{"id":34142,"date":"2016-03-02T14:16:58","date_gmt":"2016-03-02T20:16:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?p=34142"},"modified":"2016-03-04T07:30:52","modified_gmt":"2016-03-04T13:30:52","slug":"the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/","title":{"rendered":"The road to Rio: Music and meditation help prepare woman wrestler for the Olympic Qualifiers"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Nicole Sedivy<\/p>\n

Just 25 seconds before the women\u2019s freestyle finals were about to begin, Sarah Hildebrant was still pacing around the mat in her red Team USA singlet, with \u201cThunderstruck\u201d by AC\/DC blasting through the headphones that covered her messy French braids. Her adrenaline was rushing. She felt the rage.<\/p>\n

Hildebrandt, the two-time Pan American Championships gold medalist, said to herself, \u201cYou\u2019re the best. You just step on the mat and put on a show.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Last year she already earned a berth at the Olympic Qualifiers April 9-10 in Iowa City, Iowa.<\/p>\n

But she still wanted to beat Katherine Fulp-Allen, at 53 kg\/116.5 lbs, at the Dave Schultz Memorial International.<\/p>\n

The previous night, Hildebrandt, 22, played video games late into the evening and called everyone in her family back home in Indiana. She wanted to connect with them before she wrestled the next day at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado \u2013her home since June.<\/p>\n

Trying not to stress, she went to bed at 11:30 p.m., and set her alarm for 5 a.m. Wrestling on very little sleep isn\u2019t ideal, but it works for her.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf it ain\u2019t broke, don\u2019t fix it, right?\u201d Hildebrandt said.<\/p>\n

That morning, she took it easy. She left herself an hour after breakfast to simply sit and meditate for 20 minutes.<\/p>\n

Hildebrandt roamed around the gym. She spoke and laughed with several other wrestlers in the bleachers while eating some potato chips.<\/p>\n

\"Woman
Sarah Hildebrandt socializes before her match. (Erin Barney\/MEDILL)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But when Hildebrandt stepped on the mat for warmups, she switched to warrior mode.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not peaceful anymore,\u201d Hildebrandt said. \u201cThat comes with a combative sport like that, and I eat that up.\u201d<\/p>\n

She is a \u201cgoer\u201d and \u201ca ball of energy,\u201d said her coach, Brad Harper, who missed the Dave Schultz tournament because of a meet with his Penn High School wrestlers \u2013 including her brother, Drew, an Indiana state champion.<\/p>\n

[field name=”wrestle”]
\nBut when Harper is present, she feeds off of his positive energy.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s consistently like loud, loud, loud, and I just love that,\u201d Hildebrandt said.<\/p>\n

She took one final swig of water. Her red Team USA shirt hit the floor. Her black Nike wrestling shoes stepped into the circle. It was show time.<\/p>\n

Though she lost the gold medal match 4-2, she is still on the road to Rio. She just needs to wrestle the match of her life at the Qualifiers in April.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not afraid to tell people I can make this team,\u201d Hildebrandt said. \u201cWhereas, a year or two ago, I\u2019d be like, \u2018Oh, yeah, I might do it.\u2019 But now I\u2019m like \u2018I\u2019mma make it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Photo at top: Hildebrandt (on top) takes an early lead. (Erin Barney\/MEDILL)<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Nicole Sedivy Just 25 seconds before the women\u2019s freestyle finals were about to begin, Sarah Hildebrant was still pacing around the mat in her red Team USA singlet, with \u201cThunderstruck\u201d by AC\/DC blasting through the headphones that covered her messy French braids. Her adrenaline was rushing. She felt the rage. Hildebrandt, the two-time Pan […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":265,"featured_media":34164,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,585],"tags":[1223,993,1258,1722,1352],"class_list":["post-34142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","category-winter-2016","tag-dave-schultz","tag-olympics","tag-road-to-rio","tag-usa-wrestling","tag-womens-wrestling"],"yoast_head":"\nThe road to Rio: Music and meditation help prepare woman wrestler for the Olympic Qualifiers - Medill Reports Chicago<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The road to Rio: Music and meditation help prepare woman wrestler for the Olympic Qualifiers - Medill Reports Chicago\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Nicole Sedivy Just 25 seconds before the women\u2019s freestyle finals were about to begin, Sarah Hildebrant was still pacing around the mat in her red Team USA singlet, with \u201cThunderstruck\u201d by AC\/DC blasting through the headphones that covered her messy French braids. Her adrenaline was rushing. She felt the rage. Hildebrandt, the two-time Pan […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Medill Reports Chicago\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-03-02T20:16:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-03-04T13:30:52+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2016\/03\/Feature-Image-1.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1100\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"731\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"nicolesedivy\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"nicolesedivy\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/\",\"name\":\"The road to Rio: Music and meditation help prepare woman wrestler for the Olympic Qualifiers - Medill Reports Chicago\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2016\/03\/Feature-Image-1.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2016-03-02T20:16:58+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2016-03-04T13:30:52+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/ca29f3b6df8b12eab806cde0067247cc\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2016\/03\/Feature-Image-1.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2016\/03\/Feature-Image-1.jpg\",\"width\":1100,\"height\":731},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"The road to Rio: Music and meditation help prepare woman wrestler for the Olympic Qualifiers\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/\",\"name\":\"Medill Reports Chicago\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/ca29f3b6df8b12eab806cde0067247cc\",\"name\":\"nicolesedivy\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f49765bbc096cc37276004fa55e5713b64e957e7ffe4c26e8da389b081d99c3b?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f49765bbc096cc37276004fa55e5713b64e957e7ffe4c26e8da389b081d99c3b?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"nicolesedivy\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/author\/nicolesedivy\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The road to Rio: Music and meditation help prepare woman wrestler for the Olympic Qualifiers - Medill Reports Chicago","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The road to Rio: Music and meditation help prepare woman wrestler for the Olympic Qualifiers - Medill Reports Chicago","og_description":"By Nicole Sedivy Just 25 seconds before the women\u2019s freestyle finals were about to begin, Sarah Hildebrant was still pacing around the mat in her red Team USA singlet, with \u201cThunderstruck\u201d by AC\/DC blasting through the headphones that covered her messy French braids. Her adrenaline was rushing. She felt the rage. Hildebrandt, the two-time Pan […]","og_url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/","og_site_name":"Medill Reports Chicago","article_published_time":"2016-03-02T20:16:58+00:00","article_modified_time":"2016-03-04T13:30:52+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1100,"height":731,"url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2016\/03\/Feature-Image-1.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"nicolesedivy","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"nicolesedivy","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/","url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/","name":"The road to Rio: Music and meditation help prepare woman wrestler for the Olympic Qualifiers - Medill Reports Chicago","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2016\/03\/Feature-Image-1.jpg","datePublished":"2016-03-02T20:16:58+00:00","dateModified":"2016-03-04T13:30:52+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/ca29f3b6df8b12eab806cde0067247cc"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2016\/03\/Feature-Image-1.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2016\/03\/Feature-Image-1.jpg","width":1100,"height":731},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/the-road-to-rio-music-and-meditation-help-prepare-woman-wrestler-for-the-olympic-qualifiers\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The road to Rio: Music and meditation help prepare woman wrestler for the Olympic Qualifiers"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website","url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/","name":"Medill Reports Chicago","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/ca29f3b6df8b12eab806cde0067247cc","name":"nicolesedivy","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f49765bbc096cc37276004fa55e5713b64e957e7ffe4c26e8da389b081d99c3b?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f49765bbc096cc37276004fa55e5713b64e957e7ffe4c26e8da389b081d99c3b?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"nicolesedivy"},"url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/author\/nicolesedivy\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/265"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34142\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}