The matmen, all members of the USA Cobra Montana Wrestling program, will spend the week working out with the U.S. National Team under the guidance of the U.S. Olympic Team coaching staff.
The four wrestlers are Jade Rauser of Townsend; Valyen Rauser of Townsend; Britton Thompson of Townsend and Toby Erickson of East Helena. The Townsend wrestlers are freshmen at Broadwater High School and Erickson is a Junior at Helena High.
“Training at the OTC is a major step for these young men,” commented Cobra head coach, Ken Thompson. “Ike Anderson of the Olympic Training Center has already reported back to me regarding their maturity and mat skills. He expressed his gratitude that our program had prepared them so well. The way they are conducting themselves should make us all proud.”
World Championship runner-up, Mike Zadick (originally of Great Falls) is one of the National Team training partners working with the developmental camp. Britton Thompson and the Rausers trained with Zadick’s brother, 2006 World Champ, Bill Zadick, at a training camp a few months ago as well.
“The guys have always respected the Zadicks as great examples of Montana wrestling,” says Thompson. “It’s really special for them to get to train with athletes they’ve looked up to since they were little kids. The Zadick boys trained for years at USA Cobra Oregon-which our club is a spinoff of. The Zadick’s father was their main coach and he just visited our club last week. It was a nice surprise to look over during a weeknight practice and see one of Montana’s most successful wrestling coaches watching our guys at work. He was a little bit surprised to see that we allowed parents into the practice room and even had a female wrestler in the room. Times have changed a bit.”
Texas
Kids have plenty of sporting options
Maybe you remember enjoying a giant wad of Big League Chew after the Little League baseball game or laughing with your teammates as you picked orange slices from the dugout floor following the softball game. Some kicked the game-winning goal for their soccer team. Others recall putting on those kid-sized football pads for the first time and how awkward and constricted the equipment felt.
Back then, it was all about fun for us. And that’s what sports still should be about for today’s generation of kids.
But in the 21st century kids have a lot more options when it comes to sports, and parents and their children should take the extra time to see if a different game might be a perfect fit.
One organization offering an alternative year-round activity is the Brazoswood Youth Wrestling Club. Founded in 1985, the club has trained wrestlers from age 5 to 18 for more than 20 years and has continued to grow.
“We have great kids, great parents and just enjoy introducing these kids to wrestling,” club leader Linda Martin said. “This is not what you see with TV wrestling. We teach good sportsmanship, how to win and lose, and how to be a good competitor. Wrestling teaches a lot of self motivation and it’s an individual sport so you win and lose on your own merit. We hold ourselves and kids to a strong moral and ethical code and create a good environment for us all.”
The club is part of USA Wrestling, a nationwide organization. The busy part of the wrestling season runs from October to January with tournaments in Houston, Dallas, Austin and all across the state. Club members mostly use the other months to improve their game.
Safety is a main concern for USA Wrestling. The organization not only groups wrestlers by age and weight class but also by experience — first-year wrestlers are put in the rookie division, second-year wrestlers grapple in the novice division and those with at least three years of experience wrestle in the open division.
The Brazoswood Youth Wrestling Club started in a household garage and today boasts anywhere from 30 to 45 members. The Club now has practices at Brazoswood High School twice weekly and has a third practice for advanced wrestlers.
Buccaneers’ wrestling coach Bill Baker works with the club and has seen the impact it has had on the high school wrestlers who gain experience at a young age.
“The club is a tremendous help when these boys and girls get to the high school level,” Baker said. “There really is nowhere else in the area to get any mat time, learn the techniques, get conditioned and face wrestlers in the area. To me, it’s invaluable.
“The main thing we try to do with the new kids is to get them out on the mat and have fun,” Baker said. “Maybe for the kid that’s not going to be the star football or baseball player, wrestling could be for them. It’s good for all ages and weight groups. And it’s more than just a sport — we take an overall fitness approach and teach how to keep in good shape. That’s a big part of it.”
In November the Brazoswood Youth Wrestling Club sent seven wrestlers to the Texas USA South/Central Regional Tournament in Austin, earning six trophies, and then shipped nine athletes to the Texas USA State Championships in Dallas on Feb. 15 where the club won two state titles.
Michael Martin, 14, competing in the 119-pound high school division, took first at the state meet with a 15-2 win. Ryan Snow, 13, won the state Division 4, 175-pound class with a third-round pin in the championship match and won the regional meet with a first-round pin.
Jake Chavez, 11, finished fourth in the Division 3, 65-pound class at the state meet and won the regional title with a first-round pin. Joshua Lantrip, 12, placed fifth at state in the Division 3, 135-pound class and was second at regionals.
Club members Madison Richard, Benjamin Richard, Daniel Martin, Skyler Contardi and Daxtyn Kier also competed at the state meet. At the regional meet, Contardi, 11, was second in the Division 3, 85-pound class, Madison Richard 12, finished second in the girls Division 3, 120-pound class and Benjamin Richard, 10, placed third in the Division 2 58-pound class.
Parents can register their child with the Brazoswood Youth Wrestling Club at anytime. There is a $125 annual fee from August to August that will be prorated. The club provides uniforms but athletes are responsible for shoes and head gear. Call Linda Martin at (979) 798-9851.
Jim Levesque’s youth sports column appears Wednesdays in The Facts. Contact him at (979) 237-0161 or at jim.levesque@
thefacts.com.
Michigan
Two Tawas youth wrestlers compete at AAU championship
3/26/08
DETROIT - Two Tawas youth wrestlers attended the AAU Folkstyle
World Championships at Cobo Hall in Detroit over the weekend.
Hunter Gasper received a second place medal in the midget age division.
Paige Gasper received a fifth place medal for the schoolboy age
division.
They will finish their seasons this weekend. Hunter Gasper will attend
the MYWAY (Michigan Youth Wrestling Association) Individual State
Championship finals in Lansing and Paige Gasper will attend the United
States Girls Wrestling Association National Championships in Livonia
California
Lodi native earns women's wrestling scholarship
News-Sentinel Staff Writer
It isn't easy being the only girl.
Lodi native Marissa Foreman discovered that firsthand when she
went out for the wrestling team as a freshman at Argonaut High School
in Jackson.
The coach, who'd never had a girl on his team before, would make
practices harder in hopes that she would quit. Teammates would tease
her and treat her as an outsider, thinking she'd eventually give up.
But she never did. Now her perseverance — and her wrestling
skills — have translated into a full-ride scholarship at
Missouri Valley College in Marshall, Mo., one of a handful of colleges
with a women's wrestling program. She was set to sign her letter of
intent to the school today.
"The (boys on my high school team) were really mean at first," said
Foreman, who moved from Lodi to Camanche after eighth grade. "It was
really discouraging. I'd go home crying and not wanting to do it. But I
loved the sport. Now I get more respect from the boys. I think it's
because I can beat everybody in my weight class and below. I never
missed a practice, and I worked as hard, if not harder, than half the
boys on the team."
All four years of high school, Foreman wrestled the boys, competing in
dual meets and tournaments. But she wrestled girls, too, finishing 12th
at nationals last year and sixth in the state.
Foreman says she is much closer with her high school coach now, as he's
grown to respect her toughness. Despite tearing tendons in her ankle in
January, she continued to show up at every practice, working her way
back as quickly as possible.
"The harder (our coach) made practices, the more guys left. But I never
left," said Foreman, who wrestles in the 118-pound division. "Over the
years, when I got hurt, he told me he wished more of the team had my
heart and aggressiveness." Foreman suffered a dislocated collarbone at
nationals two weeks ago, preventing her from competing at a national
event in Michigan this week. But the setback won't keep her off the mat
for long.
"An injury is not going to stop me," she said. "I'm way too driven to
give up."
She Plays Sports: Olivia Satti preps for national wrestling championship
 Slideshow for She Plays Sports: Olivia Satti preps for national ... |
Olivia Satti is 10 years old, but she’s already well
aware of what her last name means to wrestling in southeastern
Connecticut.
“My dad always says I have to live up to the family
name,” she said last week, beaming with more than an ounce of
pride in her relatives and her sport.
You see, the Sattis are among the first families of wrestling in the
area.
John Satti, Olivia’s father, was a state champion for St.
Bernard High School in 1974.
Her uncle, Michael Satti, a member of the New London Sports Hall of
Fame, won his own state championship in 1979 for the Saints despite the
fact Olivia’s other uncle, former New London Mayor William
Satti, an accomplished wrestler in his own right, once jested to this
reporter that “[he’s] not even the best wrestler in
the family.”
For now, that honor might fall to Olivia’s brother, Charles,
or C.J., Satti, who last month won the 140-pound state title for local
powerhouse Ledyard High School.
But don’t count out Olivia, who often could be found this
winter yelling out moves and strategy from the stands at her
brother’s matches.
“I was egging him on and supporting him,” she said.
With the high school wrestling season over, it’s now
Olivia’s time to get on the mat.
The only female member of the Waterford Youth Wrestling Club, this
weekend she will compete in the United States Girls Wrestling
Association National Championships in Livonia, Mich.
In order to prepare, the Waterford Youth wrestlers held a joint
practice with Ledyard Youth Wrestling in the “bomb
shelter” in the basement at Ledyard High School. (And it
really is a bomb shelter, built during the Cold War complete with an
Emergency Management Center.)
These days, though, it looks more bombed out than anything, with drab
lighting and several broken tiles on the ceiling. But from such homely
rooms, champions are made, as Ledyard has had a proud wrestling
tradition for nearly 50 years, and the kids seem to feed on the
atmosphere.
John Satti pointed out the roster of champions listed in the room, and
noted that the region is known for its wrestlers.
“The ECC is very strong,” he said. “The
[high school] conference did the best in the state last year.”
Olivia’s competitive streak came out during the practice, as
she trained her eyes on her opponents, including her close friend Emme
Cronin.
“I don’t like wrestling my friends,”
Olivia admitted.
Her father yelled out moves from the sideline: “the leg, the
leg!”
Last year, as a third-grader, Olivia placed fifth in the nation in the
60-pound division and hopes to improve upon it this time around.
“I feel good about it,” she said, with a fifth
state title won this year under her belt.
Olivia began wrestling with Waterford Youth Wrestling six years ago, as
a 4-year-old, and tasted success almost immediately.
In her first year, 2003, she won a coed state title at 37 pounds. As a
fifth-grader at St. Joseph’s School, she won another state
title in 2004, besting seven male wrestlers along the way.
Despite a trickle of all-girl competitions in the area, female
wrestlers are still something of an anomaly.
“It’s still a fairly new thing,” said
John Satti, who is also an assistant coach at Waterford Youth
Wrestling. “It’s a great sport for building
self-esteem. And the beauty of it is that you don’t have to
be tall or strong, you just have to have the ability to do your
best.”
Also, unlike some sports, wrestling is inexpensive, as a helmet, shoes,
and a singlet total less than $100.
Not surprisingly, Olivia’s role model is aspiring Olympic
wrestler Stefanie Shaw, who wrestled for Waterford High School.
And of course, she has to explain to friends that she’s not a
dancer, but a wrestler.
“‘A wrestler?’ they’ll
say,” Olivia said with a laugh. “But I think my
friends respect me. This is what I do, I play sports.”
Canada
The food, they said, was a little weird and real heavy on the meat. They expected more green and more mountains but instead got flat and white. And it was cold, even for kids from Alaska.
Still they said, almost in unison, "It was definitely worth it."
The four wrestlers, Tris and Robby Brymer, Brittney Wyatt and Zenon Martushev all came home with medals, or ulus, as they're called.
Team Alaska won the team wrestling title, Martushev took two bronze and the team gold and the Brymer brothers and Wyatt claimed three gold each.
But it was the experience, they said, of meeting new people of new cultures, that will stick with them.
Their coach for the trip, Steve Wolfe, said he couldn't be prouder of the kids who went.
"It's like the Olympics of the north," he said. "We were the only contingent from the U.S. It was a great experience and to have the national anthem play when they won gold was something they'll remember."
The Arctic Winter Games is a circumpolar sport competition for northern and arctic athletes that attracts participants from Russia, Scandanavia, Greenland, Nothern Canada and Alaska every two years.
The Games were held on the Kenai Peninsula in 2006 and they promote the sharing of cultures between northern neighbors.
The kids competed in both freestyle and Inuit wrestling a form that relies mostly on upper body strength and did well, Wolfe said.
Martushev, who goes to school at Voznesenka and speaks English and Russian, was also a pretty popular guy among the Russian contingent.
"Because he could speak Russian and could translate we got to meet all the Russian kids," Wyatt said. "But we didn't know what they were saying half the time."
Wyatt also got a kick out of competing against girl wrestlers instead of the boys like back home. Of the three other teams in competition, Team Alaska is the only one that allows boys and girls to compete against each other.
"They thought it was kind of weird that we wrestled the boys," Wyatt said.
Wolfe said the kids handled themselves well at the games and did everything he asked them to do.
"They were a great tribute to Alaska," he said.
Overall, Team Alaska dominated the final medal count with 202 total (74 gold, 55 silver and 73 bronze). Northwest Territories was second with 111.
For complete results visit www.awg.ca.
http://ubpost.mongolnews.mn/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1569&Itemid=46
Mongolia
| Wrestlers Bring Home Medals From Asian Championship, Olympic Games Are Next | 
|
|
| Written by G.Ganbayar | |
| Thursday, March 27, 2008. | |
| The Asian Senior
Wrestling Championship was held March 18-23 on Jeju Island, South
Korea. This important tournament gathered the best wrestlers from all
Asian nations to qualify for the Olympic Games in Beijing. Top
wrestlers from 15 countries were seen in action in the Korean ring. The
Mongolian wrestlers who competed at this tournament had hopes of
raising the number of wrestlers for Beijing. The wishes of the trainers
were also realized. Two more Mongolian wrestlers will now be going to
the Olympics in August.
A perfect example for that, was the gold medal bout in the men’s 84kg section. There Ch.Ganzorig made a fantastic start against Wang Ying of China in the first period, but then lost the point just seconds before the whistle, signalizing the end of the first period. In the second period, Ganzorig also dominated the bout by 5 points, but also lost 5 points by the end. According to the rules, the victory went to Wang Ying. He seemed very disappointed as well as the trainers. “Some other boxers also had chances to achieve better results”, said one wrestling specialist.
|