Oct.
4, 2007: The Wrestling Mall, High School News
Utah Wins Bid for USA Wrestling Kids
National Championships
For the first time ever, the USA Wrestling
Kids National Championships will be held in Utah.
Following a nationwide bidding process, the proposal
produced by USA Wrestling-Utah was accepted by USA
Wrestling, and the national freestyle and Greco-Roman
championships for wrestlers 14 years and younger will be
held in the Beehive State. The contract is awarded for the
next two years, 2008 and 2009.
According to USA Wrestling-Utah President
Craig LaMont it was time for a prestigious tournament like
this to come to the state. He said, "It is time to put
Utah on the map for being able to host national events.
Salt Lake is a great place to fly into, and the numbers
[of participants] and quality [of competition] was
dropping in Wisconsin. I see this as a real shot in the
arm for Utah wrestling."
For the past four years, the event was
held in Wisconsin, three of the last four in Green Bay.
LaMont said, "Most of all, I wanted nationals to move to
Utah to give a hundred or more Utah kids the opportunity
to compete at nationals when they couldn’t afford to do so
otherwise. It was about two thousand bucks per kid the
last few years, even if just one parent went back to
Wisconsin. Now the Utah kids — who, in my humble opinion,
are some of the best in the nation — can compete with only
an entry fee and the cost of gas to get there."
The event will be held at the McKay Events
Center on the Utah Valley State College (UVSC) campus in
Orem, both because it is a great facility for the event,
and because UVSC supports wrestling. UVSC is one of very
few colleges or universities to add wrestling as one of
the athletic programs.
To qualify for the event, Utah wrestlers
will have to place in the USA Wrestling-Utah State
Championships, then compete in the USA Wrestling Western
Regional Championships, which will be held in Pocatello,
Ida., the next two years.
LaMont said that he thinks Kids Nationals
coming to Utah will benefit the state association in two
ways: its athletes and financially. He said, "The primary
advantage of this tournament coming to Utah getting the
younger kids used to the national scene. When wrestlers
participate in a national event when they are young, it is
natural for them to compete later when they are in high
school. They also go in having more confidence. So boys
can grow up believing they can be like Cael Sanderson or
Rulon Gardner or Justin Ruiz and that they don’t have to
live in New York or California to make the Olympic Team.
The other advantage could be financial. I assume USA
Wrestling-Utah will lose money or maybe break even by just
hosting the tournament. But I am hoping to get some
businesses to really step it up on sponsorship. I am
hoping we can get a big name sponsor that can cover the
major costs that could represent our state well. Xango or
Larry Miller or something like that. Then the local
businesses in Orem could help with program costs. This
would be huge for us, then our state association won’t
have to foot the whole bill. We figure the tournament will
cost about $45,000 to put on. And, of course, it will put
Utah on the map for other big events, which will open up
more opportunities for our wrestlers to compete."
Although the tournament bid has been
awarded to Utah for the next two years, LaMont said he
feels that we have a good chance of having that contract
extended beyond that. He said, "I am sure that we can keep
the tournament here if we can grow the numbers and level
of competition the way the national office wants. My hope
and dream would be that we put on such a great event that
they never take Kids Nationals anywhere else."
But to put on that kind of event, there
needs to be a lot of volunteers involved. LaMont said, "We
need a lot of volunteers. I am hoping to get some old
wrestling fans who used to volunteer and be active but
have kind of retired. There is a big wrestling base in
this state, but half of it is nestled away in retirement.
This is a great way for some of those guys to come back
and, for four days of the year, have a great impact on the
sport again."
If you are interested in volunteering,
contact LaMont at
craig@telosrtc.com. For more information, go to
www.usawrestlingutah.org.
"My dream would be to have an outpouring
of support from the general public, like we had for the
2002 Winter Olympics," LaMont said. "I know this is youth
wrestling, not the Olympics. But, if no one had dreamed of
bringing Kids Nationals to Utah, that wouldn't have
happened, either."
USA Wrestling-Utah is a nonprofit
organization affiliated with USA Wrestling. USA Wrestling
is the official organization recognized by the U.S.
Olympic Committee charged with developing the sport of
wrestling in the United States. All members, directors,
and volunteers freely give of their time and talents in
the pursuit of promoting the sport of amateur wrestling.
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