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All fall down

By Mark Foyer--Half Moon Bay Review 1/14/04

Sara Fulp-Allen of Half Moon Bay was named Outstanding Wrestler at the Lady Oaks Wrestling Open Tournament on Saturday.

She overwhelmed every wrestler in her weight class to win the 48-kilo (105-pound) title.

Fulp-Allen began the tournament by beating Amantha Hordagoda by technical fall.

In the semifinals, she knocked off Laura Felix of Cal-State Bakersfield 6-3. Felix was a 2001 national high school champion.

Then in the title match, she beat Julie Gonzalez of the Dave Schultz Wrestling Club 9-1.

"It was a short and quick tournament," Fulp-Allen said. "It lasted about three hours. But it was a good tournament. Each match was very intense."

The open tournament was held at Menlo College in Atherton - one of the three California schools with a women's wrestling program. It drew some of the top women wrestlers from around the country - but not quite as many as local organizers hoped.

"There was a lot of quality in the tournament," Fulp-Allen said. "We were expecting more people," she added, "but one of the teams got snowed in."

Fulp-Allen's father, Lee Allen, is a coach at Menlo College in Atherton, and he helped organize the event. The tournament was filled with an array of high school champions and placers.

"I was surprised to be named the Most Outstanding Wrestler," Fulp-Allen said. "You usually find a lot of good wrestlers at an open tournament."

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WRESTLING: Her goals include state berth and nuclear career

PUBLISHED: January 18, 2004

Grosse Ile's Kelsey Hanson's goal for this winter is simple, really. It's a goal shared with many other elite wrestlers: Qualify for the individual state meet.

If what she's done so far is any indication, that goal might be within her reach.

Yes, "her" reach.

Hanson, a 103-pounder, is in her first season on Grosse Ile after moving in August from Golden, Colo. Heading into three days worth of meets this weekend, she was 9-4 with five pins.

She was first at Lincoln Park's team tournament and second at Highland Park's individual tournament, and all of her losses this season have been close.

To get to the Division 3 portion of the state meet, she's got to place in the top four in her weight class at a district, then place in the top four at a regional.

"Regionals are a great possibility," Grosse Ile Coach Rob Beaudrie said. "I see her getting out of districts. Regionals are going to be tough for her.

"That's her goal, to get to the state meet, and I hope she accomplishes it, not only for her but for the other girls who wrestle."

Competing on an elite level is nothing new for Hanson. While living in Colorado, Hanson qualified for the United States Girls' Wrestling Association national meet in March in Lake Orion, where she placed 11th out of 20 girls in the 105-pound weight class. As of Jan. 12, she was ranked ninth nationally by the USGWA at 105.

"She's come a long way from when I first met her," Beaudrie said. "She had a different technique. She knows the moves. At the beginning of the year, she was thinking more. Now she's using the technique and not thinking as much.

"We found out at the practices that she's the real deal."

Hanson recently won the team's Hustler of the Week award, based on practice and meet performances.

Despite arriving on Grosse Ile in August, she's a team co-captain.

"Between her and Chris (Toulouse), you can't ask for two better captains," Beaudrie said. "She is definitely a vocal leader. I don't look at her as a girl. She's a wrestler.

"The hardest thing for her is how guys are going to respond to her."

Hanson, who started wrestling three years ago, said she got some static from people, especially when she began competing in Colorado, but things have been quiet lately.

"I've had lectures and my parents have had lectures," Hanson said. "It's a sport. When you're out there, none of those things cross your mind."

Hanson wrestled for two years at Golden High School, west of Denver. She said she was "absolutely awful" in her sophomore season. Last year, she had a winning record on the junior varsity and got into some varsity matches. She bumped up to 112 and pinned another girl.

The move to Grosse Ile, which happened during the blackout, is yet another stop for Hanson. She was born in Michigan and lived in Grand Haven and Chelsea, then moved with her family to Golden when she was a ninth-grader because her father was working as a government subcontractor on the Rocky Flats Closure Project, which is a cleanup of a former nuclear weapons facility.

His role ended, so he landed a job in Luna Pier at Consumers Energy's J.R. Whiting Plant, which converts coal into electricity.

Even though she had to move again, Hanson kept on wrestling.

"It's really strange," she said. "Things started to click this summer."

And, the move was made easier by being immediately accepted by her new schoolmates.

"I was amazed," Hanson said. "Everybody knows everybody, and they know everything about you.

"People ask me about (wrestling). It's pretty neat. Some of them seem a little intimidated."

But, most don't.

Her brother, Alex, isn't intimidated. Their family owns a mat and the siblings used to wrestle each other at home in Golden, but it's still in storage after the move. Hanson admitted that it's not as easy to beat her 10th-grade brother, who is in his third year of wrestling and in the 145-pound weight class.

"He got a lot bigger over the summer," Hanson said. "It's a little bit more of a challenge."

She's proud of her kid brother. At a recent dual meet at Riverview, she wrestled before he did. During his match, she provided plenty of verbal support.

At meets, there have been a few adjustments for Hanson. She weighs in separately from the boys, and opposing schools have been providing separate changing facilities for her.

Hanson said she's enjoying her senior wrestling season too much for it to end yet. When it does, though, she's thinking about trying out for Grosse Ile's crew team this spring, which would take advantage of her tremendous upper-body strength.

It also would help keep her in shape if she attends the U.S. Naval Academy, where she wants to study nuclear propulsion.

If that doesn't work out, Hanson -- a straight-A student who is taking advanced-placement classes -- has applied to the University of Michigan, University of Wisconsin and Purdue University.

She really wants to go to the academy, though.

"I like the atmosphere and the structure, and I've always had a great deal of respect of people who serve in the armed forces," she said.

She said officials at the academy have said they might start a freestyle wrestling program. She might be able to practice with Navy's team, but wouldn't be able to compete. The lightest college wrestling weight class is 125.

But, Hanson wants to focus on what's going on now -- the wrestling season.

"I love to wrestle and I hate to think about the season being over," she said. "(Wrestling) is such a personal challenge. A loss can't get much more personal. When you win, it's an amazing feeling.

"There's no doubt about it -- you win or lose."

Hanson has been enjoying winning a lot more than losing this season. She's hoping to enjoy that winning feeling all the way to states.

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Toccara too much in 2 wins

01/17/04Pat Galbincea
Plain Dealer Reporter

It was a happy homecoming for Cleveland native Toccara Montgomery as she wrestled for Cum berland Col lege in the 2004 Cliff Keen Na tional Duals last night at Cleveland State.

Montgom ery, an East Tech graduate, is the nation's top-ranked 158-pound women's wrestler, and a two-time world silver medalist hoping to represent the U.S. in the 2004 Olympics. Last night, wrestling two opponents from Missouri Valley College, she pinned Stephanie Lee in 4:52 and won a lopsided 10-0 decision over Tzalicia McCoy.

Cumberland, coached by Cleveland Heights native Kip Flanik, won both duals, beating Missouri Valley's A team, 20-8, and the B team, 30-0.

Montgomery said she was disappointed she lost to Japan's Kyoko Hagamuchi in the world gold medal round, but avenged that loss in the recent World Cup.

Flanik said Montgomery's strength is a major asset, one which could propel her to an Olympic gold medal.

"Toccara is more comfortable wrestling at 147 pounds, but there will be only four women's weight classes in the Olympics," Flanik said. "But she's as strong at 158 pounds as anybody in the world, most guys included."

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Wrestling with the future

UNIVERSITY I They train hard, compete like champions, and put up with
some ridiculous questions

Mike Beamish
Vancouver Sun 1/17, 2004

"Young girls should go in for all styles of dancing and wrestling, and
when they marry they should obtain military training and learn how to use
weapons. They should know all these skills in order to be able to face
the enemy and defend their children and their city." --Plato.

Considering he died 2,351 years ago, Plato, the ancient Greek
philosopher and women's wrestling advocate, was a man ahead of his time.

Only three years ago, the International Olympic Committee decreed that
women's wrestling would be part of the 2004 Summer Games program in
Athens, making it an Olympic medal sport for the first time. But for some
traditionalists, the idea that women should be sporting black eyes,
cauliflower ears and kicking someone's feet out -- instead of kicking
feet up and twirling pom-poms -- is a little hard to take.

In the U.S., where universities, colleges and high schools are still
grappling with gender equity issues under Title IX, the federal
legislation whose intent was to increase women's opportunities in sport, hundreds
of lower-profile men's sports have felt the squeeze.

Three former varsity wrestlers at the University of California-Davis,
women who said they had been offered scholarships to wrestle, are suing the
university after it eliminated their sport. The Wrestling Coaches
Association, meanwhile, is appealing the dismissal of its lawsuit which
maintained that Title IX is the cause of cuts to non-revenue producing
men's sports.

While the number of women playing NCAA sports has soared from 30,000 to
150,000 today, hundreds of male teams have been cut, including more
than 170 wrestling programs. It has created an environment in which big boys do
cry, with men's Olympic sports blaming the law for their problems.

"There are only three or four states that have a state championship for
high school girls' wrestling," says Mike Jones, the long-time coach at Simon
Fraser University. "The rest of them allow girls to be on the boys'
team. So there isn't a tremendous amount of them. They [U.S.] still do a very
good job of developing their elite athletes. They are still second or third
best in the world. But they just don't have the numbers yet."

Jones, however, knows it's only a matter of time before the U.S. high
school and collegiate wrestling scene gets sorted out and the sleeping
giantess is awoken, its potential released.

For now, SFU maintains its ranking as the top collegiate female
wrestling program in North America, but for how long?

"Almost every school in Canada that runs a men's program also has a
women's program," Jones says. "In the United States that hasn't happened.
There's still a male-dominated administration in most [athletic] departments.
There are only about half a dozen [women's wrestling] programs that are
running right now. When it starts to change, look out."

Since Jones, a collegiate wrestler at Oregon State, arrived on Burnaby
Mountain in 1976, Simon Fraser has produced a string of wins, pins and
collegiate champions, from four-time NAIA titleist and Olympic silver
medalist Bob Molle to Olympic silver medalist Jeff Thue to Olympic
champion Daniel Igali.One hallmark of a dominant college sports program is its ability to
consistently lure top recruits. The Clan does that, for both male and
female wrestlers now. Indeed, SFU's women's program has moved beyond the
awkward teenaged stage.

It's not a fad or a curiosity but a platform on which young women
realize the possibility of world championship medals or a place in the
Olympics.

"We've got one of the largest programs in North America and people are
attracted to it because it's successful," Jones says. "We've pretty
much made it equal to the men's program on things like scholarships and
travel, as much as we can. There are not as many competitions yet. But
over-all, it operates on an equal basis."

In 1990, Simon Fraser saw its first women's wrestling demonstration
when visiting teams from Japan, Venezuela and the U.S. put on an intriguing
sideshow to the SFU Invitational. At that time, only a few rogue women
competed regularly in the fringe sport.

"I didn't bring them in for the right reasons," Jones admits. "I was
hoping to get some promotional money being put up for non-traditional sports.
But probably 10-15 junior secondary schools from B.C. were there and, like
me, they liked what they saw. I had real reservations that it would catch
on and be popular. And I had real reservations about the injury aspect."

Before their numbers warranted separate teams, most female high school
wrestlers in B.C. trained with boys, taking their lumps against bigger,
stronger and quicker opponents. But when his daughter, Cori, then a
student at Simon Fraser, and Rissa Wilson, the wife of Clan wrestler Chris
Wilson, wanted to get down on the mat too, Jones realized another gathering
force of girl power was at work.

SFU started its women's wrestling program in 1993, the same year the U.
of Minnesota-Morris became the first of just six U.S. colleges which
sponsor women's wrestling today as an official varsity sport.

"They train like fiends, they don't know everything there is to know
about the sport, so they listen. They're just like sponges." Jones says.
"Sometimes, working with the men, they think they know everything
already. It's hard to get them to work at the same level."

"Do you wrestle in mud or pudding?"

SFU's Emily Richardson, seventh last year in 59 kilos at the 2003 world
championships in New York, has heard some silly questions since she
decided to take up wrestling in grade eight at Carson Graham secondary.

"People say to me: 'But you're so little!' They think I don't look like
a wrestler because I don't have big, bulging muscles like Chyna [an
Amazon-like WWE pro wrestler]," Richardson says. "I guess I should take
that as a compliment."

Though none of SFU's pin-down girls made Canada's Olympic team, Carol
Huynh, in her final season for the Clan, is an alternate at 48 kilos, while
Richardson and 20-year-old Sarah White of New Westminster, who competes
at 51 kilos, will be pointing toward the 2008 Games in Beijing.

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Lady Wrestlers Help Falcons

By: Bob Salmon January 16, 2004

If you attended the wrestling match that was recently held at St. Andrews-Sewanee, you may have noticed two of the Lincoln County wrestlers who looked a little out of place Rub your eyes again. Yep! It a girl, Bethany Henderson and she is giving this guy all he can handle. Bethany and Alannah Wilson are members of the Lincoln County wrestling team and are doing a great job

When Bethany Henderson stepped on to the mat for her match against an SAS opponent, yours truly had to blink.she was a girl! A real, genuine, one hundred percent female girl.
Later on, when Alannah Wilson stepped into the ring to engage her opponent, this scribe could not stop blinking...another real honest-to-goodness girl.
Bethany Henderson wrestles in the 135 pound class and looks at her opportunities to wrestle as "really, really, really fun."
Several minutes after her first match, she removed her wrestling gear, and beneath all that "stuff" was a young ninth grade beauty. Her blond hair glistened in the evening lights and she spoke with an air of confidence that left no doubt she knew her sport, and loved it.
"It builds self esteem," Henderson said, and judging from her performances in that match, she had more than her share of confidence and self esteem.
Eleventh grader Alannah Wilson, also a blonde bombshell, took on guys in the 160 pound class and held her own in both matches.
Although she was not victorious in either match, she was much more than competitive and according to one of her opponents, "she wasn't easy to put down."
Wilson, when asked about how she felt when she began wrestling, said, "At first it (wrestling) was intimidating, but the more experience I gained, the more confidence I developed,"
Both beauties are serious about their sport and according to wrestling coach Louis Steakley, they have gained the respect of the entire wrestling team, and when they participate in matches, the guys really help them as much as possible.
Dan Stover, another key to Lincoln County's wrestling success, has been involved with wrestling all his life. Stover knows wrestling and he knows wrestlers.
According to Steakley, "Stover is the brains behind it all. We could not do what we do if it were not for Dan." Stover is another supporter of Henderson and Wilson. While he keeps score, he also yells encouragement. Stover has had a lot to do with the girl's success this season.
They're blondes, they're beautiful...and they're dangerous. They are a vital part of Lincoln County wrestling and are determined to make their mark for several years to come.