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ONE OF A KIND; SCOTTSBURG'S VIRES ONLY GIRL
WRESTLER IN INDIANA
The
Courier-Journal (Louisville, KY)
December 12, 1989,
It was 10:05 Saturday morning, and Ange Vires found
herself in a headlock. The 14-year-old Scottsburg High School freshman has
been
in that position a lot lately, but she has done the same
to a few unsuspecting teen-age boys.
The wiry 5-foot-5 Vires is Indiana's only female
high school varsity wrestler, although girls compete in wrestling in eight
other states,
according to the National Federation of State High
School Associations.
Still, while the sight of Vires in a
purple-and-gold singlet and headgear may amuse some and make others uneasy,
she feels
comfortable.
"When they (male opponents) step onto the mat,
they put out 150 percent because they don't want to lose to a girl," Vires
said.
"They say, "Whoo . . . a girl. Then I do a lot better
than they expect. When I leave they say, 'Good job.' "
But Vires wound up in the headlock almost
immediately Saturday. Flat on her back, knees buckled, arms clasping at her
opponent's
grip, she fought. Legs swung high over her head in an
attempt to get her opponent into a leglock, she fought. She tried to boost
him off,
twist and wriggle her way out.
Though most wrestlers would have conceded defeat
in a similar situation, she fought until the referee slapped the mat and
credited
Charlestown's Chad Tisdale with the pin in the
Charlestown Five-Way meet.
Vires was pinned three more times Saturday by
wrestlers from New Washington, Providence and Corydon, her season record
dropping to 3-9. Each time, she stomped her feet angrily
at a miscalculated move and chastised herself, but in the end she shook her
opponent's hand.
Newcomers get pinned often, but even knowing
that didn't make her feel any better. Vires, who normally tips the scales at
98
pounds, weighed in at 103 1/2 fully clothed (boys are
weighed without clothes) and had to compete in the 112-pound class.
To prepare for the competition, she ate pasta,
lifted weights and scrimmaged daily. Vires lost a wrestle-off to her cousin,
Ken
Peacock, in the 103-pound class and was assigned to
wrestle at 112. Most of her challengers were more experienced, and it showed
in
their techniques.
One day Vires, too, will be experienced. "It
will come," her coach, Mark Clover, often tells her. But for now, she not
only must
overcome her limited skills, but also deal with a
skeptical public. Her reception at the Brown County dual meet early in the
season was
cold and a little hostile, Peacock said. She responded
by pinning her opponent in one minute and 51 seconds. But the talk hasn't
quieted.
"Some coaches have told me they tell their kids
to go and beat up on her in a hurry," Clover said. "They don't think girls
should be
wrestlers."
Some have pointed out that her success is often
a boy's humiliation. A loss to her left a Columbus East wrestler in tears,
Vires said.
"I felt bad for him, but at the same time I felt
good for me," Vires said. "If they (boys) can't deal with it, that's their
problem."
Vires' teammates cheer for her during
competition, but some are still trying to adjust to her participation.
Roscoe Marsh wrestles
against her in practice, but he said he doesn't go after
her full force despite Clover's instructions to wrestle as he would in
competition.
"I tried to put out all my strength, but I
really couldn't do it," the first-year wrestler said. "I was being careful.
I couldn't do it because
she's a girl."
Peacock, a junior in his third season on the
wrestling team, said she has the "killer instinct" needed to compete and
will get better in
time.
Still, the idea of a girl competing in a
full-contact sport with boys bothers some. Clover, who supports her
participation, said he was
concerned about too much contact or hurting Vires when
showing her techniques. Others are concerned about a teen-age girl wrestling
with teen-age boys.
"If she has enough skill to be competitive, it's
all right with me," said Kris Knauer, father of one of the Scottsburg
wrestlers. "But I'm
afraid she will get hurt."
"I think she's unique," said Andrea Mathews, a
Scottsburg student. "She's apart from anybody else. I don't have the guts to
do it."
Vires is used to being challenged. She is
Scottsburg's No. 1 girls' cross country runner, a trumpeter in the school's
state-champion
band and was the winner of the 100-meter hurdles in last
year's junior high Mid-Southern Conference meet. So when some opposed her
decision to join the wrestling team, she heard but
didn't heed.
Vires doesn't profess to be a feminist. She
simply wants to wrestle, she said. She became attracted to the sport by
watching her
brother, Larry, a two-year wrestler in the 130-pound
class. He brought his techniques home and tried them out on his sister and
their
younger brother, Jason. Ange said she became fascinated
with the fluidity of his movement and the skill the sport demanded to be
successful.
The energetic freshman also loves basketball,
but she said the defending state champion Warriorettes are "too good."
Besides, she's
afraid mixing it up underneath the basket could lead to
her "hauling off and hitting someone if I thought they meant it," she said.
Wrestling seemed like a logical solution. "It
was the only way I could think of relieving tension without going to
detention," she said.
Vires said she was concerned about convincing
her parents to let her compete.
Her mother was the easy one.
"I basically back them (her children) on
anything they want to do," Marilyn Vires said. "She's into so many things. I
didn't have any
objections because her brother was on the team, but her
father (Herbert) didn't feel the same way. He didn't think she should do it
because
of the physical contact. I had to talk him into it, and
he still isn't completely for it. We still have disagreements about it."
But both parents gave their OKs, and Vires went
to see Clover.
"I found out about two hours after she told the coach at
practice," Larry Vires said. "I didn't think it was possible for her to be
on a guys'
team, and it was a surprise. But other than that, it
didn't matter.
"In her last match at the East Central meet (the
third match of the season) she went out and almost tore this guy apart. He
won on
points, but she had him cradled up. That was the first
time I started to think she had a chance."
Competing has meant changes for Ange Vires, who
said she plans to compete all four years of high school. The blonde hair
that
reached the middle of her back was cut close, to about
chin length. Practices usually keep her at school until after 7 p.m. She
trains to gain
weight, instead of losing as she would during the cross
country season. Unlike cross country, she doesn't want her parents to attend
any
matches until she improves. She wants them to be
impressed, not worried about her safety.
"Ange makes a lot of mistakes, but that's
inexperience," Clover said. "I tell her to be patient with me and I'll teach
her whatshe need to know"
------------------------------
Going the distance Female wrestlers grappling for respect
The Herald-Sun
(Durham, N.C.)
February 13,
1998, Friday
Sometimes success is obtained in the most delicate
manner. And sometimes you have to scratch, sweat and strain just to be able
to say
you tried.
When girls want to participate in high school wrestling,
it's usually the latter.
Science & Math juniors Nickcole Maynard and Laura Brown
have braved a few insults and not a few incredulous looks to claim their
places on the mat alongside their male peers. Success
measured in victories has been elusive, but each has found a deeper, truer
definition.
Maynard (0-6 in her matches) is an excitable brunette
from Newton, given to impromptu demonstrations of her favorite moves. Before
being felled by a season-ending knee injury, she
wrestled at 152 pounds where she faced some of the toughest and most
experienced
wrestlers on opposing teams.
Maynard credited her experiences this season with
helping her develop more pride and self-confidence.
"I like it when the guys are surprised," she said. "They
say, 'Wow, y'all can stay out there six minutes.' "
Brown (3-13 with three forfeits) comes from Advance and
wrestles in the 112- and 119-pound classes and will wrestle in today's
2-A/1-A regional. In contrast with Maynard's frenetic
aura, Brown accompanies every thoroughly considered statement with a
piercing
gaze.
Brown sees the season, in which she failed to win a
match, as a learning experience. "This is the first thing I've tried that
I'm not real good
at," she said. "I've had to learn to lose."
When Maynard and Brown consider their seasons, they
can't look to medals or trophies or stunning upsets for highlights. Instead,
they
identify matches in which they were able to go the
distance with their competitors.
In addition to individual lessons learned, Brown and
Maynard are quick to honor their teammates and coaches.
"Our team is real supportive," Maynard said. "We have to
work so much harder for the respect. [Our teammates] know how hard it is for
us."
Daryl Williams, a Science & Math team captain, said
Maynard and Brown have been an asset to the team.
"They're really motivated and spirited," Williams said.
"It adds to the whole team experience."
Brown praises her teammates and Coach Avery Winford.
"Sometimes," she said, "they have more confidence in us
than we do."
For his part, Winford welcomes girls to the sport he
loves.
"Nickcole and Laura are two of the most dedicated
wrestlers we have," he said. "To me, a wrestler is a wrestler as long as
they dedicate
themselves to the sport."
Winford has enjoyed watching his athletes develop. He
said girls are often timid and shy at first.
"But by the end of the year, they think it's OK to be
tough."
Tough enough
If the increase in the number of girls participating in
wrestling is an indication, many young women already have mastered that
"tough" thing.
On a national level, these wrestlers' cause is being
taken up by Kent Bailo of Lake Orion, Mich.
Bailo organizes the Michigan girls' state championship.
Last year 116 girls wrestled, and he expects many more this year. Ann Arbor,
Mich., will be the site of the first national
championship meet for high school girls March 28-29, and Bailo expects to
welcome wrestlers
from all over the country.
Bailo admits he's always been a "torch carrier." When it
came to girls wrestling, Bailo wanted to "do what's fair and what's best.
Girls were
just getting killed by the boys [in the later high
school years]. It's not fair if they like to wrestle this much that they're
getting this beaten up."
Witnessing girls' perseverance and devotion to the sport
led Bailo to devote his time and energy to providing wrestling
opportunities.
"It's like a field of dreams," Bailo said. "Build it and
they will come."
McMann: Best of the west
One North Carolina wrestler eager to continue to test
her skills at the national level is senior Sara McMann of McDowell High in
Marion.
McMann, a McDowell captain, has scrapped her way to a
14-11 record at 125 and 130. Although McMann primarily has competed
against boys, last year she was the youngest competitor
in the national women's open championship in Orlando, where she finished
sixth.
McMann is weighing scholarship offers from UNC Pembroke,
where she would work out with the men's team and wrestle in women's
tournaments, and Morris College in Minnesota, which so
far is the only college to offer women's varsity wrestling.
McMann echoes the sentiments of Maynard and Brown when
she said she has no desire to be a pioneer. Neither did many of their
forerunners who have exploded barriers for women in
sports in the past. The girls who stick with wrestling love the sport. That
drive
overwhelms opposition and leaves more open minds in its
wake.
"I've changed a lot of guys' views about girls
wrestling," McMann said.
Science & Math's Brown sums it up this way: "It's not
about whether it's a guy, it's about being all you can be at that one point
in that one
match."
Any wrestler can relate to that.
February 13, 1998
-----------------------------------
TOUGH ENOUGH Meade High girl grapples with
plan to break wrestling barriers
The Capital (Annapolis, MD.)
December 10,
1997, Wednesday
When John Dunbar walked into the Meade High School
wrestling room to sign up for the wrestling team prior to the season, Meade
wrestlers asked Dunbar if he was coming out for the team
this year.
He told them no, but said his girlfriend, Heidi Winkler,
was.
Even though female high school wrestlers are not too
common, it wasn't much of a surprise at Meade.
The Mustangs have had other female wrestlers compete on
the junior varsity level before, including one last year and another who
came
out for the team this year. Other females have wrestled
varsity at state schools recently, and Winkler would like to be the first to
do so in
Anne Arundel County.
As a senior, Winkler must participate on the varsity
wrestling team.
Winkler is 5-foot-11 and weighs 136 pounds. If she
wrestles a varsity match, she will compete in the 140-pound class.
Winkler did not wrestle last weekend in the Meade
tournament nor last night in Meade's tri-meet at Southern.
Following last night's tri-meet, Meade coach Pat
Arvidson said he tried to get an exhibition match for Winkler with anyone
from
Broadneck, but no one would wrestle her.
While others may choose to react differently, Winkler
said her Meade team
mates were supportive and encouraging when she came out
for the team.
"Heidi is in here running, sweating, working hard and
not complaining," Arvidson said. "She has been accepted as a member of this
team
for a long time, ever since she walked in the door."
Said Winkler: "I just want people to consider me as a
wrestler, not as a girl wrestler."
"Some guys will say if they win, they lose, and if they
lose, they lose," she said. "They might think it's a no win situation. They
might think
they're beating a stereotypical girl. I want them to
push hard at me and see how hard I push them back."
However, Winkler said she's the op
posite of any stereotype of a girl. She doesn't consider
herself a tomboy, either. So how does she describe herself?
"I'm just a girl who doesn't want to put limits on
myself," Winkler said. "I'm more laid back and I get along better with
guys."
Arvidson, an Ohio native who attended Bowling Green,
came to Meade in June of 1996. He is in the air force, and will leave in
July for
Okinawa.
"With Title IX, the only thing to save wrestling is to
open doors for women," said Arvidson, who was a high school wrestler.
"Toledo
dropped its wrestling program because of Title IX, and
they had hosted the world cup for like 10 years. It was a shame, but they
were a
victim of Title IX."
Arvidson said more and more colleges today are starting
club wrestling teams for women.
"Wrestling is really about speed, tech
nique and intelligence, and that's not dictated by sex,"
Arvidson said.
Winkler has the physical tools to be a good wrestler.
"She has extremely long arms and an incredible wing span
almost like Michael Jordan," Arvidson said. "She can put a cradle on anybody
she wants.
"She wrestled in our scrim
mages and got pinned, but she also pinned someone,"
Arvidson said. "One guy she was wrestling in a scrimmage was laughing, but
then
she put a cross-face cradle on him and he wasn't
laughing anymore."
Not only is she tall, but Winkler has a lengthy athletic
background of 10 years as a swimmer.
Growing up as the fifth of seven children, wrestling was
a way of survival around the Winkler home.
Brothers Hans and Haldan toughened her up by putting pro
fessional wrestling moves on their sister.
"I have three brothers and three sisters, and the
sisters were as equally as tough as the brothers," Winkler said.
Heidi said she wanted to come out for the wrestling team
last year, but couldn't because she worked 40 hours a week at her job. This
year, she cut back on her hours so she could wrestle.
"I wanted to wrestle because I've been doing that with
my family for as long as I can remem
ber," Heidi Winkler said. "My brothers used to put
figure-four leglocks on me and try to piledrive me. They also tried grapple
moves from
ultimate fighting championship."
Born in Tacoma, Wash., Winkler has lived in six
different places throughout the world due to relocation because her father
was in the
army.
After living in Washington state, she moved to Panama,
N.J., Utah and is a resident of Mary
land for the second time.
Winkler moved to Maryland when she was 5, then moved to
New Jersey and stayed there for five years. She has been living in Maryland
for eight years now.
"This is the longest time I've ever lived in one state,"
Winkler said. "It's strange, I felt like it was time to move again because I
was so used
to moving.
"My mom is single now and she has been raising seven
kids by herself for 10 years," Winkler said. "My mom is my main role model.
She is
a strong person."
December 11, 1997
-----------------------------------------
Meet's First Day Is Entertaining
Chattanooga Free Press
February 14,
1997, Friday
A female wrestler, the lightest boy victorious, a man
named "Rampage" with a two-foot chain and a self-inflicted tattoo, a
successful
ballet dancer, a guy who wore the stars and stripes and
a blind wrestler from Cumberland County were all part of the first day of
the 37th
annual Tennessee State Wrestling Championships.
Held at UTC's Maclellan Gym for what seems like forever
now, the state mat extravaganza's opening day was glorious for the 223
winners, disappointing for the identical number of
fallen foes but entertaining nonetheless to the 3,000-plus fans statewide.
Receiving more media attention this week than possibly
in her total three-year varsity career, and justifiably so, Warren County
senior/homecoming queen/honor-roll student Andi Jones
lost to Baylor sophomore Shawn Weller by fall in 1:29.
If Weller advanced to the semifinals today, as expected,
Jones was going to be back in action by late afternoon for a first-round
consolation match.
"When I walk off the mat and say that I gave it my best,
that's all I can do," said Jones, who has not made a spectacle of the sport
but has
made history.
She points to the Biblical reference for inner strength,
Philippians 4:13, which states, "I can do all things through Christ who
strengthens
me."
Speaking of strength, Quinton "Rampage" Jackson from
Raleigh Egypt High School is a wonder to watch in the 189-pound class.
"I like wrestling because you throw people around and
they throw you around," said Jackson, who is 33-2. "That's fun."
He wears a two-foot, big-link chain around his neck and
anticipates a pro wrestling career after his amateur days have concluded.
Surviving a life foreign to the vast majority of his
wrestling peers in this week's competition, the soft-spoken, well-mannered
Jackson was a
street guy for a time with any empty, unlocked car as
his address and gang members his business associates.
"I have been to juvenile court twice and I'm never going
back," said Jackson.
A junior by class but a senior by eligibility, Jackson
plans to petition the TSSAA for an extra year, with the help of coach Peter
Bolgeo.
"Coach has really worked with me to respect my elders,
overlook others' faults and be responsible for my grades," stated Jackson,
who
punctuates answers with "yes, sir" and "no, sir."
He once gave himself a tattoo but now wants to get a
professional one of a big tiger with red eyes or a black panther larger than
life on his
chest. "I like animals."
About 50 pounds lighter but with similar cat-quick
reflexes and an identical 33-2 season mark, Phoenix III's Brian Williams
dances past
mat opponents as well as in performance halls throughout
the state.
Holder of a 60-14 career mark, Williams attributes his
mat success to, of all things, ballet.
"Without the strength I get from performing ballet, I
couldn't compete with any of these guys on the mat," said Williams, who
faced
defending state runner-up Derrick Jordan (Overton) in
the round of 16 earlier today.
Today the action continues until we have the 28
finalists for Saturday's grand finale at 5 p.m.
Phillip Simpson of Father Ryan, the lightest at 90
pounds, and the flag-covered Chad Lane of Oakland look for more wins, while
blind
wrestler Jad Wauthier hopes for a second chance in
consolations.
