When Victor Wembanyama’s agent, Bouna Ndiaye, needed to create a training program to satisfy his intellectual curiosity and relentless drive, he called Rob Pelinka, the Los Angeles Lakers lead executive who spent years as Kobe Bryant’s agent.
Ndiaye saw in Wembanyama the same consuming drive and approach to his craft as Bryant, and believed a conventional training path would fall short of what his client required.
“The way they think is different,” Ndiaye told ESPN. “The way they play, the way they stretch themselves. Just their curiosity. How they study and watch things. They’re both very creative on how to solve a problem.”
Pelinka recounted how Bryant had spent summers studying great white sharks to sharpen his defensive instincts and arranged a private tour of the Sistine Chapel to absorb lessons about creating something extraordinary under impossible conditions.
The problem Ndiaye needed to solve for Wembanyama was specific. The 7-foot-4 center needed to become more physical inside without adding bulk that would compromise his unique athleticism and flexibility. He needed to impose his will closer to the basket against opponents 30 to 50 pounds heavier, while preserving the fluidity that makes him impossible to replicate.
The answer was the Shaolin Temple in China’s Henan province, where Wembanyama spent nearly two weeks last summer training under 34th-generation warrior monk Master Yan’an. The customized kung fu program focused on controlling his center of gravity, generating force from multiple positions, and resisting contact, directly mirroring the double-teams and physical punishment he faces nightly in the NBA.
The mental component proved equally demanding. Wembanyama meditated for up to 90 minutes at a stretch alongside 100 monks, rose at 4:30 each morning to train in forests and on uneven hillside tracks, and completed a nighttime climb up a 1,500-step mountain path in total darkness as an exercise in awareness and courage.
Wembanyama played a career-high 49 minutes in Game 1 of the Western Conference finals against Oklahoma City, posting 41 points and 24 rebounds while displaying the kind of balance and body control under contact that Master Yan’an had specifically trained him to develop. Master Yan’an watched Game 1 and noted Wembanyama’s body control as he was pushed by defenders.
“Power comes from inside,” Master Yan’an said. “I would look at him and say: You are not a cat; you are a tiger. For power to come out, you have to change the inside first.”
“His conditioning is second to none,” Ndiaye said. “We’re getting into that period of the year where you’re playing every other day, and Victor is still looking so good physically, and I think this is the result of all this work.”