The New Zealand Secondary Schools' Wrestling Team will be flying out to Southern California on April 13th, the day after the NZSS Champs in Hamilton.

They will be hosted by wrestling families in the Orange County area for the first two and a half weeks, visiting and wrestling in dual meets at the following high schools:

El Dorado HS, Orange County; Esperanza HS, Orange County; San Clemente HS, Orange County; Lakewood HS, LA County; La Costa Canyon HS, San Diego County.

El Dorado HS is an old friend of NZ Wrestling. Like Lakewood HS, they hosted the NZ team in 2000. Successful El Dorado coaches Steve Lawson & Kyle Iwanaga (winners of their League and Conference for the past two seasons) had NZ wrestler Israel McMillan on their team in 2001. Coach Iwanaga has visited NZ and so they are well-familiar with our wrestling and keen to help us develop. Coach Lawson is a former US Open National Champion (Greco), Pan Am bronze medallist, 3 other National titles and California HS Champ.

The team will also compete in freestyle/Greco tournaments at the following venues:

April 13th: Canyon HS

April 19th: El Dorado HS

April 26th: Segerstrom HS

These tournaments will be bigger and of a higher calibre than any our boys have seen before.

Coach Mark Grayling is intending for the team to train with each of the high schools visited and to learn from their experienced US coaches. He has also arranged a wrestling clinic at Cal State Fullerton, the only NCAA Division 1 wrestling college in Southern California. The clinic will be taken by world renown freestyle wrestler and top folkstyler Joe Gonzales.

Gonzales has an incredible record and has collected a huge number of honours. He was a National High School Champion, an NCAA Division 1 National Champion and set an NCAA National record for takedowns in a single season, 448, and most wins in a single season 55-0. He was a many times National Open Freestyle Wrestling Champion, 3 times World Cup Champion and a winner of the Tibilisi Tournament, which was considered to be the toughest tournament in the world. He is also an inductee of the USA Wrestling Hall of Fame and was the subject of a feature article in Sports Illustrated.

Also at the Cal State Fullerton clinic will be Head Coach Dan Hicks. He is a 2xNCAA Champion,
2XPac 10 Champions and was voted wrestler of the decade for the 142 lbs weight class

After a little recovery and relaxation at the famed theme parks and cultural events, the team will head up to Centennial HS Bakersfield in Central California. Coach Grayling has wrestled in this area himself and knows how tough it is.

From Bakersfield the team moves further on up to the San Francisco area, where there are duals with a couple of the local schools, before returning home on May 10th.

The team management are pleased with the way the organisation for the tour has progressed and the wrestlers are keen to get under way after their recent training camp. Says Coach Grayling: "It would take about three seasons in NZ to get the same amount of specialist training and quality matches that these guys are going to get in one month. It is the perfect time of year for this tour because it's just before our season really gets going and it suits US Wrestling's freestyle season, which runs from 8th March till 31st May."

The Team:

Andy Roche (Manager - Katikati), Mark Grayling (Coach - Mt Maunganui), Dan Grevatt (Team Leader), Lee Darbyshire (Katikati), Tim Myers (Hawera), Josh Clarke (Waitakere, Ak),  Sean Dowd (Sacred Heart, Ak), Matthew Grevatt (St John's, Hastings), Caylen Greenwood (Katikati), Sam Gurnell (Dilworth), Gerard Van Der Mark (Hillcrest, Hamilton), Jason Harvey (Katikati)

On 9th March we held a 'quickfire' open tournament for only 3 weight groups. Wrestling started 10 minutes after weigh-in finished and was all over within 2 hours, including a number of requested special bouts. We were fortunate to have our old friend, Axel Frommhold from Germany, visiting at the same time as this event and his participation was welcomed by all.

Results:

66kg: 1. Clinton Hall (Dilworth Grizzlies); 2. Sean Dowd (Counties-Hunua); 3. Kazuki Baker (DG)

74kg: 1. Axel Frommhold (Germany); 2. Stefan Frick (DG); 2. Sam Gurnell (DG)

84kg: 1. Faisal Attayee (Kelston Gladiators); 2. Reza Abedi (DG); 3. Nick Munro (DG)

Five members of the Dilworth Grizzlies WC have been selected so far to represent New Zealand in 2008.

Ali Masoudi, Clinton (Davies) Hall, Olena Bondarenko and Andrei Paulet have been chosen to compete for NZ at the Oceania Championships in Canberra from 8th - 10th of February.

Ali (74kg) and Clinton (66kg) will compete in both Senior freestyle and Greco-Roman. Olena (48kg) competes in the Senior Women's division and if she can win her weight class she has a very real chance of representing NZ at the Beijing Olympics.

Andrei (66kg) is entered in the Junior Men's (Under 21) division and is hoping to use this event as part of his build-up to compete in the World Junior Championships to be held in Turkey in July.

The fifth club member to have been selected in a NZ team is Dilworth School Team Captain, Sam Gurnell (74kg). Sam has been chosen as part of the New Zealand Secondary Schools Team which will tour to California in April of this year.

The South Pacific Games were held in Samoa early in September and Samoan representative Faafetai Iutana, who trains at the Dilworth Club, won silver medals in both the 96kg freestyle and the 96kg Greco-Roman events.

Faafetai represented Samoa at the 2000 Sydney Olympics in Greco-Roman and at the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games in freestyle.

A series of unfortunate events meant that, once again, only a small number of our club members were able to travel to this year's Nationals in Hamilton: a small, but very successful number.

 On the first day (Friday 24 August) we had competitors in the Junior (Under 21) freestyle and the Senior Greco-Roman. Andrei Paulet won the 66kg Junior freestyle with a calm and controlled performance, having only 1 point scored against him (for stepping out of bounds). North Island Junior 74kg Champion, Sam Gurnell, wrestled some of his best matches of the season, but could not make it through to the medals in a very tough weight group, won narrowly by Scott Gerrand (Tawa).

In the Senior Greco-Roman session, Dilworth stormed through, winning the divisions at 66kg (Clinton Hall), 74kg (Ali Masoudi) and 84kg (Ali Bagheri), with an addtional bronze medal at 84kg to Reza Abedi.

 The following day saw more medals in the Senior freestyle, with Andrei Paulet (66kg) and Ali Masoudi (74kg) both taking their second golds and Clinton Hall (66kg) and a very tired Ali Bagheri (84kg) earning silvers.

 These fine performances meant that Dilworth Grizzlies won the trophy for  Champion NZ Senior Club and Champion NZ Greco-Roman Club.

In addition, Ali Masoudi took out the award for the Most Scientific Senior Wrestler and Andrei Paulet completed a double for us by winning the Most Scientific Junior Wrestler award. Ali was also presented with the trophy for the Most Outstanding Performance in Greco-Roman Wrestling.