Wyoming 'kid' mauls the Siberian Bear

SYDNEY — This is a story straight out of the heartland. As down-home as apple pie, as spin-free as they come.

If the Olympic Games were looking for a break from the drug wars and the scandals, for something as far from a courthouse as humanly possible, they got one on a Wednesday night in Sydney in a converted convention hall by the harbor when a dairy farmer's kid from Afton, Wyo., beat the unbeatable man.

Wrestling in the super heavyweight division against long, tall odds, 29-year-old Rulon Gardner defeated three-time Olympic Greco-Roman gold medalist Alexandre Kareline, 33, 1-0 in overtime.

It was Kareline's first loss. Ever.

For 12 straight years the man called the Siberian Bear won every match at every tournament he entered, including nine world championships and three Olympic Games. He didn't even lose off the mat. A year ago, Kareline was elected to the equivalent of the House of Representatives in his native Siberia.

Strong, chiseled, a Jordanesque bald head, perfect posture, a regal bearing, Kareline was in many ways the poster man of the Olympics — solid, quick, agile; Citius, Altius, Fortius (swifter, higher, stronger) personified.

No one had ever won the same weight class in four straight Olympics, as Kareline was expected to do in Sydney. It was no coincidence that Olympic royalty showed up for his gold medal match. Juan Antonio Samaranch, the president of the International Olympic Committee, selected himself as the person who would present the gold medal to the victor of the super heavyweight class.

But when the medal ceremony arrived, it was the 20-inch neck of Gardner that felt the weight of the gold medal, as Kareline stood to the side to await the silver.

Not far from that spotlighted scene, no more than 30 feet away in the first four rows of spectator seats, stood the people who had made it all possible: Rulon's brothers and sisters.

They were all there, standing at attention for the national anthem, trying not to cry because they're from Wyoming, but tearing up anyway.

Their little 281-pound baby brother had just won an Olympic gold medal.

They were all a big part of this. Hadn't they all played a role pounding him into fighting shape, keeping him humble, making sure he wasn't spoiled rotten? Hadn't they all packed up their boots and "Wyo Cowboy" hats and come halfway around the world to cheer him home?

He was the last of the Gardners, the last R in the string of boys — Rollin, Ronald (who died), Russell, Reynold, then Rulon — born to Reed and Virginia Gardner; the last kid brother that sisters Gerry, Evon, Diane and Marcella could either mother or terrorize, depending on their mood.