Asgari takes U.S. mat experience to Nicaragua

Ardeshir Asgari is a recognizable name in U.S. wrestling circles. As a young man, Asgari competed for Iran, and defected at the Military World Champions held in South America and moved to the United States. He attended Cal-State Fullerton for three years as a varsity wrestler. For a number of years, Asgari was a talented freestyle wrestler, placing four times at the U.S. Nationals, competing at 74 kg/163 pounds during the years when Kenny Monday and Dave Schultz were the dominant stars. 

Asgari also coached on the college level, serving 10 years as the head coach coach at Cal-State Fullerton, where he developed a few Div. I All-Americans for the program.

Asgari is at the Pan American Championships this year, but not because of his American wrestling pedigree. He is here as the President of Nicaragua Wrestling Federation and is leading the delegation here. He has lived in Nicaragua since 2002, and is working hard to build the sport in his new Central America homeland.

"I met my wife in California. She is from Nicaragua. She was vacationing in the United States. She is a body building champion from Nicaragua. We got married in 1998 and four years later, I moved with her to Nicaragua," said Asgari.

It was during a vacation in Nicaragua that Asgari found out about the state of wrestling in the nation. 

"It was pathetic. They had one mat and one club in a police station. There were between 10 and 15 wrestlers. Many of them were alcoholics. When I moved there, I decided to get involved. Since I was a kid, wrestling has always been a part of my life. I wanted to build it for them," he said.

His first involvement was as a volunteer coach, and Asgari realized that there was a tremendous amount to do.

"We built the program. We changed it. We had them train for the whole year. They used to work out for just two weeks prior to competitions. I had to teach them how to train. They would wrestle for about 10 minutes. We had to teach them to drill and to weight train. Conditioning was not part of the program. At the time, it was one of the weakest programs in Central America. We gradually built things up," said Asgari.

Last year, Asgari was elected President of the wrestling federation. He added four high school clubs. Two of the new clubs were in areas that were far away from Managua, the nation's capitol. The number of competitors has grown to 500, a majority who are youth.

The basics for wrestling to succeed, including mats and wrestling shoes, were just not available. Asgari has worked to get these materials into the country, seeking discounts on shoes and mat donations. He praises USA Wrestling President Jim Ravannack for helping him in many ways to get these needs filled.

"Nobody had wrestling shoes. They wrestled bare foot. They had two singlets for the team. The guys from 55 kg to 66 kg shared the small one, and from 74 kg up they used the large one. Now we have singlets and we look like a team," Asgari said.

There are clubs without mats, and wrestlers are training on the grass, according to Asgari. He noted a club in the city of Carazo which has 120 athletes, yet must work out in the grass. 

Asgari brought three wrestlers and two referees to the Pan American Championships, which is the biggest delegation which has traveled to the United States for the nation. Things are starting to turn around for the Nicaraguan team. The budget for the sport has doubled from $30,000 to $60,000 in a year. The team is entering many more events, and the performances are starting to improve. 

Nicaragua plans to host the 2009 Pan American Cadet Wrestling Championships, something which has not been done with any sport in the past there.

"We use to lose to everybody," said Asgari. "We now go head to head with them. It is the most improved team in Nicaragua. What we have done in a year is more than they did the last 30 years. We are getting a lot of publicity now. I really think, the way things are progressing here now, these athletes will develop in five years. We may never beat the United States. However, we will challenge Venezuela and Columbia in some weight classes soon.

Olympic weight structure makes Dugrenier drop down

For the last three years, Martine Dugrenier of Canada has won a World silver medal at 67 kg/147.5 pounds, competing with a style which features power and aggressiveness. Her ability to make it to the gold medal match each season made her one of the most consistent performers on the international level.

At the 2008 Pan American Championships, Dugrenier is competing at a new weight class, 63 kg/138.75 pounds. She has taken off the weight because she wants to win an Olympic gold medal. There are only four weight classes at the Olympic Games, and Dugrenier has been a star at one of the "non-Olympic" weight classes.

Dugrenier dropped to 63 kg this year for the Canadian Olympic Trials, where she beat 2007 World Team member Megan Dolan for the Canadian team. Now, Dugrenier needs to qualify the weight class for the Olympics in order for her to attend the Beijing Games.

"She has done a good job with it," said Canada's National Women's Coach Leigh Vierling of Dugrenier's weight change. "It was a part of the plan the entire quadrennium that she would eventually be down to 63 kg. She is a focused person. The lure of the Olympics will make a lot of people get the job done in changing weights."

Dugenier now needs to show she can be as successful at an Olympic weight class as she had been at the non-Olympic division.

"I believe she will be performing well at the new weight," said Vierling. "Time will tell. She has been successful at 63 kg, plus 2 kg. I have no doubts she can succeed."

So far, at the Pan American Championships, Dugrenier has qualified for the gold-medal finals, where she faces Sandra Roa of Colombia. Her morning victories were against Tori Adams of the United States and Caroline Cardosa of Brazil. One more victory, and she has punched her ticket to Beijing.

"She is a competitor for sure," said Vierling. "She improves her game each year. At the end of the day, she gets it done. She had to beat quality wrestlers to make our Olympic team. She will step it up internationally, also."

Clinch "flip" procedures changed again

On the second day of the Pan American Championships, a new wrinkle in the former coin flip procedures for the clinch position was changed. On Friday, FILA instituted a process where there was a coin toss, and then an athlete selected a colored ball out of a black bag.

Today, the coin toss was eliminated from the process. If there was a need to decide who would secure the leg during a freestyle clinch, the mat referee would go to the scoring table and pull a ball out of the black bag. The color which appeared would indicate which wrestler had the leg hold for the clinch. This process saved some time from the way it was done on Friday.

According to FILA refereeing delegate Mario Saletnig, this was a procedure used in Europe and was well received there.

"We are improving this process," said Saletnig of the change for today's action.