By Gary Abbott USA Wrestling 10/11/2010Tommy Rowlands in action at the 2007 World Championships. Larry Slater photo
GROZNY, Russia - A pair of U.S. wrestlers claimed bronze medals at the Ramzan Kadirov Cup of freestyle wrestling, Oct. 9-10.
Winning bronze medals were Nick Marable (Columbia, Mo./unattached) at 74 kg/163 lbs. and Tommy Rowlands (Hilliard, Ohio/Sunkist Kids) at 120 kg/264.5 lbs.
Marable defeated Samuel Imeksuyan of Russia, 1-0, 0-2, 1-0 in the bronze-medal bout. He finished with a 4-1 record in the tournament. His only loss was in the second round to eventual champion Muslim Dudaev of Russia, 0-1, 0-4.
For Marable, a former star at the Univ. of Missouri, it was his first major international freestyle medal.
Rowlands won his bronze-medal bout over Khizir Durgaev of Russia, 1-1, 1-1. He finished with a 3-1 record, with his only loss to eventual runner-up Taha Akgul of Turkey.
Rowlands was fifth in the 2007 World Championships and is a past World University Games champion.
Russia won gold medals in all seven weight classes.
“The tournament was really good,” said U.S. coach Jamill Kelly. “The quality was probably as good as the Worlds and the Yarygin. The winners got prize money on the award stand. It was a tremendous competition.”
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