Adam Coon, a dean’s list aerospace engineering student, is the nation’s No. 2-ranked heavyweight in Greco-Roman wrestling. In between problem sets, design projects and exams this academic year, the rising star trained for Olympic tryouts. There was just one spot on the U.S. team in his weight class and style. To nab it — and go to Rio for the 2016 summer games — Coon needed to upstage an older, long-time master. Find out if he did, and what it was like to be Coon during one of the most demanding times of his life.

I came to Michigan because they had such a great, highly ranked aerospace engineering department. To me, the hardest thing about engineering is really the workload. The material is fun and you can learn it. But when it comes to the work that needs to be done, that’s the hardest part.

How do I fit it all? I prioritize my time. As soon as I’m done with classes, I need to have a mental switch in my head to make sure I’m all about wrestling. I don’t think about classwork, I don’t think about homework. I’m all wrestling for the next 2.5 hours.

Then I get into my car and on the ride back to my house, I make a mental switch to thinking about food, getting nourishment. I need to relax a little bit to make sure I’m operating efficiently.

I get my food and then I make that switch again. I’m back to academics. I’m all academics from now on. There’s no wrestling, there’s no distraction, I need to get my homework done. I meet up with people for study groups.

Partying? Ask anybody on the team — Coon doesn’t party. [Laugh.] Coon is in bed by 10 p.m.

“YOU HAVE TO MENTALLY TRAIN TO PUSH YOURSELF THROUGH PAIN. Once you’ve pushed through pain, you can mentally elevate yourself to that pain. And once you get used to that level, you push yourself past it. You keep working until your pain threshold is through the roof and you keep trying to push it up because everyone else is doing exactly the same thing.

I kind of put myself through a routine. Three hours before the match starts, I’m in a wrestling room, I’m going through a hard workout, I’m trying to physically exhaust myself. I’m pushing myself so hard so that when I push myself in a match, it’s not so uncomfortable because I already experienced that. It’s like I already wrestled a match before I even start the actual bout.

The hardest part of wrestling is just wrestling. It wears on your body. You need to have the mental capacity to put yourself through that. The workouts just grind away your body. You wake up in the morning and you think, wow, my body hurts so much. I need a day off. And yet, you still get off the bed and you go to the practice and you put yourself through that insane workout again and again.

It’s really mind and body. You need to have the mental capacity to keep going even when you feel you can’t keep going physically any more. That’s what makes this sport so tough, you have the mental grind and the body grind.

“The desire to be the best — it’s how I was raised. My parents always told me, whatever you do, put everything into it. You have to pour your heart and soul into wrestling if you want to win. The same goes for academics. You need to continue to elevate yourself as an engineering student.

“THE OLYMPICS IS A DREAM. A GOAL. I WANT TO BE ABLE TO SAY, ‘I’M THE BEST ATHLETE IN THE WORLD.’ Plus, I’d like to compete for my country.

It all started for me when I watched Rulon Gardner beat Alexander Karelin in the 2000 Olympics. Rulon was a farm boy, just like me — a heavyweight wrestler. Growing up, I was a big, fat kid, just like Rulon. Karelin was this Greek god of wrestling. He was unbeatable. And yet Rulon beat him. He won gold for the United States. I thought, ‘That’s what I want to be. I want to be an Olympic gold medalist.’

In April 2016, Adam Coon arrived in Iowa City for the 2016 Olympic Wrestling Trial to compete in the Greco-Roman style, including against longtime U.S. champion Robbie Smith. He had been training for this day for four years. He describes what happened.

“WE FLEW IN TWO DAYS BEFORE THE COMPETITION. That morning I was supposed to take an exam for one of my aerospace classes. I took it earlier in the morning in order to make the plane. On the day of the competition, I took my typical very hard warm-up. I made sure I was ready to go. And then I had to sit down and wait.

Right afterwards I was crashed.

But you’ve got to quickly shut that off and realize that you gave it all you had and that you will be better for it. I had to quickly turn the switch to not to get too down on myself and to realize that I’m young. I still have some years ahead of me. I told myself, ‘Adam, you gave it all you had, but it wasn’t quite enough, you still have more to go.’ I told myself, ‘Go back to work.’ And that kind of helped me shut it down.