All That Glitters

Bouvaysa Saytiev

The meat head in me is breaking the blogging hiatus to put a word in for the world's oldest and greatest sport. When I was little I dreamed of competing as a wrestler in the Olympics. I thought Olympians were true heroes, and that the wrestlers were the best of the best. Now I live that dream vicariously through real athletes, watching from my couch with a mouth full of potato chips. It's the Olympics of Michael Phelps right now. For good reason too. The man is amazing, doing things that have never been done. But, he participates in a sport that gives out medals liberally, and there are other story lines to follow though, so I'll point you to one if you're sick of the five sports that are being shown on NBC prime time. Freestyle Wrestling began last night and I was almost in tears in the middle of the night as I watched Henry Cejudo win a gold medal in a stacked weight in stunning fashion. The kid is amazing.

Tonight we'll get the chance to see a living legend, Russia's Bouvaysa Saytiev (multiple time Olympic Champion and six time World Champion). He is on the tail end of his competitive years, but as I watched him win a barnburner in the Russian Nationals this year it was apparent that he has plenty still left in the tank for one more run in Beijing. In the same weight the U.S. is bringing first time Olympian Ben Askren into the fray. Ben is a funny, thoughtful character who looks to "put the chin in China". I've followed his decorated career through the NCAAs. He's funky and an absolute pleasure to watch. If the two men win their first two matches they will meet in the quarterfinals.

Thanks to technology and NBC's online coverage, you can watch every match live online by going to www.nbcolympics.com and browsing to their live coverage. Tonight wrestling gets started at about 7:30 pm.

Wrestling

Saitiev waves after another big win

I’ve always loved watching amateur wrestling. It’s been in my blood since I was just a boy, watching my older brother compete. I can’t remember a time when the sport wasn’t a part of my life. Wrestling is great on so many levels. It is a branch martial art, full of technique, strength, power, and stamina. It is a one on one competition, and therefore it’s easy to determine where you stack up against those around you. Like all great sports the mental preparation and endurance is just as crucial as the physical, and supersedes it in the big matches.

Wrestling seems to be a dying sport, despite being one of the oldest. Title IX, the legal precedent that set standards involving discrimination on the basis of sex, is in essence very noble. But it has resulted in many schools cutting their wrestling programs because of the requirement to make room for an equal number of men and women’s sports, and since wrestling isn’t a real moneymaker, it gets the chop first.

Wrestling in the U.S. could and should be huge. In Russia it is the popular equivalent of perhaps professional tennis in the United States. The athletes who dominate in the sport come mainly from Russia, the former Soviet republics, Iran, Korea, the U.S., and several eastern block countries.

Up until recently it has been nearly impossible for me to actually watch our wrestlers compete, let alone foreign wrestlers. The competitions aren’t televised nationally, except for the NCAA Championship round, and a precious few Olympic Gold medal matches. Recently Real Pro Wrestling is trying to find a niche in cable networks, but for the most part viewing the matches must be done in person.

This week the World Championships (an annual event) are held in Freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling. For the first time they were broadcast in their entirety—Quarter, Semi-, and Final matches. Freestyle is my preferred discipline, and I’m always excited to see who the U.S. sends to the world stage to compete. I was disappointed to see that only two of our wrestlers made it into the Quarterfinals, and only one, Joe Williams, medaled (bronze). But the real joy was to see for the first time Russia’s Buvassiar Saitiev. This guy is the Michael Jordan of wrestling. He won his first World Championships in 1995, and the next year won the Olympic Games. Some years he has competed in the World Championships, others he opts not to, but he has tallied an impressive 5 World Championships and 2 Olympics Championships. In 10 years he has only lost one match, that came from USA’s Brandon Slay in a huge upset in the 2000 Olympic Games. Yesterday Saitiev won his 6th World Title.

Watching this guy is pure joy and excitement. He moves unlike any other wrestler I’ve ever seen. Graceful as a dancer, always poised, always controlled, effortless, smooth, humble, and totally unconventional. In each match I saw he did some trick, some move, some scramble where I said, “Whaaa? I’ve never seen anything like that before.”

Congratulations to this phenomenal athlete.