Dan Gable

Early life

Gable grew up in Waterloo, Iowa.

Along with wrestling, Gable excelled at many sports before his sophomore year making the commitment to being a one sport athlete. He was a YMCA state champion in swimming, the quarterback of his junior high football team, and also very skilled in baseball.

High school career

Competing for Waterloo West High School, Gable posted a 64-0 high school record en route to winning three Iowa state scholastic championships.

As a sophomore in high school, Gable experienced a personal tragedy. His older sister, Diane, was molested and murdered May 31, 1964, in the Gable family home, while Dan and his parents were on vacation. Diane Gable's killer, John Thomas Kyle (a classmate of Dan Gable's), pleaded guilty to charges in connection with her death and was sentenced to life in prison. Kyle died in a Kansas state penitentiary on June 17, 2011; Gable was in northeast Iowa—the same area where he was vacationing when his sister was killed—when he learned of Kyle's death. Gable later recalled that the event gave him a singular passion for wrestling as a way to uplift his shattered family. In his documentary Gable, he said, "I needed to give them enough entertainment that they didn't have to look other places." In other interviews of Dan, he stated that, "It [The tragic incident with his sister] made me even more of a horse with blinders as far as wrestling went."

Collegiate and freestyle career

After high school, Gable wrestled for the Iowa State University Cyclones of the Big Eight Conference. Gable wrestled for Iowa State's varsity squad for three years and won two NCAA titles. Gable's overall collegiate mark was 181–1. His only collegiate defeat was in his final match where he lost to Larry Owings of the University of Washington.

Gable wrestled on the national freestyle wrestling circuit between 1967 and 1976 where he earned a record of 67–4. He wrestled internationally between 1971 and 1973 where he earned a record of 30–1. Overall, his freestyle record was 97–5. His biggest accomplishment was winning the 1972 Olympic medal even after the Soviet wrestling team had promised to "scour the eastern bloc to find a wrestler who could take down Dan Gable." They were unsuccessful.

1967

1968

1969

1970

1971

1972

1973

Coaching career

Gable became head wrestling coach at the University of Iowa in 1976, and went on to be the most successful coach in American collegiate history. From 1978 to 1986, the Hawkeyes won the NCAA title each year, a record nine in succession. He continued to coach the team until a sabbatical after the 1997 season due to the injuries keeping him from doing the hands-on coaching he thought his team deserves.

His teams compiled a dual meet record of 355–21–5. He coached 152 all-Americans, 45 national champions, 106 Big Ten Champions and 12 Olympians, including four gold, one silver and three bronze medalists. The Hawkeyes won 25 consecutive Big Ten championships, 21 under Gable as head coach and four while he was an assistant coach and administrator. He led them to a record 15 National titles.

Despite his success, Gable was not honored as Big Ten Coach of the Year until 1993, which was his 17th year as Iowa's coach and his 17th Big Ten championship. The Big Ten Coach of the Year Award did not exist until 1988. J Robinson of Minnesota has been given the award seven times in his career.

In 1997, the Hawkeyes were expected to lose to the favored Oklahoma State Cowboys. But Gable, who was by this time coaching on crutches after hip replacement surgery, led his team to its 17th NCAA team title and to an NCAA-record 170 points. A documentary following him that year "Freestyle: The Victories of Dan Gable" directed by Kevin Kelley and produced by David L. Gould aired on HBO 2.

In addition to his leadership at the college level, Gable was head coach of the United States Olympic team in freestyle wrestling in 1980, 1984, and 2000.

Gable's successor at Iowa, Jim Zalesky, won three NCAA titles under him. It was announced on April 14, 2006, that Gable would be rejoining the coaching staff at Iowa as top assistant coach to current coach and former Gable national champion Tom Brands. He did spend time as an assistant athletic director at the University of Iowa until 2012.

Gable remains involved with the team, but stepped down from his assistant coach role in October 2011.

Achievements and status in popular culture

Gable has frequently been a subject in American popular press. In an Esquire interview, actor, and high school wrestler Tom Cruise considered Gable his greatest hero. Gable himself was profiled in Esquire by the novelist and former University of Pittsburgh wrestler John Irving. The story was entitled "Gorgeous Dan". Gable was praised extensively during the speech given by The Iron Sheik at his induction to the WWE Hall of Fame in 2005. In 1999, Sports Illustrated selected him as the greatest sports figure in the history of the state of Iowa. During Gable's tenure as coach, the teen sitcom Saved by the Bell referred to the University of Iowa and a fictional coach that had appeared to scout AC Slater portrayed by Mario Lopez for their team. Gable appears in the documentary film Catch: The Hold Not Taken in which he speaks of the origins of amateur wrestling. He recalls that, growing up, he knew high school wrestling as 'Catch as catch can', which is the name of the traditional style from Lancashire, England. In the movie Never Back Down, Gable is mentioned in a scene as the greatest Olympic wrestler ever. An author himself, in 1999 he published Coaching Wrestling Successfully in which he shared his blueprint for developing wrestling champions. He has also created a series of wrestling instructional videos. Gable’s accomplishments had even caught the attention of former President George W. Bush, who in 2002 named Gable to the President’s Council on Physical Fitness. On April 18, 2012, the University of Iowa erected a bronze statue of its beloved former wrestling coach in his iconic pose demanding from the referee a stalling call.

On February 12, 2013, the International Olympic Committee made a decision to drop wrestling as one of the core sports of the 2020 Olympics due to internal politics. Since this decision, Gable has used his fame to lobby against the decision and formed the Committee for the Preservation of Olympic Wrestling. This decision has "raised a sleeping giant" according to Kathy Gable. The IOC reinstated Olympic wrestling in September 2013.