Sag: What is your most memorable experience in sports?

RA: Probably last season at sectionals when I beat a kid ranked number nine in the state, and I made it to the sectional finals. Another time at sectionals, I had to wrestle up in my weight class, and for four matches at the weight above mine, I beat all my guys.

Sag: How did you begin wrestling?

RA: In eighth grade, my football coach was also a wrestling coach, and he said, “If you guys want to get better at football, you should do wrestling.” So I thought I might as well give wrestling a shot to get better at football. It turned out that I was actually better at wrestling than I was at football, so I stuck with it.

Sag: How do you think wrestling has influenced and helped shape who you are?

RA: Wrestling is mentally tough; you just suck it up when things get tough and get through it. No matter what life throws at you, you just deal with it, overcome it and get past it.

Sag: What do you find most enjoyable about wrestling?

RA: Competition. I would say that is my main goal about everything. I thrive off of competition, and I think that with wrestling, you can find the most competition because it is not much of a team sport. It is more individual. It’s you against another guy.

Sag: What do you find unique about wrestling?

RA: How mentally tough it is. Everything is mental. It’s 90 percent mental, 10 percent physical.

Sag: How did you get the nickname “Rambo?”

RA: The first football practice I ever went to, I told my coach that my name was Ramesses, and my nickname was Rambo. He responded with “I’m going to call you Rambo. It suits you better and it’s cooler.” After that, it just stuck to me.

Paul Kim can be contacted at [email protected].