#TeamUSATuesday: Greco-Roman National Team member Dalton Duffield

Dalton Duffield has been the No. 3 on the National Team at 55 kg for the past two years. For the Olympic year, he is making the move up to 60 kg. Dalton currently trains at Northern Michigan University where he is a student. He recently took time from his schedule to answer a couple questions for us.
What is your favorite movie?
Stepbrothers


Who is your favorite musical artist?
Blake Shelton, he’s another Oklahoma Boy.
What is your favorite food?
My favorite healthy food is grilled chicken. My favorite unhealthy food is pizza. Pineapples are my favorite topping
What is your favorite sport to watch other than wrestling?
Football and soccer.
Did you play any other sports growing up?
I played football and baseball up until my freshman year of high school.
Who is your favorite wrestler to watch either past or present?
Kyle Dake probably, I’ve been watching him since I was little. In Greco-Roman probably Roman Vlasov (Russia) or Mohamed Elsayed (Egypt).
What are some of your other hobbies off of the mat?
I like fishing, lifting and working out. I also like just hanging at the lake.
What is your biggest fear?
My biggest fear related to wrestling is getting an injury that would put me out of competition. Unrelated to wrestling, it’s running up on a bear during one of our mountain runs. Me and Dalton Roberts ran up on a black bear one time. It was the first time I’d seen a bear in person. It was a scary experience.
Do you have any plans once your wrestling career is over?
I’m getting a business management degree at school right now. I’m probably going to move back to Oklahoma after I graduate and start a business. I’ve thought about being a loan officer or working construction.
How did you first get involved in wrestling?
My dad made me go to practice when I was about seven or eight years old. I used to run around the living room watching WWE and wrestle with my stuffed animals, so my dad decided to take me to wrestling practice. I practiced for a year or so before I wrestled a match. I was just going to practice to wrestle around, not taking it too seriously. My parents let me decide when I wanted to take it seriously. I was 10 or 11 when I started taking it seriously. I got a lot better and started wrestling better guys. I switched clubs and started wrestling at a club with Boo Lewallen. Our dads were the coaches, and I started travelling and wrestling a little bit more.
You’re currently at Northern Michigan University, but you also spent some time at Oklahoma and Oklahoma City. Could you talk about what led you to NMU?
When I left OCU, everyone was telling me I needed to go train Greco. I was good at Greco in high school, and I won Fargo twice. (Sam) Hazewinkel told me if I really wanted to do it I needed to go to Northern Michigan. I called Coach Hermann and we had a couple talks. I went up there to take a visit and train for a few weeks before U23 Team Trials. I made the U23 World Team, so I went back up there after U23s to train for Seniors. I ended up making the Senior National Team, and I was like ok yeah this is where I want to go.
Your weight class, 55 kg, is a non-Olympic weight. How is bumping up to 60 kg going, and how is an Olympic year different than a non-Olympic year?
I have to cut quite a bit of weight to get down to 55 kg, so going up is probably good for me. I think 57 kg would have been better for me because I’m still a little bit small for 60 kg. Right now I’m just focused on trying to gain strength. I’m getting a little bit bigger. I get up to about 65 kg right now but that’s kind of just me being fat.
It being an Olympic year makes the competition a heck of a lot more stiff. There’s like ten guys at the weight that could potentially win the spot. There are no easy matches anymore. When it’s just the World weights, you have the chance to catch some easier guys in the first round. Now you walk out there and have (Ryan) Mango (the 2019 World Team member at 63 kg) first round.
Has Greco-Roman always been your favorite style?
Greco isn’t really big in Oklahoma. At first I didn’t really like it; I hated it. They used to have to make me wrestle Greco at tournaments. Then I started doing pretty good, and as I got a little bit older, I started liking it a lot more. I didn’t place at Fargo for two years, and then the next year I came back and actually trained a little bit with Hazewinkel, and I came back and won. I was like ok I actually think I like this.
Can you talk about your relationship with Hazewinkel?
He coached me for a very long time. When I was a little kid he would do private lessons with me. As I got a little bit older it became a dual training session. He was training for the trials a couple years ago, and I was his training partner. Ever since then, every time I go home I work out with him. I give him a call and he says “yeah, sure” and comes and works out with me.
Was it strange wrestling against him two years ago at the World Team Trials?
It was kind of weird. At that point, he’d taught me nearly everything I knew about Greco. I started going to him when I was 12 or 13.
What was the best advice you’ve received in your career?
Focusing on the way you perform rather than the outcome. Being able to say, even though I lost, I wrestled well, or vice versa. I lost because I didn’t wrestle well. Before my matches I’m not thinking that “I need to win this match.” I’m thinking, “I’m going out here to wrestle hard”. I got that from one of the Team Oklahoma coaches that is actually a sports psychologist in Oklahoma City. I used to talk to him a lot about it; his name is Zach Randall.
What advice would you give to a younger wrestler?
I’d give them the same kind of concept; don’t put too much pressure on yourself to win or lose. At younger ages, it doesn’t really matter. Go out there and wrestle well, and see what you need to improve on. Even if you lose, it’s a good day if you come out knowing what you did wrong and knowing what you need to fix.
Do you have any pre-match rituals?
I’m very superstitious. I tie my shoes up the same way. I put tape on them the same way. I don’t know why. It’s just something I’ve always done since I was younger. I try to stretch the same way too.
What motivates you during training?
In practice, I don’t usually feel sorry for myself a whole lot. That’s what’s supposed to happen. You’re supposed to get tired, you’re supposed to hurt. If you’re not hurting, you’re not working hard enough. That’s what I was always told. A famous Dan Gable quote that still runs through my head often is, “Most people train until they’re tired. Champions train when they’re tired.” Anyone can do anything when they’re not tired. When you’re tired and fatigue starts to set in and wear on your mind, that’s when you’re really training your body.
What is your best wrestling memory to date?
On the mat would be the first time I won Fargo. I hadn’t placed there before, and that was the first step I over the hump. That was kind of a huge deal for my wrestling mentality. My favorite memory off the mat was at a tournament in Kansas City. We had a banana fight in the hotel room. By the end of it, there was smashed bananas everywhere.
The Duffield file
Birthday: August 13, 1997
Hometown: Moore Oklahoma
High school: Westmoore High School
College: Northern Michigan University
Residence: Marquette, Mich.
Club: NMU-OTS/NYAC
Twitter: @DaltonDuffield
Instagram: @dallttonn
• Two-time National Team member (2017/2018, 2018/2019)
• 2019 U.S. Open runner-up
• 2019 Dave Schultz Memorial International runner-up
• 2018 U23 World Team member
• Two-time Fargo Junior Greco-Roman champion (2015, 2016)