September 5th - Emma Randall

Today is our last day in Ostia, Italy.  We ended the training week with one mat session this afternoon.  After a warm up led by Seiko, the world team members each wrestled one match and worked on individual focus areas.  This team is prepared and ready to fight for world medals.  In each athlete, you can see their desire for gold and their strong will that enables them to go through hell to reach for it.  It's inspiring to be surrounded by such great individuals (both athletes and coaches) and their passion for our sport.  I'm grateful for the opportunity to be a part of Team USA and their journey to the 2014 World Championships. 


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World Championship Information including athlete entries, weight class previews, schedules, broadcast information, and more can be found at the link below.
http://www.teamusa.org/USA-Wrestling/Features/2014/August/25/2014-World-Championships-Special-Section

September 3rd - Alex Conti

The attitude of the ladies seems great.  They are all working very hard, the partners are giving them great looks, and the whole process seems to be heading in the right direction.  I'm very excited for the upcoming World Championships because I know these young ladies are ready and prepared for whatever may be placed in front of them.  It's been  a great week of training here in Italy.  It was nice to have the men's freestyle program around.  They are looking awesome as well.  I hope that men's freestyle has a great flight tomorrow to Tashkent. 
Our hosts here in Italy have been over the top, fantastic.  They have been accommodating and great to be around.  It's great to travel around the world and meet people so hospitable to our teams.  On Tuesday our hosts, Michele Liuzzi and Salvatore Finizio went out of their way to treat the coaches to a phenomenal dinner it included about 22 courses.  Mama Mia! Or so they say...
Ciao
Alex Conti
World Coach

September 2nd - Elena Pirozhkova

Today is our third day here in Ostia, Italy. The weather is amazing...its a bit hot during the day but the morning and evenings are a cooler which is nice when you go out for a stroll along the water. On the schedule we had a team mat practice in the morning and then open mat/game in the evening.
      Practice is short and sweet. There is nothing you can really change at this point technically. All this years hard work has lead up to this point... you either did the work or you didn't. We go over focus areas Terry has for us and do some live 3 min goes. Right now its all about just getting your body feeling good and staying in a good mind set.
    Between practices its hard to stay awake since we really haven't adjusted to the time yet so we resort to caffeine.  Me, Helen, Vicki, and some of the junior guys that are here with the mens freestyle team head to a cafe on the beach and kill time with some ridiculous "would you rather" scenarios along with too many lattes and cappuccinos.
    Evening is on our own. Some people come in to play soccer, some are wrestling, and other just doing cardio to get their weight off. But we all end up in the sauna.
     We are less than a week out from the start of the tournament and you can see people getting focused. Its one of my favorite times during the year, the week leading up to competition. Every one has a different "ritual" of how they get ready for the tournament and how they cut weight. You can tell there is a tension in the air...Everyone is walking a fine line of staying focused, but not to focused.  Staying relaxed, but not to relaxed. Trying to get to that perfect zone where you feel your body and mind are ready to compete.
    Terry tells us there is never a moment where you feel like "yep I'm ready" so I try not to look for it. You just have to trust yourself that when the moment comes you will do what you have been trained to do.

September 1st

Why do you wrestle?  Why do you choose to sacrifice time with friends and family, a lazy Sunday morning in bed, and delicious deserts for a sport?  The prize money and notoriety (the two don't really exist in women's wrestling) are results of your action.  Those aren't what drive you.  So tell me why do you wrestle?  Look deeper.  When the sacrifice becomes so great or that confidence is rattled, what gets you through it?  What is the source of that passion, tenacity, and inspiration?  The world team members were asked to write their own reasons... Here are a few:

I wrestle for a lot of reasons.  I fell in love with the sport because it was the most uncomfortable thing I ever tried. And I wants to figure out why it pushed so many of my buttons. Wrestling was a way to develop myself as a person. Is highlights all your flaws physically and mentally. I thought after high school I was gonna be done with this sport and move on but I got a chance to move to the training center. From that moment on wrestling was an opportunity to make something of myself, with my life and help my family in the future. This sport has opened so many doors in life for me and to myself.  It allows me to live the life I want. I travel the world, work on myself and personal development and get paid for it. Since I don't have real bills it allows me to take care of my family. I have been able to buy a house for my mom.... help my family see at least a bit of the world and use my connections to get them jobs and internships. The better i get the better they get. Wrestling doesnt come without hardships but the positive gains I get outweigh any negative. When the going gets tough for me I think of all these things. That my success is not only about me. And it doesn't matter how I feel. I inspire my family, friends and people around me. One of my sisters told me that she never though I would go this far in life so far... and it wasn't ment to be mean. I started becoming a troubled kid in high school and resented rules. I'm surprised as well... well maybe not any more....so for her she thinks if I can do it and get my shit together so can she. I know in our family we all push each other. My younger siblings compare themselves to me. I would never give up... so they won't either.... in whatever aspect that would be in life. Also when you are in a hard situation in a match I think about how I respect myself and what I do. I've worked to hard to just give up and not try. To much money had been put into me and other coaches and people investing time into me. If I just give up its a slap in the face to everyone and myself. Its one thing to lose but its another thing to give up... I would never live that down within myself.  My story in life and wrestling is something bigger... bigger than me.    

I wrestle for many reasons. A few of them being that I can't picture life without it and I wouldn't want to. I wrestle for the thrill and because I'm addicted to the competition aspect of it. There are so many ups and downs with wrestling, but there's no better feeling than competing to win. I wrestle not only for myself, but for the hours my parents spent when I was growing up taking me every weekend to tournaments all over. I wrestle to make them proud because I know they love to see me succeed as much as I do. I wrestle because I love to win and therefore I like the process put in to winning. 

Why do I wrestle? I found myself thinking about this question for a long time after it was asked. It's clearly not a yes or no answer, but there's more behind the reason than just love. Truthfully, sometimes I don't always love the sport or the grind. I wrestle because I've put everything into this sport, to stop, or not give it my all would be an injustice to myself, my family, and my coaches. I continually push myself day in and day out because I have an itch for more. Climbing the ladder of success is fun, but stumbling, that is were I truly learn. I believe I can learn from every single experience on the mat. So that is why I do it, because I want more, I want better for myself. Even when I fall, I know that the next step is getting back. So that, in a short summary is why I wrestle. 

August 31st - Alli Ragan

Hey y'all! After two long flights I have some serious cankles, but happy to say we made it Rome all in one piece! I couldn't think of a better place to acclimate for worlds than here, and from what I've seen so far it's beautiful. The training center is just a block away from the beach, which means I expect the team to be tan by the time worlds comes around in a week. Once we got settled, Sarah Hildebrandt and I went for a run along the beach to get the flight out of us, and later as a team we played some soccer which can get pretty competitive with us wrestlers. A bunch of us then took the train into Rome to explore and we got to see the Pantheon, the Trevi Fountain, and got some gelato! Thanks for reading!

- Alli Ragan

58kg World Team Member

August 30th - Erin Tomeo

Today was a travel day for US women's team. Most of the group departed out of Colorado Springs and those who didn't were met in Washington Dulles before taking of for Rome. The day, unlike many other travel days, was smooth and easy. Alarms did not have to be set prior to the sun coming up. A full nights sleep is always a great way to start any trip, Some enjoyed sleep than others... I may or may not have overslept a tad.
United was good to us as we embarked on our 9 hour flight . Their planes could use some upgrades but we all got our reward miles booked. Of course conversation on the plane is always fun when a team of 20 deep roll in reppin' the USA swagger. I'm not sure if the sweet old lady knew Terry just turned 45 and was trying to make him feel good - but who doesn't like to be called attractive. The baggage claim on the other side is always suspenseful as everyone watches to see if their bags made it, everything arrived - even Victoria's delicious Mexican coffee.
The energy is great, everyone's spirits are high as we know what this team is capable of. The team is excited to arrive in Rome get the jet lag out, acclimate and go through the final phase to prepare for world domination.
Stay tuned! More exciting updates coming soon...
Erin Tomeo
World Team Coach

August 29th - Helen Maroulis

Yesterday, marked the last day of wrestling practices for our World Team camp. We did a competition simulation: 4 matches in the morning, and a “finals” match for our night practice (complete with spotlight and crowd-chanting music to really set the scene). Doing a competition simulation gives us an opportunity to recreate those nerves and excitement that we get during a tournament, while being able to test out the moves we have been working on this whole summer. We followed last night’s hard day of training with a recovery workout this morning. The workout consisted of foam rolling and dynamic stretching. Since camp has officially ended I have been able to fully reflect on the past couple weeks of training, especially the goal I’ve set for myself, and that we have set as a team: 2014 World Champions. We are ready. This has been one of the best training camps I have ever been a part of. Coach Steiner always stresses that it is not just the outcome, but the process, as well. The process this year has been great, especially thanks to the coaches, national team, strength and conditioning, and sports medicine staff. Now it’s just time to get those results. All that’s left to do here in the US is finish packing and board the plane to Italy tomorrow, where we will have our acclimation camp. Acclimation camps help us get adjusted to the time change while putting us in a new training environment, which is good for our minds and bodies. I couldn’t have asked for a better summer, and it’s not even over yet. I know for many school has already started, but I still don’t consider the summer to be over :P. Not until we finish it off right…2014 World Champions!!!!
Till next time,
Helen Maroulis
55kg World Team Member