#WrestleBudapest

LIVE BLOG: European Olympic Qualifier, Day Two (Tokyo Qualifying Session)

Friday, March 19, 2021 - 14:55 By Eric Olanowski

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BUDAPEST, Hungary (March 19) --- The #WrestleBudapest freestyle medal matches will start at 16:00 (local time) and will be followed by the women's wrestling #Tokyo2020 qualifying round at 18:00. 

20:07: That'll do it for Friday's coverage. We'll see you back here on Saturday at 11:00 as Greco-Roman actions gets underway at the European Olympic Qualifier.

20:04: Obviously two inactivity points was not the ideal way that Vorobeva wanted to earn Russia's Olympic spot, but sometimes the results is more important than the performance. She defeated Kuenz, 2-1, and will wrestle Marzaliuk in Saturday night's 76kg finals.

19:55: Olympic champion Natalia VOROBEVA (RUS) and world bronze medalist Martina KUENZ (AUT) will close Friday's women's wrestling semifinals. 

19:53: That was quick! Vasilisa MARZALIUK (BLR) pinned Mariya ORYASHKOVA (BUL) in just over two minutes and helped Belarus punch their fifth overall ticket to Tokyo and second in women's wrestling.

19:48: Here's the final weight for women's wrestling. Vasilisa MARZALIUK (BLR) and Mariya ORYASHKOVA (BUL) are up first!

19:46: The future is bright at 68kg! First, it was 22-year-old Larroque who qualified for the Olympics. Now, 21-year-old Khanum VELIEVA (RUS) just qualified Russia for the Olympics with her 6-0 victory over fellow European champion Elis MANOLOVA (AZE).

19:31: Larroque is on first early in the first period. She's scored three takedowns and leads 6-0 heading into the second period.

19:25: We'll move into the 68kg semifinals. First up will be Koumba LARROQUE (FRA) and Dalma CANEVA (ITA). 

19:24: WHAT A COMEBACK! Grigorjeva trailed 3-0 in the second period but scored a pair of takedowns to pick up the come-from-behind win over Yesilirmak and Olympic berth, 4-4.

19:20: European champions Elif Jale YESILIRMAK (TUR) and Anastasija GRIGORJEVA (LAT) will wrestle in the second semifinal match at 62kg.

19;19: Koliadenko secured Ukraine's second Olympic license of the day with a 10-0 win over Mariana CHERDIVARA ESANU (MDA) in the 62kg finals.

19:11: Mariana CHERDIVARA ESANU (MDA) and Iryna KOLIADENKO (UKR) are up next in the 62kg semifinals.

19:07: Alina HRUSHYNA AKOBIIA (UKR) put on a flawless performance in the 57kg semifinals and ended Sara LINDBORG'S (SWE) hopes of qualifying Sweden for the Olympic Games. She won the match, 10-0.

18:55: Sara Johanna LINDBORG (SWE) and Alina HRUSHYNA AKOBIIA (UKR) will wrestle in the second 57kg semifinals.

18:54: What a performance by Evelina NIKOLOVA (BUL)! She scored a pair of takedowns against Bediha GUN (TUR) in the 57kg semifinals and punched Bulgaria's 57kg ticket to this summer's Games.

18:45: Rio Olympic bronze medalist Sofia MATTSSON (SWE) was in disbelief as she picked up a late fall against Stalvira ORSHUSH (RUS) in the 53kg semifinal to punch Sweden's ticket to Tokyo.

18:36: Two-time world champion Vanesa KALADZINSKAYA (BLR) blasted through Iulia LEORDA (MDA), 9-1, in the first 53kg and helped Belarus book their fourth ticket to the Olympic Games. This week, Belarus claimed three spots from freestyle wrestlers and now one in women's wrestling.

18:23: The second 50kg Olympic berth went to Miglena SELISHKA (BUL). The reigning European champion caught Iwona MATKOWSKA (POL) off balance with just over two minutes left and gained the 2-1 advantage. She tacked on a second takedown after fighting off a late flurry of Polish attacks and won the match, 4-1

18:11: Evin DEMIRHAN (TUR) reached the final of the 50kg bracket and qualified Turkey for the Olympic Games with her 5-1 win over Julie SABATIE (FRA). 

Women's Wrestling Olympic Qualification Round

17:27: That'll do it for freestyle action. We'll take a short 30-minute break and see you back here for the women's wrestling Tokyo qualification round. action at 18:00.

17:25: Belarus crowned a third champion on the day as Gennadij CUDINOVIC (GER) injury defaulted out of the 125kg title bout giving gold to  Dzianis KHRAMIANKOU (BLR).

17:10: Karadeniz grabbed a takedown and put the pressure on late, but Huyshtyn came up clutch with a short-time takedown to win back-to-back golds for Belarus. The final score of the match was 5-4.

17:06: It was a pretty even first period between Aliaksandr HUSHTYN (BLR) and Suleyman KARADENIZ (TUR) in the 97kg finals. They both scored a point, but the Belarusian has criteria heading into the final three minutes.

16:55: Shabanau continues to roll with that smoothing underhook. He's used it to pick up three takedowns in the finals, and after a lost Turkish challenge, the Belarusian walked away with a 7-0 win and the 86kg gold medal.

16:50: It's not something that'll show up on the results page or highlight clip, but let's give props to the refs for being extra cautious with knees and shoulders during these finals matches. The main objective of this competition was chasing the Olympic quota, and although a gold medal would be nice, the most important thing is the long-term safety of these competitors.

16:45: Shabanau, the four-time world medal-winner, is controlling the ties early in the match with his patented left-side underhook. He's so calculated with his attacks off that hook.

16:44:  Ali SHABANAU (BLR) and Osman GOCEN (TUR) are the next finals match up. They'll wrestle for 86kg gold. 

16: 41: It doesn't look like Khadzhimurad GADZHIYEV (AZE) will compete in the 74kg finals, which means the European OG Qualifier gold goes to Georgia's '18 world runner-up  Avtandil KENTCHADZE.

16:36: What a performance by Tevanyan. He has to be looked at as a serious contender to win the Tokyo Olympic Games at 65kg. Since December, he has wins over Olympic champion Vlad KHINCHEGASHVILI (GEO), world bronze medalist Ismail MUSUKAEV (HUN), two-time world medalist Magomedmurad GADZHIEV (POL), and now three-time world champion Aliyev.

16:24: Tevanyan just opened the match-up and leads 7-0. He was on the inactivity clock but snapped Aliyev down for a takedown. He caught the Azeri's left arm and roll twice with a trapped arm gut. He added another takedown and claimed 65kg gold, 9-0.

16:22: Nothing much to talk about in that first period outside of the inactivity point. Aliyev has to attack, and for us fans, that's a positive! This is where things are going to get interesting!

16:18: Vazgen TEVANYAN (ARM) has had a lot of tough tests since December, but none like three-time world champion Haji ALIYEV (AZE). This should be a great gauge for the '20 Individual World Cup champion.

16:16: The Bulgarian tried everything he could to close the gap, but Harutyunyan takes the safe route out and concedes a takedown and flattens out. Harutyunyan wins 57kg gold with an 8-3 victory over Vangelov. 

16:14: The Armenian built a comfortable 8-1 lead after a counter-offensive go behind and a pair of below the hip exposures.

16:12: Harutyunyan scored the lone first-period takedown and leads 2-1 at the break. The 21-year-old used a textbook head outside single to take the one-point lead into the closing period. 

16:08: Just over a minute into the 57kg finals and we have a stoppage due to a cut on the head of Georgi VANGELOV (BUL). Arsen HARUTYUNYAN (ARM) is staying loose -- bouncing around the medical stall as the tape up the Bulgarian's head.

16:00: Please keep in mind that there could a good amount of medical forfeits in this session. Wrestlers who made it to the finals have already qualified their nations for the Tokyo Olympic Games. For now, we'll have to wait and see who is going to take the mat.

marketing, #development

Wiebe inspires next gen at UWW-IIS camp in India

Saturday, February 15, 2025 - 08:21 By Vinay Siwach

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KARNATAKA, India (February 15) -- Erica WIEBE (CAN), the 2016 Rio Olympic champion, usually doesn't take it around but for her India trip, she made sure to pack her gold medal from Rio.

Call it luck, the gold medal turned out to be the highlight of her trip.

In India for a masterclass at the international women's wrestling camp organized by the Inspire Institute of Sport and United World Wrestling, Wiebe got mobbed by 50 young wrestlers as she showed them her medal. Wrestlers from Jordan, Estonia, South Africa, Mauritius, Mongolia, Kazakhstan and hosts India, all part of the camp, wanted to touch it, feel it and may be keep it.

"To see the looks on their faces and in their bodies responding to what it felt like to hold the kind of weight of your dream in your hand, I got emotional with them," Wiebe says. "It was so surreal for me to share the medal with the athletes because it brought me back to where I was at that time, and how it felt like winning an Olympic gold medal was just like this impossible dream that would never happen. It's really important for me to come here and do things like this to remind these women that, these crazy, unimaginable things are real. They can happen and to encourage them to continue to dream big."

No wrestler could walk away without a photo. A few even got emotional as they took the medal in their hands.

"God, I don't know how many times I have dreamt about that in the night," U17 world bronze medalist Lisette BOTTKER (EST) says. "When I got the medal on my hands, I was also trying not to cry but the feeling is awesome."

Maya QUTAISHAT (JOR) adds, "It seemed like the dreams of most of us wrestlers in front of us. Like getting the Olympic gold medal."

UWW and IIS organized the camp for wrestlers from around the world from January 15 to 31. It was hosted by IIS at it's world class facility in Vijayanagar, a township in Ballari district of north Karnataka, India.

Wiebe held a masterclass for the wrestlers along with training sessions with IIS head coach Amir TAVOKKALIAN, a former world silver medalist and Asian champion.

"It's a really amazing development opportunity for a young wrestlers from all around the world," Wiebe said. "There's several nations here, and it's so incredible to see the level of talent and passion of these young athletes. At the camp this week, we've had a number of sessions kind of leveraging different unique styles, having the different countries lead different warmups. We're here at the Inspire Institute of Sport which is a phenomenal world class facility. We don't have anything like this in Canada, there's very few facilities like this in the world. It's really exciting to see that India has this.

"Not only that, they have this for their athletes training, but they've invited many countries around the world to share in this moment and to leverage the resources that are available here on this site."

IIS President Manisha MALHOTRA also visited the camp and threw some light on the partnership with UWW to grow the sport.

"We're very passionate about the sport from an Indian ecosystem point of view," Malhotra said. "But what we realized is that, we need to start looking outside India to bring in expertise, look in partnerships. With that in mind, I think there was no better partner than UWW.

"They’ve done a phenomenal job with wrestling worldwide and growing the sport very well. The idea was to have a very good mix of people, whether they are from a very developed wrestling nation or from an underdeveloped wrestling nation, it needs to be a common platform where people can extract some sort of benefit for everybody. That was the main premise with what we worked with."

Apart from the training, wrestlers at the camp used the high performance center at IIS and indulged in sightseeing.

"Training here is very strong. We come out of the mat sweating a lot, and it's very tough," Qutaishat said, "The girls here are very high level. When I wrestle them, I learn a lot of techniques and so many things that I usually don't see back in my country. But I get to explore more as I go out to the camps."

Wiebe had an advice for all wrestlers, especially coming from smaller countries to the development camps.

"I told the athletes the goals are: to have fun, and to get better," Wiebe said. "And how do you do that? You find strength on the edge of failure. You have to put yourself on the line. Wrestling is not easy. You see it on the athletes bodies. They're pushing themselves to their limits, physically and mentally. They are tired. I remember being that way as an athlete. You always have to find another level to yourself."