Stepan Maryanyan from Russia has been one of the most dominant Greco-Roman wrestlers world over. Following his gold medal at the 2018 World Wrestling Championships, the Greco-Roman grappler was victorious in the 2019 European Championships, European Games and the prestigious Dan Kolov event. Stepan recently won a silver medal at the 2019 world championship in Nur-Sultan in 63kg weight category.
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But it wasn’t always so straight forward for the mercurial Russian. Before 2018, his career was marked by two dominant traits: Creative flair, and inconsistency. His explosive flips and vice-like clamp on opponents were often undone by basic errors, undoubtedly caused by matters in his personal life particularly death of his father.
The champion from Dinskaya hasn’t forgotten his days of struggle as kid. 28 year old Maryanyan every year organizes a tournament for children in his native village of Dinskaya in the Krasnodar district. In the 3rd edition of the event about 350 wrestlers of the age group of 11-13 years participated in the tournament. The tournament was attended by biggest of the champions from Russia in the sport of wrestling and otherwise.
This year’s event prize money ceremony was attended by three former Olympic winners in three sports – Alexander Moskalenko (trampoline), Arsen Galstyan (judo) and Davit Chakvetadze (Greco-Roman wrestling).
“I am glad that so many athletes, so many guys are present at the tournament for the prizes of Stepan Maryanian, this is great initiative by him to promote his sport” said Olympic Judo winner Arsen Galstyan.
Maryanian added, “I feel very happy to organize this tournament for kids. Its great to see them participate in my village from where my wrestling journey started, I am sure these kids will be future stars for Russia and will become great ambassadors for sport”
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In this year’s edition competitions were held in 12 weight categories – from 32 to 85 kg. In addition to cash prizes, medals, cups and diplomas, various special prizes were handed over – from fitness bracelets to plasma TVs.
