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Crushers reign supreme
Sunday, January 21, 2001
By BARRY GRAHAM
Register Sports Writer
NAPA
Vintage High sent six wrestlers to the third annual Napa Valley Girls Wrestling Classic Tournament at Vintage on Saturday. Those six competitors showed why they were logical choices to make the event a memorable one for many people.
Maika Watanabe at 99 pounds, Danni Presley (114), Christie Rafanan (119) and Carina Valle-Santana (127) all won their weight classes in leading the Crushers to a strong showing at the tournament.
At 140 pounds, Emilee Murphee had a chance to give Vintage another title, but came up short in a hard fought contest against Helaina Day of San Mateo. Day won the match 4-1. Jessica Hsieh (104) took a fourth-place finish in her weight division, suffering a one-point loss to Lenci Landaker of Vallejo.
The tourney, which featured 94 wrestlers from California, Oregon, Nevada and Ohio, is the second largest wrestling tournament in the country. Event winners have also gone on to win national championships.
For many of the competitors from Vintage, the tournament offered them the chance to show people how competitive girls wrestling can be and how it contrasts to females opposing males on the mat.
"It can be a like a chess game," said Presley. "Girls are more flexible on the mat and you have less strength than boys. If you make a mistake against a guy, it is going to be a tough match. Against another girl, you can still overcome some of those mistakes."
Presley, like the other wrestlers at Vintage, made few mistakes at the NVGCWT. The senior, who is ranked No. 7 in the nation, stated that added confidence has been the biggest difference for her this season. Presley, like the other five competitors from Vintage at the tournament, believes that having fun and not being tense is key to winning in the sport.
Most of the athletes from Vintage stated that their experience in wrestling has them more than prepared for their opponents and the electric atmosphere at the venue.
"I wrestled in this tournament for the first time last year," said Murphree. "I took second place in 2000. Being on the mat everyday and improving my technique has been the difference for me this year. It is more important to do well here than at normal meets."
For some wrestlers on Saturday, the NVGCWT gave them the chance to use their experience gained from past events. Watanabe said that the tournament was more difficult this year because of the quantity of competitors, but that she was able to do well because of better technique on the mat. Hsieh also feels that her improved repertoire came into play at the event.
"I used an arm-spin and inside trip to beat my opponents," said Hsieh, who is a freshman at Vintage. The young wrestler commented that making it to the semifinals was the best moment for her at the meet, especially since this was her first year competing.
Tournament Director Carl Murphree said that the girls were ready and performed well and that the event was a success.
"It was a lot of fun," he said. "Competition was good and Vintage wrestled great."
Vintage will try to gain some more titles at the upcoming Girls California State Championship wrestling tournament, to be held at Vallejo on Feb. 3. The tournament will begin at 9:30 a.m. with weigh-ins running from 7:30-8:30 a.m.
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Strength in numbers
Josh Robbins
of the Sentinel Staff
Posted January 21, 2001
When Rusty Irby started lifting weights in the early 1970s, men populated weight rooms almost exclusively.
"When I first started going to a gym, it was dirty and dark," said Irby, an assistant coach for South Sumter's girls team, as well as head coach for the school's boys team. "There were no women in there."
But times have changed: Weight training isn't just for men anymore.
Wednesday afternoon's Gulf Coast Athletic Conference girls weightlifting championship meet offered proof of the dramatic changes in the sport.
Teams from seven schools had assembled in South Sumter High's gym for the event. And, make no mistake, winning the meet meant something to the participants.
Many of the girls from Brooksville Central High, which won the conference championship, had dyed their hair in the school colors of blue and silver.
After the meet, Alaya Smiley, Central's top lifter and the defending state champion in the 129-pound weight class, described her team's victory in terms that a Super Bowl champion might use.
"It feels like we won all the gold in the world," she said.
Irby could only smile as the meet proceeded. Four years ago, before he had arrived South Sumter, he coached Central's first girls weightlifting team, back when fielding a full team proved difficult.
The days of female weightlifting as being considered unfashionable have ended. In addition to South Sumter, Leesburg High also has a girls weightlifting team.
But this trend goes beyond high school girls weightlifting and extends into gyms in Lake County, where increasing numbers of women have taken up weight training.
"There's been a change in thought," Irby said. "They can train to enhance their athleticism without sacrificing their femininity."
One of South Sumter's female athletes to embrace weightlifting is 18-year-old senior Elizabeth Everett.
Everett took up the sport during her freshman year at the school, and she has seen improvements in her performance as a member of the Raiders' track and field team.
In track, Everett participates in the triple and long jumps, occasionally throws the shot put and runs the 200- and 400-meter races, as well as the 4x100 relay.
Her 4x100 relay teammates - Sally Ingram, Kari McCullough and Ezria Parsons - also compete for the school's weightlifting team.
The foursome has finished in the top 10 in the 4x100 relay at the state track and field meet two years in a row.
Everett - who placed sixth and eighth in her weight class at the state weightlifting meet the last two years - believes that weight training has played a big role in her athletic success, especially in developing confidence.
"You become more sure of yourself," Everett said. "It carries over into everything.
"I learned it was OK to be tall and be big, and you definitely learn to accept your strength - that it's not a downfall."
Parsons, a senior who has committed to attend and play basketball at Auburn University, took up weightlifting in a gym class in 10th grade. By then, she had already established herself as an outstanding basketball player.
"I just felt that weightlifting would help me on my basketball game, so I just took the class," Parsons said. "It improved my jump shot and my rebounding, because I can jump higher and I'm quicker."
These are improvements that Gary Russo - Parsons' coach in basketball, volleyball and softball - has noticed over the years. Russo likes to see as many of his school's female athletes take up strength training as possible.
"I think every year it becomes more and more popular," Russo said. "And every year girls athletics are getting better and better.
"Strength means confidence and confidence means success."
South Sumter's roster also includes Deanna Ives and Nicole Rodgers, who won their weight classes in a four-team meet Jan. 10.
But high school athletes aren't the only ones pumping iron these days.
Owners of local gyms have seen increases in the number of women who incorporate weight training into their exercise regimens.
Doris Weizenecker, owner of Muscle Plus in downtown Tavares, said women make up half of her gym's clientele. When Muscle Plus opened 2½ years ago, half of the female members limited their workouts to cardiovascular training, such as running or walking on treadmills.
Now, Weizenecker estimates that two-thirds of the gym's female members include some form of weight training in their workouts.
"A gym used to be just for muscleheads," she said. "It has changed for women. They've realized the only way to get to the ideal body weight is to have a hard body, not a soft body."
Body Shop Fitness Club in Mount Dora also has experienced a surge in the number of women hitting the weights. Eighty percent of the club's female members use weight-training machines or free weights, owner Kelly Bost said.
Marty Foreman, the Golden Triangle YMCA's wellness director, said that 25 to 30 women use the Y's weight room facilities each day.
"Now, they're interested in using the weights more," he said.
Irby hopes most of South Sumter's female weightlifters will continue with the sport in some fashion long after they graduate high school.
"It's a lifetime sport," he said.