Peterkin - The cage : escaping the American dream

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR

THE CAGE

Rollie Peterkin left a glide path to Wall Street wealth for the bloody, gritty, impoverished life of a South American cage fighter. This sounds crazy. But whats crazier: Quitting an uninspiring job to chase a dangerous dream? Or how most of us live and die in cages of our own makingnever thinking to fight our way out? I left this tale of competition, adventure, and primal fear feeling inspired to live a bigger and braver life.

JONATHAN GOTTSCHALL, PHD,

Distinguished Fellow, Washington & Jefferson College. Author of The Professor in the Cage: Why Men Fight and Why We Like to Watch

Rollies life is much like his wrestling style: wide open, contrarian, and unorthodox. But having coached Rollie, I am rarely shocked by his bold and daring adventures. This book speaks to how a single decision can cause a ripple effect in your life. One minute youre sitting behind a desk on Wall Street crunching numbers and the next youre stepping into a cage (in Peru, no less) to fight someone wanting to rip your head off. Truly a story of staring down fear and having the courage to follow your happiness and intrigue.

KENDALL CROSS,

Olympic Gold Medalist, NCAA Champion, and Distinguished Member of The National Wrestling Hall of Fame

Rollie and I have unknowingly been living parallel lives. We were born wrestlers, graduated to become professionals, and then left the professional world for the allure of mixed martial arts. Though Ive only known Rollie for a short time, our shared passion for wrestling, fighting and Spanish has created among us a strong bond and mutual respect. His life was meant to be transformed into a book. I mean, really, who leaves Wall Street and an Ivy League education for South American cage fighting?!

CHARLIE THE SPANIARD BRENNEMAN,

UFC Veteran and Author of Driven: My Unlikely Journey from Classroom to Cage

COPYRIGHT ROLLIE PETERKIN,

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronically, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book. The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law.

ISBN-13: 9781514294208

COVER/INTERIOR DESIGN BY: ERIN TYLER

CONTENTS

My mother and father, thank you for everything.

Most men and women lead lives at the worst so painful, at the best so monotonous, poor and limited that the urge to escape, the longing to transcend themselves if only for a few moments, is and has always been one of the principal appetites of the soul.

ALDOUS HUXLEY, THE DOORS OF PERCEPTION

The dull roar of the crowd echoed in my ears as I fell to my knees in the middle of the mat. I couldnt breathe. I couldnt move. The realization of what had just happened tore through me like a bullet. I was finished.

It was the last wrestling match of my college career and I had gotten pinned. If I had won, I would have been guaranteed a spot on the podium as an NCAA All-American. It was something I had always dreamed about, and this year was my last chance. I had beaten many top-ranked wrestlers during the season, but now, for the third year in a row, I was eliminated in the final round. I had fallen short and now I was done forever.

I got up, shook my opponents hand, and staggered off the mat in a daze. I stumbled into the concourse of the Wells Fargo Center and collapsed against the cold concrete wall. And I cried.

I sobbed and sobbed until snot ran down my face. I sat with my head tucked between my knees, still sweaty and shirtless. I struggled to catch deep breaths of air between hysteric outbursts. Other wrestlers and coaches passed through the concourse, but I didnt care. I was in a different world.

When I finally caught my breath, I stood up and rushed through the concourse to meet my father. I kept my head down and wiped the tears from my eyes. When I saw him, I fell apart again. We hugged and I cried into his shoulder until his shirt was soaked in tears. He held my head and tried to comfort me.

Rollie, Im so proud of everything youve done.

Whenever I lost a match as a kid, he would always say, You did a great job! I would reply, No I didnt! I LOST! This time I didnt say anything. I had no words.

I thought about all the sacrifices my parents had made for me over the years. I knew they always wanted the best for me, but now I felt like a complete failure. I erupted in another bout of tears as my entire wrestling career flashed before my eyes.

Seventeen years earlier, I was doing handstands in the driveway when a neighbor commented that I would make a good wrestler. The next week, my parents enrolled me in a local youth program. After the first practice, I knew right away that this was the sport for me.

From that day forward, I rarely missed a practice. As the years passed, I started winning tournaments and traveling further around the country. By this time, I had quit soccer and baseball because I hated team sports. I didnt want to rely on other people. Winning was so much more fun when it was just me out there. And losing, as I was discovering, was that much worse. When I lost, I couldnt blame the goalie or the quarterbackit was me and only me out there. And the losses tore me up.

In high school I became a three-time Massachusetts state champion. In summer competition, I won nationals twice. For my last two years of high school, I went to a boarding school in New Jersey called Blair Academy, which was famous for its wrestling program. During my first year, we won a national title as a team. Wrestling was a religion at Blair and every day I trained with the most elite athletes in the country.

I was recruited to wrestle for UPenn and I qualified for nationals three consecutive years. Each year, I beat many of the top competitors during the season. I won over 100 collegiate matches, which was a notable achievement by itself. But that didnt help me at the NCAA tournament, where I suffered heartbreak in the same round for three years in a row. I had been working towards this moment for the previous seventeen years of my life and it all came down to one day in March. And I had failed.

That final year, the NCAAs were held in Philadelphia, so UPenn alumni and supporters flocked from all corners of the globe to attend. They had rented out the entire top floor of the Loews Hotel for the celebrations following the tournament. There were speeches and toasts and everybody was having a good time, but I just wanted to shrink away from it all and disappear.

I spent the remainder of my senior year wallowing in anger and self-pity. I drank a lot, and that sometimes helped. Other times I would wake up in the middle of the night, panicked and sweaty, with the image of that last match searing my memory.

Eventually, I chased the feelings of pain and resentment into the remotest corner of my brain, and sealed them off, brick by brick, like a spiteful Poe character. I could talk about that moment, and maybe even joke about it with a few friends, but I couldnt let myself actually feel it.