Completed Event: Men's Wrestling versus Harold Nichols Cyclone Open on January 18, 2026 , , One Champ
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Men's Wrestling
Harold Nichols Cyclone Open
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Iowa State University Athletics
Five Minutes, No Pulse
08.12.2008 | Men's Wrestling
AMES, Iowa ? Former ISU NCAA wrestling champion Kelly Ward told himself “Hold your breath.” Even paralyzed and lying face down in three feet of Atlantic Ocean water off the Ocean City, Md., beach, he had the presence of mind to instinctively try to keep himself alive. “Wait for the lifeguard,” he told himself.
Ward's last memory before his July 19 body-surfing accident was being in the water with Al Freeman. Ward, a three-time All-American at Iowa State (1977-79) had gone on to coach Freeman at Nebraska where Ward had been an assistant coach before a successful starting a long and successful career in the U.S. Secret Service.
Ward was comfortable in the water. He had received water rescue training from the Coast Guard while in the Secret Service, from which the 51-year-old Cyclone retired last year. Ward was demonstrating his body surfing technique to Freeman.
“I caught a big wave and, bang, I hit the bottom of the ocean,” Ward said. “I was face down like a jellyfish and could see the bottom in three feet of water. I knew I was paralyzed. I couldn't stand up. I held my breath because I knew the lifeguard was right in front of me. Then I went black.”
The experienced lifeguards pulled him from the water and worked on reviving Ward.
“For close to five minutes I had no pulse,” Ward said. “There was no sound or anything.”
All his life, Ward has been a self starter and achiever. The son of former Iowa State assistant football coach Bob Ward, he won three Maryland prep wrestling titles. Then it was on to ISU, where he was a three-time All-American who won the NCAA 1979 158-pound title and finished his career with a 124-10-2 record. He was an assistant coach at Nebraska before his U.S. Secret Service career. This guy made his own luck. But even a career of meticulously protecting others couldn't fully prepare Ward for the greatest challenge of his own life.
The first thing Ward saw next was a sliver of light.
“There was no sound, no nothing, just light,” Ward said. “Then everything went full Technicolor like a Disney movie and I could see everything, including the chaos and all the people gathered around me.”
Ward realized he was paralyzed.
“I started screaming for my wife (Tammy) who I then saw because she had come down from the condo. It then occurred to me that I had to concentrate on the lifeguard to stay alive.”
The EMTs put him on a body board. He was loaded on a helicopter for a 30-minute ride to the University of Maryland's Medical Shock Trauma Center. It was then that Ward felt pain in his right heel, which was on the edge of the body board. He welcomed this unpleasant sensation.
“It was painful, which I told myself was actually good,” Ward said. “I took my left foot to knock my right heel off the board. I thought ?Well, look at that, I can move my left foot.'”
Knowing about spinal injury from his secret service training, Ward tried to remain as still as possible.
“The Ocean City life guards were well trained,” Ward said. “They brought me back and kept me stable. The Ocean City EMTS also put a neck brace on me because it was a neck injury. They then loaded me on an ATV, which took me across the beach. Local firemen then took the body board over a giant sand dune to an ambulance.”
Because of the number of serious spinal injuries that can occur on a crowded beach, Maryland State Police helicopters are often standing by in close proximity. Ward was then airlifted by helicopter to Maryland Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore, Md. Thanks to the professional expertise of each rescue worker who attended to Ward, it took only 43 minutes to get the former Cyclone out of the water and to Maryland Shock Trauma.
“Maryland Shock Trauma is the busiest shock trauma hospital in the world,” Ward said. “They have great experience in these types of injuries.”
On July 20, surgeons removed a disc between his vertebrae and fused bone to his neck for stability. After four days, he was transferred to Kernan Hospital in the Baltimore metro.
“Ultimately, I spent about 20 days in the hospital,” Ward said. “The rehab guys have never had a guy like me. When I am given the exercises, I work to do them. When it starts to hurt I work through the pain, which I am used to. The therapists see me laboring and ask if I am all right. I tell them I will push through the pain.”
His comeback continues with rehabilitation. The sport of wrestling, which demands so much from its champions, now gives Ward the will to push through rehabilitation.
“I'm feeling great when you remember that for 20 minutes I was a quadriplegic,” Ward said. “Things are coming back. My right arm is coming along slowly. My left arm is about 70 percent but I can pick up a glass of orange juice. I' m walking, although I look like an ultimate fighter who got hit by a roundhouse. Overall, I'm feeling good.”
Fans can mail cards to Kelly Ward at 2001 Courtland Rd., Davidsonville, Md. 21035. Emails can be sent to kward1158@aol.com.
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