After the stupendous success of Senior World Wrestling championships in Nur-Sultan – Kazakhstan, United World Wrestling (UWW) is all geared up for the U23 World Championships in Budapest. As the (unofficial) early entries currently sit, there are 631 athletes from 64 different nations that’ll wrestle in Budapest, Hungary from October 28 through November 3.
10 Defending U23 World Champions will be seen in action
Ten of those 631 wrestlers return to the U23 World Championships looking to defend their world titles won a year ago in Bucharest. The championships is less than two weeks away and reigning senior-level Nugzari TSURTSUMIA (GEO) headlines a list of entries that boasts one-third of last year’s U23 world champions.
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Greco-Roman will have five returning worlds champions — headlined by reigning senior-level world champion Nugzari Tsurtsumia, who just reached the top of the 55kg podium at the Nur-Sultan World Championships in late September. He’ll be joined in Budapest by fellow Georgian Zviadi PATARIDZE (GEO), who already has six age-group world titles to his name.
The other three returning U23 Greco-Roman world champions are Mohamed ELSAYED (EGY), Katsuaki ENDO (JPN) and Semen NOVIKOV (UKR).
El Sayed, who qualified Egypt for the Olympic Games at 67kg, will wrestle at 67kg — which is the same weight as Japan’s Katsuaki Endo, while Novikov will lace up at 87kg. Freestyle has a trio of returning U23 world champions. They are Taimuraz SALKAZANOV (SVK), Kamran GHASEMPOUR (IRI) and Shamil ZUBAIROV (AZE). They’ll compete at 74kg, 86kg and 92kg, respectively.
In women’s wrestling, Japan’s Saki IGARASHI (55kg) and China’s Paliha PALIHA (76kg) will travel to Hungary to try to defend their titles from a year ago.
The entire action from the UWW U23 World Wrestling Championships will be streamed LIVE on WrestlingTV.in straight from Hungary, Budapest.
Returning U23 World Champions:
Freestyle
74kg – Taimuraz SALKAZANOV (SVK)
86kg – Kamran Ghorban GHASEMPOUR (IRI)
92kg – Shamil ZUBAIROV (AZE)
Greco-Roman
55kg – Nugzari TSURTSUMIA (GEO)
67kg – Mohamed ELSAYED (EGY)
67kg – Katsuaki ENDO (JPN)
87kg – Semen NOVIKOV (UKR)
130kg – Zviadi PATARIDZE (GEO)
Women’s Wrestling
55kg – Saki IGARASHI (JPN)
76kg – Paliha PALIHA (CHN)
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