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vietnamnet.vn/reports/2006/09/25
Five female and four male wrestlers from Vietnam are competing at the 2006 Senior World Championships in Greco-Roman, Freestyle, and Female Wrestling, which kicked off in China's Guangzhou province on Sept. 23. The female wrestlers are Le Thi Trang, Pham Thi Hue, Nghiem Thi Giang, Luong Thi Quyen and Nguyen Thi Hai Yen.
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www.arktimes.com 9/25/06
news release from David Bazzel says an announcement is coming this week that eight Arkansas high schools are prepared to add wrestling to their varsity sports menus. The release doesn't say if they'll be offering the sport for both men and women, as is the case in international competition.
Insurance man Greg Hatcher, a wrestler in college at Michigan, also will offer $10,000 each to install wrestling mats for the first 20 schools that apply. Once Arkansas begins wrestling, only Mississippi will lack it as a high school varsity sport.
Personal note: I played football and basketball and did field events in track, but had no exposure to wrestling until P.E. and intramurals. in college. It was the hardest of them all. No contest. It lacks a little as a spectator sport, but say that in Iowa or Oklahoma and you might get your head torn off.
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MHS’ Phillips fourth-ranked grappler in U.S.
By JONAMAR JACINTO9/27/06
Staff reporter of the Manteca (Calif.) Bulletin
Samantha Phillips was en route to Oregon for a tournament when she got the phone call.
Manteca High wrestling teammate Vincent Bordi informed her on March 4 that he completed an unexpected and inspiring run at the California Interscholastic Federation State Wrestling Championships in Bakersfield.
Bordi finished second in the 215-pound weight class, wrapping up the deepest ever run made by a Manteca High wrestler.
“I was in a van when all that happened, but I wish I could have seen him,” Phillips said. “It really motivated the whole team.”
And it has motivated Phillips.
Last week, Phillips and the Manteca wrestling team started their preseason conditioning, and the accomplished senior is looking to set her own standard as a top-flight female grappler.
“I really want to do as well as I can this year,” Phillips said. “In the past, I was concentrating on wrestling boys to help out the team, but this year I’m going to be doing a lot more girls tournaments.
“I want to get a scholarship. I’m a lot more focused, and I really enjoy wrestling a lot more than I have any other year.”
Based on her fifth-place finish at the national girls tournament in Michigan, Phillips enters the season the fourth-ranked 130 pounder in the country according the USA Girls Wrestling Association.
She is also third in the 126-pound class on the California Women’s Wrestling Association high school preseason rankings.
“I was really surprised,” Phillips said of her nation-wide ranking. “I already knew that I was going to be ranked, I just wasn’t sure what. When I found out I was fourth, I was pretty happy about that.”
Phillips, who is also an advanced black belt in Judo, qualified for the state tournament her freshman year but went two-and-out. She then took fifth as a sophomore and took off during the 2005-06 season.
Last year, Phillips claimed the Lady Lancer Wrestling Tournament and was named the Most Outstanding Welterweight; took first in the Asics Napa Valley Classic; won the CIF Girls Northern California Championships in Rocklin; and was the runner-up to five-time national title holder Tatiana Padilla (Northview High of Covina) in the California Girls Wrestling Invitational.
Padilla, now a sophomore, is the top wrestler of her weight class on the USAGWA and CWWA rankings.
Phillips finished the season with an impressive 35-2 record before she was invited to compete with the Northern California Girls Wrestling Club, which she represented in the national tournament in March.
“(The USAGWA) doesn’t rank you unless you’ve been to nationals,” Phillips said. “When I took fifth, I think that really surprised everybody.”
Now she has the recognition she both wants and deserves.
It’s just a matter of backing it all up.
“I’m just really excited to get on the mat again,” Phillips said.
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