Daniel Igali's Golden Moment
By | Howard Tsumura
Daniel Igali's life has always been an exercise in the unscripted, a boundless journey guided solely by the heart.
And so in the very moment of his greatest zenith, Canada's first Olympic gold medal-winning wrestler listened to that heart and delivered a response which has taken its place amongst the most iconic sports moments in our nation's history.
Fifteen years later, it continues to resonate.
Standing before the crowd at the 2000 Sydney Olympics and on televisions around the world, including his native Nigeria and his adopted homeland, the Simon Fraser University grappler placed the Canadian flag on the ground before kneeling down to give it a kiss.
So rare are moments as unvarnished, and so rare are they as unscripted.
"Never, in my wildest dreams, had I ever thought of what I'd do if I'd won," says Igali, who did just that by beating Russia's Arsen Gitinov in the 69-kg final. "But I was always living in the moment."
As SFU celebrates its 50th anniversary, there is no doubting the impact that Igali, one of its most famous graduates, has had both nationally and globally in the areas of athletics and humanity.
Yet there remain layers to his oft-told story -- of defecting to Canada after his Nigerian national team competed at the 1994 Commonwealth Games in Victoria -- which aren't as well known, and it's those stories which reflect the serendipity that occurred when a courageous young athlete was welcomed into the nurturing environment of the Clan wrestling program.
A RAPID RISE
These days, with his competitive days behind him, Igali leads a globe-trotting life of purpose, giving back to the sport which has defined him while at the same time, using his status within it to affect positive change in his third world homeland.
A family man with a home base in Surrey, Igali resides for parts of each year in Nigeria, where he is not only the president of the Nigerian Wrestling Federation and the chairman of the technical committee of the Nigerian Olympic Committee, but a tireless advocate for change in his native country where he has built a school for the children in his tiny hometown of Eniwari.
It was there that Igali first learned to wrestle, taking his lumps on the dirt fields in the Niger Delta region of the African nation.
It was an unforgiving beginning, but also a springboard to his master's class in the sport, one which would take place atop Burnaby Mountain over a concentrated three-year university career.
"I had heard that this kid had jumped ship and that he wanted to stay here and train," remembers longtime Clan head wrestling coach Mike Jones, who would go on to become Igali's mentor. "So I said to someone 'Did he medal (at the Commonwealth Games)?' and they said 'No, he was 11th.' I said 'Give me the guy who was third or fourth.'"
Of course it soon became a moot point as Clan coaches and Igali's teammates witnessed his transformation to world-class grappler.
After a year spent wrestling at Douglas College in New Westminster under Dave McKay, the former Clan great who would later become his Olympic and national team coach, Igali enrolled at SFU where he was taught the technical side of the sport. His athleticism was already off the charts, and once the two were combined, he was ready to take on the world.
"He came from traditional Nigerian wrestling where they did it outside on the dirt," remembers SFU men's head coach Justin Abdou, another former Clan Olympian who over various parts of his career, was both a coach and teammate of Igali's. "He could really wrestle on his takedowns, but he was getting turned all over on the mat. He'd been coached well, but Mike is a bit of a magician, and Daniel really responded to that. He and Mike had a special relationship."
So much so that Igali would eventually compile a breathtaking 116-0 record as a collegiate wrestler over his Simon Fraser career.
COACHES WHO CARED
In the early stages of his development, Igali wrestled with so many opposing forces away from the mat as he adjusted to life in a new country.
"I can remember him talking to me about his decision and still worrying about what was happening back home," says Abdou. "He didn't know what would happen to him or his family. I can remember leaving Saskatchewan to come to SFU, but I couldn't even comprehend what he was going through. He was 19 or 20 at the time, but he didn't seem like it. He was a very mature guy."
In those early days, Igali admits to almost giving up on his dreams.
"Initially, coming over was very tough," Igali says. "I wasn't used to the food, the weather, the way Canadians spoke. Everything was strange. There was a lot of loneliness and on some days I questioned my path and thought I would go home and face whatever consequences there were."
Wrestling saved him.
"I have to credit my coaches," Igali says of Jones and McKay, who would amp up the training to a new level prior to the Sydney Olympics. "Mike and Dave both said they needed to push me to the brink, to break me down to get me ready."
To that end, Igali leaned on the vast tradition of the Clan program to help him prepare. In fact there were times when a pantheon of Clan greats like Abdou, Chris Wilson, Craig Roberts and Chris Rinke, all of varying weight classes, would jump on the mat against Igali in concentrated tag-team sessions.
"It was eight minutes, eight different guys, all one minute each," remembers Igali of the punishing scrimmages.
Adds Abdou: "We were all just lined up and waiting for him and for Daniel it wasn't that much fun. But in the end, it was a perfect fit. He had all of the physical tools, but he needed to be in an environment where he got pushed and where he was getting internal competition from training partners."
And thus those gruelling training days in the Clan's wrestling room would ultimately represent the first steps toward Canadian history in what is the world's most time-honoured sport.
HISTORICAL PERSEPCTIVE
Canada, and its cache of Clan greats have a rich history at the world wrestling championships. There was bronze and there was silver. Gold, however, proved to be elusive.
"So what you needed to believe that was on a given day, you could win it," says Jones, "and that's what had been missing. We had been so close but never had anyone break through the barrier and win. Jeff Thue was second, Chris Wilson was second, Bob Molle was second.
"But when Daniel won in 1999, it was the first," continues Jones, counting the moment as one of the biggest in Canadian wrestling history. "Then he won the Olympics, and Canada won another gold at the worlds in 2001. And then we had (SFU's) Carol Huynh on the women's side winning Olympic gold in 2008."
Adds Abdou: "It was almost like the four-minute mile."
Going 116-0 for the Clan and breaking through Canada's gold-medal barrier remain the most tangible aspects of Igali's wrestling career.
Yet none of it would have happened without the special DNA that he possessed within his compact, muscular frame.
He was on a mission to succeed, and there was no better example of that than in 1998 when he won his third straight NAIA national collegiate championship title.
"When he won that third title, it was in a slow, boring match," says Jones. "I gave him a hard time about it. I told him that he needed to put himself in a situation where he was on a bigger stage, a world stage. I told him that it was a poor performance."
Jones then remembers getting an unexpected visitor that night at his hotel room.
"That bothered Daniel so much that at three in the morning he came knocking at my door," the coach says. "He'd just won his third national title, and he didn't understand what I was talking about. He was stewing about it. That was Daniel. He just had that little extra desire to win and he would never give up."
How could he?
"When you grow up in an environment without hope," Igali says, "and then you are able to achieve, you just feel like you have the ability to reach out and help others. I went to the best school in the world for wrestling. And so when I kissed the flag I was thinking of Canada and all of the people that had helped me."
