At the 2008 Summer Olympics, Cejudo opened up with a win over Radoslav Velikov, the 06' World Champion; after losing the first period 0–1, he bounced back with 3–2 and 4–3 periods. In the next round, he faced Besarion Gochashvili from Georgia; the same results as his opening bout popped up, after losing the first period 1–3, he came back with scores of 3–2 and 3–0 to defeat Gochashvili. He then wrestled Azerbaijan's Namig Sevdimov, whom he took out after once again, losing the first period (3–5) and winning the next two (3–2, 4–3). In the finale, he met Tomohiro Matsunaga, a Japanese athlete who was coming fresh off an Asian title; he won the first period after scoring the biggest move and won the second period after a comfortable 3–0 score. This made Cejudo the youngest American to win Olympic Gold in wrestling history at age 21 (record was later broken by Kyle Snyder, 20, in 2016). He then took a break from his freestyle wrestling career.