By Kyle Klingman, W.I.N. Staff Writer
Sammie Henson loves winning so much it makes him sick.
“I love to win,” said the Sunkist Kids’ Henson after posting his second victory over fellow club member Henry Cejudo in the 121-pound Championship Series of the World Team Trials. “I hate it but I love it. I get sick but when I get here it’s in me. I’ve been doing it so long and when the lights are on I love it.”
Being sick also played a factor in Henson’s decision to skip this year’s U.S. Nationals, April 14-15. The 35-year-old veteran came down with the flu several days prior to the event and chose not to compete. Because he failed to medal at last year’s World Championships, winning at the U.S. Open didn’t ensure Henson an automatic berth to the finals.
In Henson’s absence, Henry Cejudo, a 19-year-old who recently graduated from Coronado High School in Colorado Springs, Colo., made waves by becoming the first high school student to win the Open. But Henson made it clear that age has little to do with success.
“The one thing I do want to say, everyone makes a big deal about his age but if you start looking at people’s ages you’re going to get beat,” said Henson. “That kid is a man as a wrestler. He’s a great wrestler. He’s going to win some world titles and an Olympic gold maybe someday for our country. The age thing, they’ve said things about me being 35 too. At this point, if you’ve got the desire, age makes no difference.”
And it’s desire that motivates Henson to compete beyond what many would consider his prime wrestling years. After winning back-to-back NCAA titles for Clemson in 1993 and 1994, Henson won a world title in 1998 and a silver medal at the Olympics in 2000 during the peak of his career.
After taking time off after the Olympics, Henson attempted to make the team again in 2004 but lost to Stephen Abas, the eventual silver medalist.
With Abas moving up a weight last year, Henson earned his third world or Olympic team berth in 2005 by defeating his arch-rival Eric Akin at the World Team Trials.
As this year’s U.S. representative at the World Championships, Henson has a better understanding of why he still competes. Initially, it was the pain of his loss in the finals of the Olympics that drove Henson out of retirement. Now, as a veteran of the sport, it’s an unabashed desire to win that keeps him going.
“I had a great coach, John Smith, tell me don’t let (not winning an Olympic gold medal) be the reason why you come back and I never understood that,” said Henson. “But if you come back to get something you don’t have and that you missed out on, you’ve come back for the wrong reasons.
“I’m here because I have a passion to wrestle. I have a passion to wrestle for the United States and beat those foreign countries. That’s why I’m here.”
Now the question remains how much longer Sammie Henson will continue in his quest to be the best in the world.
“My wife said China is it but there are two Chinas, this one and 08,” said Henson, referring to the Olympics in Beijing. “I agree with her that China is it; she just doesn’t know which one.”

FS 55k/121lb notes
• Matt Azevedo, who finished second behind Cejudo at the U.S. Open, took third place at the Trials with a 4-0, 3-0 victory over Luke Smith of the Gator Wrestling Club.
Azevedo, representing the Sunkist Kids, lost a semifinal match to Henson but came back to win a pair of consolation matches.
• Luke Smith, who wrestled for Central Michigan, actually lost a first-round match to Franklin Gomez, but came back to win three wrestlebacks, including a 6-3, 8-0 victory over former Hawkeye Luke Eustice
• Henson was the only wrestler who had won an NCAA title in the 121-pound weight class. Only one other wrestler, Eustice, had ever been an All-American in college.
• Two wrestlers competing were still teenagers. Gomez and Cejudo are both 19 and won Junior National championships last summer in Fargo. They met in the quarterfinals with Cejudo winning 0-1, 2-1, 3-1
• Henson was the oldest competitor at 35 years of age. The next oldest wrestler was Azevedo, who was 28. The two met in the semifinals with Henson winning 6-2, 3-1
• Henson only lost one period in the four matches he wrestled. Cejudo took the first period of their first match, 3-1, by taking Henson to his back on a takedown.
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