Anyone who has attended the Wyoming State Wrestling Championships in the last 20-plus years has likely passed the familiar booth run by Spencer Condie.
The Wheatland man has spent more than two decades compiling every state placer since the tournament began in the 1940s. He shares the data at the event, and said it’s the almost daily interactions he has with curious people at his booth that keep him going, including one man who asked Condie to search for his father’s name and was surprised to discover it on the list.
“He said, ‘My dad never told me that he even placed, but you've got his name here,’” Condie said. “His dad passed away without his son knowing he placed. It brought a tear to his eye. It's those connections that have been my drive thus far, because I like to think we're a tight-knit community in the wrestling world.”
Now after years of work, the information will be available through Champ Stats, an app available for both Apple and Android.
“He has brought a wrestling community together and has created a platform that creates motivation for future generations of athletes who want to see their name displayed for all to see forever,” Sheridan High School wrestling coach Tyson Shatto said. “The amount of time and effort it has taken Spencer to not only track down this information but to find fun, playful ways to use it is out of this world.”
Interesting Hobby
Condie grew up in a wrestling family in Evanston and placed once at the state tournament as a freshman in the 1980s.
“I grew into some of the more competitive weight classes, but that was my one time flash in the pan,” he said.
He began documenting state placers while living in Utah in the mid-1990s as a way to keep connected with Wyoming wrestling. He inputted results from each year into an Excel spreadsheet and color coded them by school.
“Before I knew it, it was this big spreadsheet that had a lot of holes in it, but it was starting to take form and take shape,” he said. “Then I thought, ‘I wonder what this would look like if it was completely filled in.’”
It became a goal for Condie to find the results from the early days of the state wrestling tournament, which began in 1947. He caught a break while living in Powell in the late 1990s. His dad told him that Cody was the team champion the first six years of the tournament so Condie asked to see Cody High School yearbooks and archives of old newspapers to fill in some of the gaps.
“That became the beginning of this journey,” he said. “If I knew I was traveling through a town that had a fairly decent wrestling history, I'd stop by the local library and see what I could find.”
He later moved to Wheatland, where he was an assistant wrestling coach under Shatto.
“In those years Spencer was working on how he could accumulate information that would tell a story of what had transpired in the state of Wyoming over its wrestling past,” Shatto said. “This information has been gathered to not only show how well someone did at a sport, but it is used to bring families and the state vital, fun information. As a coach, it helps build your legacy so when you see a name, you see not only that name but a storyline.”
Eventually Condie began taking the information to the state wrestling tournament, and it was there that someone connected him with former Natrona County High School wrestling coach Jerry Quinlan (now deceased). During his tenure, the hall-of-fame coach’s teams won five regional championships; two state runner-up titles and four state championships. He also coached 22 individual state champions and holds the state record for consecutive undefeated duals in the years 1965, 1968 and 1969 (35).
“The current Casper coach connected me with him and knew he would have some historical background,” Condie said. “Sure enough, he happened to have some of the programs from the early years that listed every name. I got most of my missing stuff from those programs.”
He also used photographs of the top finishers from the 1940s and ’50s to determine names. As the years became more recent, he was able to find information online or in newspapers. It has taken multiple hours over almost 30 years, but the Wyoming list is complete to this point.
“I need to thank my wife for her generous patience with me in my hobby,” he said.
Creating An App
Even though he’s been going to state wrestling for more than 20 years, Condie often has people stop who’ve never heard of him.
“So I tell them what the booth is all about and how to navigate the information, and they seem genuinely excited to find out,” he said. “Seeing the looks in the kids’ eyes, or their mom's eyes, or dad’s or sister’s and knowing that there's a level of recognition that their family is getting for their participation in the sport is always gratifying for me.”
It was 13 years ago at the tournament that someone mentioned putting the information into an app. Without a background in coding though, it took much longer than expected for Condie to make it a reality.
He began working with someone on the project about 12 years ago but they were unable to complete it and it sat for about seven years before he found someone new to help. The connection unsurprisingly came through the wrestling community.
“I was just looking for someone to help me, and it came in the form of a Montana family that had had two state champions in their family,” he said. “Their older brother is now working for a computer outfit in Washington State. It would have been way more difficult without that help. So I have to give props to Mr. Michael Wakkinen for helping me get this far.”
People can search for information through a variety of ways, including by athlete name or school. The app includes information on 7,636 athletes, 2,582 championships, 13,614 placers and 73 teams.
“The most interesting information to me is how a single name can stretch across so many other categories that Spencer has created for this app …” Shatto said. “It’s a way to keep memories and names for those who put so much into this demanding sport. To have an app that allows your accomplishments to live on and be available to those as passionate as you is something you can only smile at.”
Shatto was a four-time state placer, three-time finalist, two-time state champion and two-time high school wrestling All-American for Douglas High School. He then competed for the University of Wyoming wrestling team.
After coaching in Wheatland from 2006-11, Shatto has spent the last 14 years as the head coach at Sheridan. He said he’s used the information to reminisce with wrestling buddies about past glory days and to help motivate wrestlers who might have a family member listed in the app.
“I have used it to recruit students who never knew their family was so good at the sport,” he added. “Wrestling will never stop and as technology advances it is important to have these apps that bring generations together both old and new. Spencer Condie is who we can thank for that. He was a man on a mission and that mission was driven with passion and pride.”
Spencer Condie of Wheatland stands next to a large printout he created for the Montana State Wrestling Championships displaying every place-winner from every year of the tournament. He began his project with Wyoming wrestling and has been asked by several states to do it there as well. (Montana Sports via YouTube) 
Spencer Condie loves everything about wrestling, including coaching and working matches as an official. 
Spencer Condie of Wheatland stands next to a large printout he created for the Montana State Wrestling Championships displaying every place-winner from every year of the tournament. He began his project with Wyoming wrestling and has been asked by several states to do it there as well. (Courtesy Photo) 
A Wyoming man has created an app that chronicles all the stats and history of the state's wrestling seasons going back to the 1940s. (Courtesy Wyoming High School Activities Association)
Wrestling Genealogy
One popular feature in the app is the family section. There are 484 listed at this point. To qualify, a family must have two or more athletes that have placed at state a combined minimum of five times.
“I think it's just the tight-knit nature of the wrestling community,” Condie said. “They like knowing what their families have done, what their brothers have done.”
With the addition of girls wrestling, he’s now going to have to do more research to connect relatives.
“And it's only going to be a matter of time now before these state champion girls are going to have daughters or sons with a different last name, which is going to present a challenge,” he added.
The top family listed in the app is the Teicherts out of Cokeville, with 21 athletes, 26 champions and 55 placers. Family members have been active in 31 different years, starting in 1969 through today.
“I think it is pretty awesome to see how so many members of my family have contributed,” said Brock Teichert, who wrestled from 2011-14. “A lot of uncles and even my dad made the list. There are a handful of the next generation starting into high school. I’m sure they’re eager to prove themselves and add to the statistics.”
Teichert had heard about the project while winning three state titles in high school, but it was after he graduated and worked as a wrestling referee with Condie that he learned how extensive the research was.
“The amount of information he has gathered is incredible,” Teichert said. “He has a real passion for it. Multiple times he has reached out about different family members and their relation to each other, or to clarify information.”
There’s also a section that breaks down four-, three-, two- or one-time champions, as well as four-time finalists and four-time place winners.
“I like that I can search in the app a name and quickly see any connections,” Teichert said. “During the season this will be an awesome app for fans to use at tournaments to see how wrestlers have done in the past.”
Originally, Condie hoped to release a free app, but ran into trouble with ads displayed on it, so he will soon be releasing Champ Stats for purchase. He said feedback so far has been positive, and while he expects some negative responses at some point, he hopes the majority of users are happy with the effort.
Branching Out
While wrapping up Wyoming, word quickly spread about his hobby and he’s been contacted by multiple other states to compile their wrestling information into an app as well including Montana, Idaho and Colorado.
“If your state has Interstate 80 go through it, then I've probably done that state, with the exception of Nevada and Indiana,” he said. “There’s also one for college, and the Olympics and senior-level world championship. So there's a total of 18 wrestling apps.”
While many states he’s researched have an online presence, he’s had to rely heavily on newspapers.com to find information. He’s still missing placers from various years in states such as Michigan, but he’s releasing the apps with what he currently has and hopes he’ll be able to fill in the gaps.
“As incomplete as they are, they're still more than 90% complete,” Condie said. “Hopefully I can run into someone who says, ‘Well, I think that was my brother. He was third in 1958 at heavyweight.’ There's a way on the app you can send me a little note to let me know.”
He’s also branching out to other sports as well and will soon be releasing state information for both Wyoming swimming and track and field, which should be available this spring.
