There are still 36 spots for wrestlers up for grabs at the Rio Olympic Games, and six wrestlers from the USA will be in Istanbul, Turkey this weekend trying to earn one. They will be battling at the 2nd Olympic Games Qualifier, there is no 3rd qualifier.
The event will be held in the Bagcilar Sports Complex, a short drive from the Golden Horn of the Bosporus Strait. The old capital of the continent spanning Empires both Byzantine and Ottoman will play host to teams of man’s oldest sport from across the globe, meeting in the appropriately ancient crossroads between east and west.
But ancient history won’t be on the minds of the competitors, who will instead be looking to the future of the 2016 Summer Games, held in less than 100 days in Rio De Janeiro. The finalists in six weight classes from three divisions, Greco-Roman and Men’s & Women’s Freestyle, will guarantee representation for their country. A loss before the finals will almost certainly mean a dream deferred for four years, or, more likely, retirement before their next chance at Olympic glory.
For more information on the qualification process, Wikipedia has the answers HERE. For an occasionally insightful stroll through each weight class of the 2nd Qualifier, read on below.
Men’s Freestyle
57 kg
Tony Ramos qualified the weight for the USA at the Pan Am Qualification Tournament, after which Dan Dennis won the right to represent the USA at the Olympic Team Trials Tournament. Vladislav Andreev, of Belarus, who just missed qualifying for Rio in Mongolia, will be making another attempt in Turkey. Andreev also goes by Uladzislau Andreyeu, because Cyrillic is Romanized differently in Belarus than it is in Russia, just to confuse everyone and for no other good reason.
65 kg
This is the most exciting weight class for American Freestyle fans as it’s the only weight class not yet qualified for Rio. As he was in Mongolia, Frank Molinaro will be tasked with earning the reservation for himself and Team USA. The field is crowded. 38 nations entered a wrestler for this tournament, from Pulau to Pakistan. Molinaro will have to fend off fellow NCAA multiple All Americans, Dave Habat, an American competing for Slovenia, and Boris Novachkov, a Bulgarian competing for Bulgaria. Former world champions and other highly decorated competitors will litter the stingiest weight in men’s freestyle. Frank will have a good shot at reaching the finals but a lot will depend on the random draw of the bracket that is decided after weigh-ins.
74 kg
Returning Olympic and World Champion, Jordan Burroughs, clinched his bid a year ago and has already begun contributing to the pre-Rio NBC hype machine. Looking to join in him at the Games will be another NJ public high school grad, Asnage Castelly, competing for Haiti. Former Clarion University All American and current Harvard University coach, Bekzod “The Merciless” Abdurakhmanov, will compete for Uzbekistan. Finally, Cornell University’s Dylan “Pele” Palacio, was a late addition to the tournament, and will compete for Uruguay.
86 kg
J’Den Cox, rising senior at the University of Missouri, punched his ticket at the ‘first’ last chance tournament, notching an impressive podium topping finish in his senior level international tournament debut. Rumor was, Cox did not even have a passport by the time he won the USA Olympic Team Trials, and had to do a bit of scrambling in order to make sure he’d pass customs in Mongolia. Also of note is current Campbell University Fighting Camel, Ville “A Hidey Hidey” Henio, who is competing for Finland. There are also wrestlers from the North Caucasus region of Russia competing for Armenia, Belarus, Canada, France, Greece, Macedonia, Spain, Ukraine and probably several other countries, because that place is good at wrestling. Very very good.
97 kg
There are still 19 countries with wrestlers entered at this weight, which speaks to the incredible drawing power of the Olympics for a sport like wrestling. A fun thing I like to do is look at a list of international wrestlers and try and figure out which name sounds most like a character from Game of Thrones. For this tournament I’ll go with either Ragnar Kaasik of Estonia or Jozef Jaloviar of Slovakia. Eastern Europe is a treasure trove of great Thones names. Kyle Snyder, whose name does have quite the panache or power of intimidation, has already qualified and will be the US rep.
125 kg
Though often the shallowest talent pool of all the divisions, the heavyweights in Turkey will not lack for world class wrestlers still looking for an Olympic nod. While not a favorite, Jesse Ruiz is an American wrestling for Mexico with All American credentials at the junior college and NAIA level. Bulgarian born but Texas raised, Tervel Dlagnev, will be at the Olympics representing the Stars and Stripes.
Greco-Roman
59kg
Former Wisconsin Badger, Jesse Thielke, will be looking to qualify the weight for the States. This is also the only men’s weight that Iran still needs to qualify. They may or may not be sending seven time World Champion, Hamid Sourian. You’d think they definitely would send him but who can tell how things with that team are going to go. Nothing against the I.R. of Iran, but it’s not like they are known for their transparency and forthright communication.
66 kg
This weight also needs to be qualified for the USA, and Ravaughn Perkins is the one who will try to get it done. It’s also another stacked weight class, and perhaps the most formidable wrestler in the bracket (assuming he makes weight) might be world champion, and legit dance move haver, Rasual Chunayev, of Azerbaijan.
75 kg
Another weight class, another laundry list of quality wrestlers still looking for an invite to the Olympics. Luckily, Andy Bisek and his 2015 world bronze medal already took care of that last year in Vegas. Guamanian Joseph Lopez Jr will try to be the second American citizen invited at this weight class, but I would not get my hopes up (no offense Joseph).
85 kg
Ben Provisor is the American rep and his spot at Rio has been secured. Another American looking to make the trip to Brazil is Nathaniel Tuamoheloa, of American Samoa. As everyone knows, The Samoan islands are in the South Pacific, whereas the Marinara Islands, of which Guam is the largest constituent island, are in the North Pacific.
98 kg
Josef Rau is the American charged with earning a spot at this year’s summer games, and he’ll have a crowded field of 25 wrestlers to contend with. I don’t know anything else about this weight so I’ll pick another GoT name. How about Felix Baldauf, from Norway? Sounds typically Westerosi to me.
130 kg
Robby Smith has his spot at Rio locked up for the Red, White & Blue. Two countries that will not be represented at this weight in Rio, however, are Turkmenistan and Tajikistan, neither of whom entered a wrestler for this tournament. They are also the only two ex-Soviet Republics that have yet to qualify a single wrestler for Rio. Tajikistan is also the only ex-Soviet Republic where the predominantly spoken language is related to Farsi.
Women’s Freestyle
48 kg
Haley Augello qualified this weight for the USA in Mongolia, so Americans can kick back and relax for this weight. Maybe even max and relax, why not?
53 kg
Another weight class where the United States can chill, as Helen Maroulis snagged the quota in Mongolia. I see Chinese Taipei has an entrant. We should probably just call that place Taiwan, as it’s what the Taiwanese call their home. But to do so would be to ignore the political implications, and despite constant protestations by the IOC to the contrary, there is no extricating politics from the Olympics. Sigh.
58 kg
America still has some work to do here and Kelsey Campbell is the one who’ll be doing it. She may face a Vietnamese opponent named Thy Ly Kieu. That’s three names with only nine letters. That’s good efficient letter usage by the Thy family.
63 kg
The USA already has a rep for Rio named Elena Pirozhkova. I feel like the “zh” letter combo (digraph, I believe, for the technically inclined), needs to be formalized as the official orthography for the sound the “s” makes in treasure (and the “zh” in Pirozhkova). We have the “th” and the “ch”, now it’s time to welcome the “zh”. It can take the place of the “ph”, we don’t need it anymore. We have “f”, that’s enough. Oh and the “gh”, that’s out, too. And another thing, hey! Wait! Where are you going? OK fine, I’ll stick to wrestling.
69 kg
Tamyra Menseh will go to her second tournament in two weeks looking to secure her trip to Rio. Menseh came tantalizingly close in Mongolia, losing her match in the semi finals by a mere one point.
75 kg
Three time world champ Adeline Gray made sure the USA would be represented in Rio when she won a yellow medal last year in Vegas. Two more of her competitors will come from a field of 16 wrestlers in Turkey.
How to Watch
There will be a free live stream hosted by UWW (CLICK HERE). The stream coming from Ulaanbaatar two weeks ago was only occasionally buggy, so hopefully this one holds up all right in Constantinople.
Unfortunately there are no pre-seeds or brackets to inspect yet, as those will be created after weigh-ins, because no one trusts anyone else enough in international wrestling to use a process other than a random draw.
Greco starts Friday morning (or Thursday night) at 3:00 am Eastern Time. The Women wrestle Saturday morning/Friday night, and Frank Molinaro will step on the mat sometime in the wee hours of Sunday, May 8th. Cheers to any other insomniacs staying up to follow the action.