COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. - Army Female Athlete of the Year Tina George knew she had to prove her wrestling family wrong at the 2002 World Championships.

Her closest supporters in the tight-knit community thought she made a wrestling mistake by joining the U.S. Army. They said basic training would hinder her on-mat training; that military demands would deter her evolution as a wrestler.

"The wrestling community didn't think I was taking my wrestling career seriously enough because I had joined the Army," recalled George, 24, who never placed higher than sixth in her first three trips to the World Wrestling Championships. "So that was my chance to prove a point that I was making the best move."

George, a five-time U.S. women's wrestling champion, made her point loudly and clearly by winning a silver medal in the 121-pound division of the 2002 World Wrestling Championships at Athens, Greece.

"I knew before I went in that I was making the right decision," said George, 24, a native of Cleveland. "Joining the Army isn't something that you just jump up and decide to do one morning. It was something I thought about and I knew without a doubt that it was the right move for me."

After attending the University of Minnesota at Morris for two years, George began training at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, where she scrounged to live off a $900 monthly training stipend.

"It was really hard to live off $900 a month," she said. "It would be OK in any other city, but Colorado Springs is so expensive. I barely had enough money to take care of my day-to-day activities, like eating. I used all my money to move out here and I was eating oatmeal for two months. If I had a little extra money, I would buy some strawberries for my oatmeal. But it was a sacrifice that I felt like I had to make because this was my dream - to compete in the Olympics."

George also worked part time and studied chemistry at the University of Colorado. She plans to graduate this summer from Colorado Christian University with a degree in human resources. Competition travel took its toll on her chemistry labs.

While training at the OTC, George caught the eye of All-Army coach Shon Lewis, who convinced Army officials to allow women to join his wrestling team in the Army World Class Athlete Program. In the meantime, George realized it was time to get serious about working for a living or giving up wrestling.

"I thought I might have to move back home and live with my parents to continue training," she said. "When coach Lewis first approached me, I really was more focused on finishing school because that was one of my primary goals, right up there with wrestling. I did not want to put my school plans on the side, but it got to a point where school was too expensive.    "And it was getting tough to ride a bicycle uphill to class after finishing my workouts."

The prospect of joining the Army suddenly seemed much more feasible. She became a soldier in October of 2001 and completed Basic Training at Fort Jackson, S.C., in March of 2002.

"I was really excited about the opportunity to be in the Army, be a soldier, and still accomplish my goal in wrestling," George said. "I had wanted actually to be in the Army since I was younger. My aunt [Rachel George] was in the Army and my uncle [Daniel George] was in the Gulf War. I really admired them. I wanted to do everything that my aunt did. She was really tough.

"My dad always talked about how tough she was. We looked at pictures when I was little and we kind of looked alike and had the same mannerisms. After that, I wanted to be just like her. She was jumping out of planes, and I wanted to jump out of a plane.

"She was tough, and I wanted to be just like her."

George began wrestling in 1996 during her junior year at Cleveland Heights High. She made the boys varsity squad and posted a record of "two and I don't even count the losses."

"To remember all the losses would depress me," she said with a laugh. "But those two wins were the whole world."

She wrestled against boys at 125 pounds.

"Which is not typically where you see a female wrestling; they're usually at 103 or 112," George explained. "That's a big jump to be at that weight class because those guys are pretty strong when you get past 119. Those guys are monsters."

The soldiers at Fort Carson, however, graciously welcomed George.

"The Army wrestlers were exceptional about accepting me into their training program," she said. "Wrestling is predominantly a male sport and you cannot usually just walk into someone's training room. That's like walking into somebody's home. Being a female athlete, it is difficult sometimes to break in and to be accepted, but they didn't make a big deal out of it.

"If anybody did have any kind of reserved feelings, they kept them to themselves. Of course, if someone says women should be in the kitchen and not wrestling, I might turn around and break their neck."

George stands 5 feet tall and weighs 128 chiseled pounds. After taking nearly a year off the mat for Army Basic Training and Advanced Individual Training, she defeated nemesis Stephanie Murata to win the U.S. World Team Trials at Minneapolis, Minn., on July 21-23, and earned a trip to the World Championships in Greece.

At Worlds, George finally proved that she had made the right decision after forfeiting a year of competition.

"It made all the difference in the world for me to be in this program," she said of training with soldiers. "I would come in at 5:30 or 6 in the morning to lift weights and I would always have a partner. I would come in the middle of the afternoon, in between practices to work out, and I would always have a partner and I would have a coach. The difference is always having these resources and always having somebody in your corner who wants you to win.

"They gave me a key and said I could come in the middle of the night and work out," George continued. "I've never had that before - nowhere."

Likewise, George never has been to the Nation's Capital, where she was honored Friday night.

"I've never been to D.C. before," she said. "When I found out, I was pretty much stunned. I wasn't expecting to receive so many accolades, as far as awards, being able to meet people and receiving coins. The World Championships and Olympics have been my personal goals for so long that it never occurred to me that anybody else would even be interested in what I did or my accomplishments -- being as excited as I am that I've been doing so well.

"It's really a nice feeling to be supported like that and know that you have a whole cheering section that's just for you."

Especially during wartime.

"We were just in Guatemala competing last weekend and all the channels were covering the war," she said last week. "It was really hard to be focused knowing that your fellow soldiers are going to war, your country is at war, and as an Army soldier that I might receive a call also.

"As much as I want to wrestle, I'm always a soldier first and I'm going to do my job if they call me," continued George, a carpentry/masonry specialist for the 52nd Engineer Battalion. "But my unit hasn't been called yet."

George and teammate Dremiel Byers not only were named Army Athletes of the Year, they received the same type of awards from the U.S. Olympic Committee.

"We're going to be together for awhile," she said with a big grin. "Out of all the athletes, they picked the two of us. They must think we're greedy for two athletes from the same program to get all the awards. But we're going to try to do it again next year. We're going to hog all the awards for our wrestling program."

For the first time in Olympic history, women will wrestle in the 2004 Summer Games at Athens, Greece.

"Every competition and every practice is focused on the ultimate goal of having an Olympic medal," George said. "And I want nothing but gold."

She also plans to spread the word of the Army World Class Athlete Program.

"I just want to thank coach Shon Lewis for going out of his way and above and beyond by putting in all this work to get me i