the U.S. had not been shut out of the medal count, but it was in danger of doing so in Athens until Gardner sealed his final win — and left his shoes, and a legacy.

``He beat Karelin,'' Fraser said. ``How can you top that?''

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