It’s time to come clean. I’ve lied in this blog for two and a half years. I’ve always claimed that I never wrestled and that isn’t entirely true. I did win an 8th grade intramural championship at Frank L. Smart Junior High School. In 1963 every boy in Davenport, IA (it was a sexist world) was introduced to wrestling in some way. There were instructional units in our PE classes where we were taught the basics of the single leg takedown, the sitout and the half nelson. At the end of the unit the teacher would organize an intramural tournament and we were encouraged to enter.
At about the same time that I reached the apex of my wrestling glory, 130 miles to the northwest, in Waterloo, a kid named Gable was launching his career. It’s a story of 2 choices. I opted for being a really bad basketball player and he chose to become one of America’s greatest wrestlers. A few years later, in Del City, OK, some brothers named Smith were exposed to wrestling and chose to pursue their dreams – with John going on to win two Olympic Gold medals and four World Championships.
ST. CROIX, Minn. – A little boy from Stillwater is inspiring hundreds of wrestlers in his community. The boy with special needs hasn’t let his disability slow him down or keep him from wrestling the best.
Dillon Hill, a 9-year-old with Down syndrome, started wrestling at St. Croix Valley Athletic Association a year ago.
Hill started working with the Coach Chris Bahl’s to learn the ins and outs of the sport.
When news surfaced in September that Ryland Geiger was leaving the University of Minnesota, it was more than just a small blip on the radar for the Gopher faithful.
The 19-year-old Geiger, who was one of the nation’s top recruits from the Class of 2008, was expected to make an immediate impact at 197 pounds for a young and talented Gopher team looking to get back to the top of the college wrestling world after coming off its worst NCAA finish (14th) since 1996.
Great expectations had been placed on the broad shoulders of Geiger after a prep career that saw him capture two Oregon (OSAA) state titles and win titles at prestigious high school events such as NHSCA Nationals, Cadet Nationals, and Junior Nationals. He was ranked No. 1 in the country at 189 pounds by InterMat.
Last season, as a redshirt for the Gophers, Geiger compiled a 19-3 record while competing in open tournaments. In the spring, Geiger won both the FILA Junior Nationals and FILA World Team Trials in freestyle to earn a spot on the Junior World Team. Geiger, though, chose not to compete at the Junior World Championships in Ankara, Turkey in August, and instead opted to stay in Minneapolis and focus on his summer term courses at Minnesota.
Robinson has had an illustrious career as an Army Ranger during the Vietnam War, an Olympic wrestler and one of the greatest coaches in University of Minnesota history.
Robinson demonstrated his bravery by telling a roomful of military policemen how he listens to Britney Spears and Lady Gaga to get motivated.
Robinson is also caring. He flew to Iraq recently to motivate the troops and when he learned the government wasn’t going to pay his way, he was perfectly willing to fly halfway around world on his own dime.
All to offer a simple “Thank you.”
“When the chaplain called and asked if I could come, I thought it was the least I could do,” said Robinson, who was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2005. “I was sitting at home, and you know what that’s like. It’s pretty good. Sometimes you don’t realize that until you leave.”
Robinson visited troops all over Contingency Operating Base Basra, at each stop encouraging Soldiers and telling them to embrace their deployment as a learning experience.
FARGO, N.D. – North Dakota State head wrestling coach Bucky Maughan has announced the hiring of Roger Kish as an assistant coach. Kish joins the NDSU program after a successful wrestling career at the University of Minnesota.
“We’re excited to have a wrestler with such an outstanding background joining our coaching staff,” said Maughan. “Roger will be a tremendous help with our upper weights both on the mat and from a recruiting aspect.”
Kish was a graduate assistant for the Gophers last year. Kish, a LaPeer, Mich. native, was a two-time All-American and two-time NCAA runner-up for the Gophers at 184 pounds.
He had a career record of 117-27 for the Gophers. As a sophomore, he went 35-7 en route to a Big Ten title and an NCAA runner-up finish. In his junior season, Kish was 37-3 and was the Big Ten and national runner-up. He was also a team captain.
Kish graduated from Minnesota in May 2008 with a BS in business and marketing education.
He was also a two-time cadet national champion and also captured a USA Wrestling junior national title.
ENZO Films is embarking on the making of an Independent Film that promotes and supports our beloved sport of wrestling.
The film, which was inspired by actual events, is entitled CARTER-145. It is a Midwestern, sports drama that focuses on a high school wrestler who has just arrived to a small town obsessed with its wrestling team and the legendary coach that leads them. The wrestling program primed for its fourth state title in a row, begins to spiral out of control, when some devastating truths are uncovered about the coach’s winning ways.
Bob Hoskins will play the role of the coach.
Bob Hoskins’ first appearance to mainstream American audiences was in Who Framed Roger Rabbit, for which he received a second Golden Globe nomination. Some of Hoskins’ other notable appearances include playing opposite Cher in Mermaids (1990), the foreign film Mona Lisa which won him an Oscar nomination as well as a Cannes Film Festival and Golden Globe Awards), boatswain Smee to Captain Hook in Hook (1991), and Uncle Bart, the violent “owner” of Jet Li in Unleashed.
The filmmaker, Joshua J. Smith, was a former coach and wrestler in the Midwest.
Minneapolis Wrestlers will have their first informational meeting on Tuesday June 30th at 8 pm at the 19 bar in Minneapolis.
It will be an open-house, get-to-know-each other kind of event. You can meet the organizers, other wrestlers, and ask any questions.
The 19 Bar is located at 19 West 15th Street in Minneapolis. Google Map. Everyone is welcome!
If you’re curious, but not sure if you want to commit, this will be a great opportunity to learn everything you need to know. No need to RSVP, just show up.
A group of Minneapolis & St. Paul wrestlers are working to get an amateur wrestling league put together.
They are seeking wrestlers of all sizes with any, or no, level of experience. They are open to any wrestling styles such as freestyle, amateur, submission, etc.
Wrestlers must be 18 years of age or older, any size, gay or straight, basically anyone who wants to learn wrestling, train, or to just wrestle in Twin Cities area.
If you’re using Firefox as your web browser, which you should be, you can now get an amateur wrestling persona theme created by WrestlingPod.
Check out the screen shots.
Mac Screenshot
Windows Screenshot
If you’re not running Firefox, you can download the free web browser for Mac, Windows and Linux. If you’re still running Internet Explorer, click the download link to find out why Firefox is safer and better.
If you have Firefox, but not the Personas extension, you can grab that for free at GetPersonas.com.
Former Hawkeye, 49, wins pair of matches at regional tourney
By Jim Nelson
Waterloo Courier
WATERLOO — At an age when most men are beginning to stare down retirement, Randy Lewis decided to find out if he was still tough.
Wrestling for the first time since the 1992 Olympic trials, the 49-year-old Lewis, a 1984 Olympic gold medalist, showed he’s pretty tough for a guy who will turn 50 next month, but not quite tough enough to tame all the youngsters in his given sport of freestyle wrestling.
Lewis, a two-time national champion at Iowa, won two matches Saturday at the 2009 Northern Plains Senior and Junior Regional championships at Young Arena before losing in the semifinals to Northern Iowa’s two-time All-American Moza Fay.
“It was fun,” Lewis said. “It was real fun those first two matches. It was fun against Moza. It was a great experience for me. I’m glad I did it.”
Fay, more than a quarter century younger than Lewis, won the 163-pound semifinal, 9-2, 7-0.
“I made a couple of mistakes in that match against Moza and he is too solid for me to give up that much position,” Lewis said. “And once he got on top it was pretty much over.
