He tosses and turns the night before a wrestling meet because his body aches from dehydration. He practices technique with anyone he can find -- even a junior high wrestler, claims teammate Jeff Dernlan.

Ken Chertow might not have an overabundance of natural athletic ability, but he makes up for it with more than five hours of practice every day of the year.

"He's a compulsive workaholic," Coach Rich Lorenzo said. "He puts in more quality time than any wrestler I've ever been around. And he does it year round, not only during the collegiate season."

Dernlan worked out with Chertow the season before his freshman year at Penn State. "I wasn't in quite as good shape as Ken, but Ken believes he can get help from anybody, anywhere. But he beat the crap out of me."

One day Chertow had his little brother come to practice and videotape him beating the crap out of Dernlan. After dinner, the entire Chertow family gathered around the TV to watch the practice.

"He just wanted to watch his technique," Dernlan said. "He watches tapes anytime he gets a chance. He's the best person at evaluating it, which is good because I couldn't give him any hints, my ribs were hurting."

"It's an obsess . . . I don't want to say it's an obsession -- there're other things in my life," Chertow insists.

Even before Chertow got involved enough in wrestling to combine his nightly TV-time with 200 sit-ups, 200 push-ups and 200 squats, he excelled. As a high school sophomore, he learned a lesson with a disappointing second-place finish in the state finals.

"After that point I made wrestling a commitment rather than an activity," Chertow said. "I thought, 'Gee, I'm working so hard at this but I just lost to some kid.' There were a lot of kids wrestling competitively in elementary school, but I didn't. I said, 'I'd better catch up on this guy, this is ridiculous.'

"So I started wrestling year round, and specializing in wrestling -- 10 months a year."

When his sophomore season ended, Chertow hit the freestyle circuit. The exposed, judo-like style of freestyle wrestling suited him better than the controlled, collegiate style, and he rapidly rose in the national rankings.

"He's tenacious, aggressive," Lorenzo said. "He uses his conditioning to push people to the maximum -- he's a powerful, explosive little guy."

Freestyle wrestling is the wrestling of the Olympic Games. The Olympics had been a dream for Chertow since he watched a Rumanian gymnast named Nadia charm the world with perfect 10s at the 1976 Summer Games.

"I didn't really see any wrestling but I thought, 'Olympics, hmmmm.' I needed a long-time goal on my goal ladder. It was just a dream back then."

Watching the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, Chertow found he knew many of the wrestlers from wrestling camps and clinics. But he also found that most of them were three or four years out of college.

"I thought man, they did it, I can do it. I'll just keep working at it."

Chertow's dream became closer to reality at the 1986 World Espoir Tournament. After defeating fellow Lion Jim Martin for the national title, the pair competed against the world's top junior freestyle wrestlers.

Against a Russian in the championship finals, Chertow built a one-point lead halfway through the match. But the Russian threw him into the mat headfirst and when Chertow got up, blood gushed down his face. The American doctor tried to stop the match, saying that Chertow risked further injury by continuing.

As the three minutes of allotted bleeding time ticked away, Chertow's father, a doctor, made his way to the mat, examined his son and overruled the trainer.

"I was lucky my dad had the authority as physician to take the liability," Chertow said. "Afterwards I was conscious not to do anything overzealous, but in a close match I do what I have to do to score. The adrenalin from the injury just added to the excitement of the world championships and a Russian."

With a patch protecting his right eye, Chertow returned to the mat and battled the Russian to a tie. With 20 seconds remaining, he tackled the Russian for a takedown to win the world championship. Then he went to the hospital for eight stitches above his right eye.

"It was the first Russian I ever beat," he said with a fiendish grin, "and that's a big satisfaction to beat the Russians 'cause they're the best wrestling country."

Chertow continued to improve against his countrymen, as well. He continually lost to 1984 Olympian and three-time NCAA champion Barry Davis at 118, but the victory margin kept narrowing.

"He beat the crud out of me when I was a freshman, but I had a one-point match in '87," Chertow remembered. "But it was getting risky and I made the cut to 114. I felt like I had a better chance of making the team."

But the 114-pound class was still tough. Joe Gonzales, also a 1984 Olympian, was vying for his second straight team.

In the 1988 National Trials Chertow lost to Gonzales in overtime in the finals, 11-9. But the top six finishers in the National Trials advanced to the Final Olympic Trials, so Chertow and Penn State freestyle coach Hachiro Oishi reviewed films to prepare for the next match-up.

"My tactics work better when I can grab hold of the guy, so I controlled the tempo better in the final," Chertow said. "I didn't let him run around in a circle and fake me out, like I did the first time."

In a best-two-of-three match with Gonzales in the finals of the Final Trials, Chertow beat his rival soundly to capture the Olympic berth.

"I was like 'Yeah, I did it!' and then I was like 'Whew --what a relief.' And later I was thinking about it and thought, 'Man, that's great!' Exhilaration, relief, satisfaction -- those three words sum it up. I thought about it, I watched the film to see."

But Chertow's medal hopes ended abruptly, as his portion of the Olympic double-elimination tournament ended after only three bouts. Disillusioned, he wondered what to do in the four years before the 1992 Games.

"I don't just do this for fun," Chertow said. "It's not fun to kill myself, hurt my body. I'm always tired, I don't feel like doing my studies. It's not like when I was in seventh and eighth grade and I was out there to try to horse the other guy down.

"I wouldn't say it's a job or anything, but to get my kicks I gotta win. The idea isn't to win some crummy dual meet, the idea is to win the big ones."

Usually Chertow comes through in the clutch. With two Eastern Wrestling League titles under his belt, he is known as a top tournament wrestler. But the top collegiate prize, an NCAA title, has eluded him. Chertow finished with a 7-2 record, one loss in overtime, and the other by one point.

"I expect to win this year," he said. "I've expected to win the past two years, too, so that just makes this one extra important."

"He's impatient, he's a doer, he's a goer," Lorenzo said. "Sometimes he sacrifices good technique and position, and in nationals the last two years it's cost him."

"I'm a shaper, I'm in condition, and if I'm even with a dude going into the last period I'm going to win, so why be stupid?" Chertow said. "I'm weak on bottom and sometimes people take me down and get on top of me, and that's not too smart. I gotta be careful."