MYA Hosts NH’s First Arena Style Youth Wrestling Tournament

The Merrimack Youth Wrestling Program hosted a weekend of events at the Whittemore Center at UNH in Durham, NH on December 16 and 17, 2017. The weekend kicked off with a clinic run by gold medalist Helen Maroulis and Flo Wrestling’s “Coach of the Century” Mike Krause. Saturday concluded with the 1st Annual Defense Soap Durham Duals featuring the best wrestling club teams in the region. The winner of which was Smitty's Wrestling Barn based in Kingston, NH and runner-up was Doughboy Wrestling Club based in Lowell, MA. And to wrap up the weekend, on Sunday December 17 MYA Wrestling hosted the 13th Annual Tomahawk Throwdown for the first time at the Whittemore Center at UNH in Durham, NH. The weekend was a tremendous effort for everyone involved and a very large wrestling community rallied in support of it to make it possible. The program’s hope was to elevate the sport of wrestling in the state of NH. And, it's apparent many people in the state feel the same way. We received support from many NH high school and middle school wrestlers as well as other youth wrestling programs in the area. With that help we were able to host a very successful event and our hope is this will be the first of many years to come. Twenty nine wrestlers from the MYA competed with individual results below:

Kindergarten: Ryan Safa 4th place; Kameron Lewis 2nd place
First grade: Calissa Bell 4th place; Andrew Schuster 4th place; Olivia Dine wrestled hard in her tough bracket
Second grade: Ryan Marone 4th place
Third graders: Rhys Dewar 3rd place; Emmi Hadded: 1st place; Ben Goldstein 4th place; Luke Emond 4th place; Micah Dodds 2nd place; Aiden Kennedy 3rd place; Amir Safa 4th place; Ben Koudriashov, Collin Schuster, Liam Newman and Kael McAloon fought hard in each of their respective brackets.
Fourth graders: Brady Mahoney 4th place; Shea Buccellato 4th place; Cayden Dine 2nd place; Jackson Meehan 2nd place; Patrick Donahoe: 4th place; Gryffen Gelinas wrestled tough in his bracket
Fifth grade: Ivey Johnson 3rd place
Sixth grade: Mitchell Krupp 4th place; Owen Forrest, Brendan Curley and Danny Safa worked hard in their respective brackets.
Eigth grade: Hunter Adams wrestled well in difficult match-ups.

The Merrimack Youth Wrestling Program is part of the Merrimack Youth Association. It strives to provide a safe recreational activity for Merrimack children in grades K-8. The program promotes the sport of wrestling, the world's oldest sport, by providing a safe practice environment, by delivering high quality instruction, and by facilitating tournament competition opportunities. The Program is in its 13th season and currently has 40 wrestlers on its roster.

Photo caption 1: Gold medalist Helen Maroulis grappling with a young girl at the NXT Level Wrestling Clinic
Photo caption 2: Mike Krause and Helen Maroulis providing instruction at the wrestling clinic
Photo caption 3: “Coach of the Century” Mike Krause, Gold Medalist Helen Maroulis and Bronze Medalist Leigh Jaynes
Photo caption 4: 1st Annual Defense Soap Durham Dual Awards
Photo caption 5: Mitchel Krupp facing off against his opponent
Photo caption 6: Danny Safa in neutral position
Photo caption 7: Eagle eye view of the arena