“No pictures were supposed to come out,” the 7’3 big man out of France told a crowd of basketball fanatics on Saturday, June 21, at the Javits Center in Manhattan.
Sorry, Wemby, they came out anyway. Nearly two weeks before his time at the Javits Center, San Antonio Spurs Center Victor Wembanyama was photographed playing basketball with monks at the iconic Shaolin Temple in China. Back in the U.S. days later, Victor Wembanyama appeared at Fanatics Fest alongside Tom Brady, Kai Centa, Paul Rivera, Maverick Carter, and LeBron James for a star-studded, live edition of The Shop. During his conversation with the cast of accomplished innovators, Wembanyama opened up about his time at the Shaolin Temple.
“Going there, my goal was to put my body through things it’s not used to doing. I wanted to widen my range of movements and improve my strength. This [experience] was probably as different from what I’m used to doing as possible. We did kung-fu every day,” Wembanyama said. “It was like a vegan temple, [a] monastery basically. The Shaolin Temple, you know about that, right?”
“Yeah, of course. Wu-Tang,” Rivera jokingly replied.
Not only did the Spurs phenom push himself physically, but he also adjusted his diet somewhat. In a follow-up question, superstar streamer and content creator Kai Cenat popped in to ask, “So, Wemby, let me ask you, ‘What did you eat for breakfast?'”
“You must’ve lost like…they couldn’t feed you over there,” Brady jumped in.
“The temple is vegan, so there’s no meat in there. Breakfast was zucchini and rice noodles, so I had to get out of the temple to make sure I didn’t lose weight and eat some real food,” Wembanyama elaborated.
From playing chess in Union Square to playing basketball at the Shaolin Temple, Victor Wembanyama has proven to be a man of many talents and interests. Where will he go next? That’s unclear, but with Wemby, fans can expect the unexpected in the best way possible.
Note: The quotes used in this story were transcribed by hand during a live edition of The Shop at Fanatics Fest in New York, New York on Saturday, June 21, 2025. Quotations are lightly edited for brevity and clarity.
