Erica Wiebe attended the London Olympics in a support role as a training partner for Leah Callahan. In a rare quiet moment between sessions, she tiptoed onto the Olympic mats and closed her eyes.
“No one was looking — it was like two seconds,” the 26-year-old freestyle wrestler says at a national team training camp at the University of Calgary. “I just took a deep breath of fresh air and felt the mat.”
Lo and behold … “They felt the exact same as the mats I train on every day.”
In that moment, Wiebe realized the Olympics are not some unattainable fantasy open only to others. With hard work, determination and maybe a bit of luck, the Stittsville, Ont. native knew deep down she could compete for Canada at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio.
The first step to qualifying came in November at the Canadian team trials in Strathcona County, just outside of Edmonton. Battling to keep her breakfast down due to nerves, the University of Calgary Dino won the 75-kilogram weight class.
Next up is a more formidable battle to lock up a spot for Canada in her weight class at the Pan Am qualifiers March 4-6 in Frisco, Texas.
“I’ve wrestled at the world championships, I’ve wrestled at major games, and I’ve had success at all that,” says Wiebe, a 2014 Commonwealth Games gold medallist who is ranked fifth in the world. “So I just do what I do every day. I go to the gym, work hard, grind and don’t change anything.”
The Canadian women’s wrestling team finished second in the rankings at the 2008 Beijing Olympics and third at the 2012 London Games. A podium threat in all four weight classes, Tonya Verbeek, won silver in London and Carol Huynh, the Olympic gold medallist in Beijing, collected bronze.
Verbeek and Huynh have since retired, leaving Canada with a collection of Olympic rookies heading into Rio, where women will compete in six weight classes compared to just four in London.
At the 2015 World Wrestling championships in Las Vegas, Canada finished ninth overall.
“The exciting part of our team is that they’re in this adventure together,” says Leigh Vierling, head coach of the women’s national team. “It’s their first Olympics as a group, and all of them are planning on carrying on past this Olympics and trying for the next Olympics as well.
“We’ve got a chance to not only do something great right now, but we’ve got a really bright future as well.”
Determined to doing something great in Rio, Genevieve Morrison, of Campbell’s Bay, Que. secured an Olympic berth for Canada in the 48-kilogram class by winning bronze at the world championships. But Jasmine Mian, of Barrie, Ont. won the Canadian trials in that division, leaving Morrison on the sidelines for Rio.
“Wrestling can be cruel,” Wiebe says. “In Canada, on our women’s team, we just have amazing people. We’re just super competitive internationally, and it’s really hard to come out of Canada.”
At the Canadian trials, a similar thing happened in the 63-kilogram weight class. Braxton Stone-Papadopoulos had locked up a spot in Rio for Canada by finishing fifth in Las Vegas.
Coming off reconstructive knee surgery, Danielle Lappage, of Olds, Alta., upset Stone-Papadopoulos at the trials to book her ticket to the five-ring circus — leaving the youngster from Scarborough, Ont. at home.
At the end of the day, Canada has two wrestlers — Lappage and Mian — confirmed for the Rio Games. The other four spots are yet to be clinched in international competition.
“The dream is still alive,” said Dori Yeats, a Toronto Pan Am Games gold medallist and Commonwealth Games champion who is ranked ninth in the world at 68 kilograms. “I finished the first step by winning the qualifications. I think I’m just excited.
“When I decided the Olympics were my goal and my dream, I knew very well these were the steps I had to do. I’m just following along my path.”
To that end, Yeats and her team are off to Rio for a test event at the end of the month in a tune-up for the March qualifier.
Should they fail to advance in March, there are two last-chance qualifiers — one in Mongolia and one in Turkey.
Canada has won at least one medal in women’s wrestling at every world championship and Olympics since 2002. Intensely proud of that stat, Vierling sees no reason why the streak won’t continue.
“I want people to discount us, to be honest,” he says. “I want them to say, ‘Yeah, they’re young. They’re probably not going to do too much.’
“Because with the way the team is looking right now and the way the team is working, I’m more than confident that they’re going to do some great things in Rio.”
Courtesy of: National Post