Hood River News

December 21, 2005

While most kids relaxed and celebrated the opening weekend of their Christmas vacations, 258 young club wrestlers from Oregon and Washington came together in the Hood River Valley High School gym for the annual Gorge Challenge wrestling tournament, hosted by Hood River’s AirTime Wrestling Club.

The gym was busy, crowded and loud as it bustled with coaches, parents and fans cheering on wrestlers in six side-by-side matches running simultaneously.

Organizers, scorekeepers and referees struggled to keep up with the day’s hundreds of matches.

“It was a little crazy,” said tournament organizer and AirTime coach Mark Brown. “But overall it went very well. AirTime had 27 wrestlers take part and they all competed very well.

“I was very impressed with Max Lane, who wrestled up an age division ... and had a great attitude.

“Brett Hopper and Joshua Bell wrestled for first place and put on a great finals match, which ended in a tie. Wyatt Egeland wrestling in his first tournament put on quite a show by pinning two of his three opponents for first place. Wyatt is a product of our community education wrestling program. Newcomer Robert Fisher also did an outstanding job by winning his first-ever tournament. Christian Marquez dominated his bracket on the way to first place. And Jared Davis showed his experience of over four years with the AirTime program with two pins and a 10-3 victory for first place.

“We would like to thank the following for helping with this year’s tournament: Hood River Elks 1507, Lane Paving, Your Rental Center, Hood River County Chamber Ambassadors, Odell Lions Club, Rick Zeller, Jim Wilson, Adam Lapierre, Jacob Krizman, Josh Van Ek, Keith Bassham, Adam Brown and family, all the table help and all the AirTime Wrestling Club parents.”

AirTime wrestlers:

Open division:

Tanner Montgomery 1st

Jared Davis 1st

Seth Bell 3rd

David Brunk 3rd

Derrick Van Ek 4th

Catherine Kiyokowa 4th

NWJCWA division:

Adrian Villegas 1st

Ryan Zeller 2nd

Brice Wilkins 1st

Ryan Lockman 2nd

Christian Marquez 1st

Robert Fisher 1st

Wyatt Egeland 1st

Justin Willson 4th

Brett Hopper 1st

Joshua Bell 1st

Kurt Wilkins 2nd

Caleb Bell 1st

Alec Runyan-Wiltz 2nd

Tyler Wilson 2nd

Steven Swafford 2nd

Nathan Bell 3rd

Dalton Jones 3rd

August Grossman 3rd

Charlie Fisher 3rd

Max Lane 4th

Skyler Tennant 4th