Road to Paris 2024: USA Wrestling Stars “Locked In” on Advancing Towards Olympic Dreams at Pan Am

The end of February 2024 marks two big opportunities for Team USA to qualify for the road to Paris 2024. With the Olympics beginning in July this year, the qualifying games are the steps of the ladder to the Olympic destination. While the PAN American Wrestling Championship took place from February 21-24, the PAN American Olympic Qualifier is scheduled for February 28 to March 1.

Organized in Acapulco, Mexico, both these qualifying games help the top wrestlers wriggle their way to the pinnacle of their final destination. With the top 5 wrestlers from each category securing a qualifying seat, a total of 90 wrestlers have secured their spot on the road to Paris 2024. Seeking to add continental titles and accomplishments to their athletic profile, the PAN American Olympic Qualifier will help 36 athletes earn a spot for the 2024 Paris Olympics.

Road to Paris 2024: The upcoming Pan Am Olympic qualifiers

Divided into three phases – The men’s freestyle, women’s freestyle, and the Greco-Roman – wrestling champions will seek to add every effort in their Olympic quotas throughout their qualification system. This is because there is not a direct qualifying procedure for wrestling athletes. The three-day qualifier event will be seeing six Greco-Roman Olympic weight classes on the 28th of February, followed by Women’s Wrestling on the 29th of February and Men’s Freestyle on the 1st of March, mentions the USA Wrestling post on X, while ‘locking in’ the upcoming PAN American Olympic Games.

As understood before, with no gold, bronze, and repechage bouts covering the event, it is clear that only 4 wrestlers from each weight category will be seeded to qualify for the rounds. Awaiting some of the most intense competitions in the qualifying rounds, some renowned names in the wrestling sport who will be representing the USA in the upcoming PAN American Olympic Qualifiers are listed below.

Prominent names who’ve made it to the Qualifiers

On the road to Paris 2024, the three prominent categories of wrestlers comprises of few names that have dug into the qualification. The Women’s freestyle eyes the very talented, 72kg world champion wrestler, Amit Elor (USA). Dominique Parrish (USA) is also looking ahead of the 53kgs weight class. The Men’s freestyle already has Olympic qualifiers in wrestling, for 74kg, 86kg, 97kg, and 125kg. Covering only the 57kg and 65kg in Acapulco, Zane Richards (USA) and Nicholas Lee (USA), are the throbbing wrestlers aiming to qualify in the PAN American Olympic Qualifiers.

Read More: Pan Am Championships: USA Men’s Wrestling Team Concludes Competition With 6 Mind-Blowing Stats

The gold medalist under the 62 women’s category, Kayla Miracle, had an interview with USA Wrestling lately. She said, “It is the most nerve-racking tournament. I need to learn how the last 40 seconds or maybe 45, when I went gun-blazing you know, I need to be clutching that moment when I’m down for the first fireman. I need to learn how to do that from match one, minute one, second one.” Therefore, making provisions for the upcoming PAN American Olympic Games Qualifier in Acapulco, the USA wrestlers are ready to battle off for new records.