Four years before he flew the Artemis II around the Moon, Victor Glover sat down for lunch inside Cal Poly President Jeffrey Armstrong’s office.
It was April 2022, almost a year since Glover returned to Earth from the International Space Station orbiting Earth.
The NASA astronaut was meeting with Jon Sioredas, the head coach of Cal Poly Wrestling, and Adam Kemp — a recruit Sioredas was trying to bring to the program.
Glover is a 1999 general engineering graduate who wrestled and played football for Cal Poly. When Sioredas asked if he could meet Kemp, he happily obliged.
The four sat down, and Glover pulled out a sealed bag which he had aboard the ISS with him. Inside was a large, green flag with a gold border and white letters that read “CAL POLY” across the front.
When Glover opened the seal, he said, “That’s what space smells like.”
Sioredas, who mentioned the bag may have been opened a few times, said the actual smell was not potent or distinct.
“Maybe someone that’s been in space can smell it, but for someone that hasn’t, it was hard for me to really tell,” Sioredas said.
Glover went on to become the pilot of the Artemis II mission, a 10-day expedition that flew around the far side of the moon last month. The four-astronaut crew flew 252,756 miles, marking the farthest distance humans have traveled from Earth.
The mission was NASA’s first crewed flight to the vicinity of the Moon since 1972, and Glover and the rest of the crew safely splashed down off the San Diego coast April 10.
Since that first conversation between Kemp and Glover — which inspired Kemp to become a Mustang — the two have talked multiple times. One of those included Kemp’s graduation in 2023.
“I was thinking to myself, ‘Having wrestling alumni that is an astronaut, what more could you ask for?’” Kemp said. “It’s just crazy.”
Before Kemp captured a 174-pound title at the Pac-12 Championships in 2023, Glover texted to wish him luck, telling him: “Rumble, young man, rumble.”
But, before Glover was floating in zero gravity and eyeing the details of the Moon, he was inside the Cal Poly Wrestling room, trying to stay on his feet as he dripped beads of sweat onto the foam mats beneath him. At the time, he was unaware of how much being an athlete would shape his career, and ultimately help him pilot the first mission around the Moon.
How sport shaped Glover’s life
Before he arrived on the Central Coast, Glover competed in wrestling, polevaulting and played both running back and quarterback for the Ontario High School football team in California.
In 1994, his senior year, he won sixth place in the California Wrestling State Championships at 160 pounds, and would later win Ontario High School Athlete of the Year.
For the Mustangs, Glover played defensive back for the football team and wore No. 23 under Head Coach Andre Patterson, who was Cal Poly’s coach from 1994–96.
On the wrestling mats, Glover was trained by Lennis Cowell, who led the program from 1985–2003. Cowell, a legendary wrestler himself, was inducted into the Cal Poly Athletics Hall of Fame and the National Wrestling Hall of Fame.
When Kemp would talk with Glover, Kemp felt a deep bond because of the “chosen suffering” they endured in wrestling.
“Before wrestling, I thought I knew where my ceiling was,” Kemp said. “After a coach forces you past your ceiling, the old version of you kind of dies. In that way, wrestling prepares you for life because it pushes your ceiling further than anything really could.”
“The hardest thing I ever chose to do in my life was walking in space,” Glover said to Armstrong on a call while aboard the ISS. “The second hardest thing I ever chose to do in my life was wrestling practice with Coach Lennis Cowell.”
Kemp, who now runs his own business, said wrestling prepared him for a lot of challenges he’s faced. He didn’t want to speak for Glover, but said he thought Glover would feel the same.
“I’m guessing he would owe wrestling a lot because it’s a good teacher of life,” Kemp said. “It’s investing in yourself, like a stock.”
One current wrestler, redshirt senior Zeth Romney, who attended Glover’s keynote speech at Cal Poly Wrestling’s 75th anniversary celebration in 2023, wasn’t surprised by the heights Glover reached.
Romney, a 2025 NCAA All-American, described on The Gallop, a KCPR podcast, that a wrestling match can “sometimes feel like life or death.”
“When he was put in the position of who was going to space or who was going to get the job, I feel like that’s where work ethic comes into play,” Romney said. “The mindset of being comfortable competing with others, that’s where wrestlers thrive.”
How his heroics impact Cal Poly
Glover’s pilot career began shortly after Cal Poly, with Naval Aviator training in Pensacola, Fla., in 2001. Over the next 12 years, he accumulated 3,500 hours of flight time in over 40 different aircrafts for both the United States Navy and Air Force.
In 2013, NASA selected Glover as one of eight members of the 21st astronaut class.
About seven years later, Glover embarked on his first space mission as the pilot of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft, and he spent six months aboard the ISS, beginning Nov. 16, 2020. Glover went on four different spacewalks on the ISS — and he referred to them during his speech at the wrestling anniversary dinner.
“He had a video of his spacewalk and how it related to wrestling,” Sioredas said. “He absolutely crushed it. Our guys love him.”
The team quickly became a huge fan of Glover, with Sioredas noting his “awesome” personality as one reason. But beyond the team’s appreciation for him, Sioredas believes his success will bring a lot of attention to Cal Poly Wrestling.
“I think it brings a lot of eyeballs to our program and to our institution,” Sioredas said after the Artemis II landed. “I can’t even tell you how many text messages I’ve gotten over the past week or so, with those guys orbiting the moon and coming back in.”
No matter the time, place or whoever he’s speaking to — whether it’s millions of people watching a NASA broadcast, a room full of Cal Poly engineers or catching up with Adam Kemp — Glover notably inspires each to believe in themselves.
“He made me feel like I was on his level, you know?” Kemp said when asked about their first interaction. “He’s like this huge, heroic figure. But when you could touch a legend and touch a hero, it makes you feel like you could be one too.”
For as much as Glover has not been on Earth — in total, 178 days — Kemp praises him as “one of the most down-to-earth” people he’s ever met.
This story originally appeared in the May printed edition of Mustang News. Check out more stories from the issue here.