Wrestling preview, Aug. 7: Sarah Hildebrandt fights for an upgrade from bronze to gold

Three wrestling medals of the Paris Video games can be awarded, because the three weight courses that acquired underway on Tuesday can have their gold medal matches on Wednesday.

Ladies’s freestyle 50kg

Will Crew USA’s Sarah Hildebrandt double down on compatriot Amit Elor‘s gold medal run with a second first-place end on the Paris Olympics?

It is actually attainable — although Indian opponent Vinesh Phogat owns two bronze World Wrestling Championship medals and has appeared in three Olympics, the 29-year-old has come away from the Video games empty-handed … till now. Phogat upset Japan’s Tokyo 2020 gold medalist Yui Susaki in her opener, and whereas her two subsequent matches had been shut, she nonetheless managed to emerge victorious.

Males’s Greco-Roman 77kg

Japan’s finalist Nao Kusaka had a haul of just about completely bronze medals till this yr’s Asian Championships, the place the 23-year-old earned gold. He’ll look to repeat the feat over Kazakhstan’s 34-year-old Demeu Zhadrayev, whose greatest win was a silver medal on the 2017 World Wrestling Championships in Paris. (Or perhaps the Metropolis of Gentle simply fits him?)

Males’s Greco-Roman 97kg

Armenia’s Artur Aleksanyan has positioned on every podium place throughout the final three Olympics: bronze on the 2012 London Olympics, gold on the 2016 Rio Olympics, silver on the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The 32-year-old, nicknamed “White Bear,” is assured silver in Paris. To win gold, he’ll should overwhelm Mohammad Savari of Iran — the Tokyo 2020 bronze medalist who received titles on the 2022 Asian Video games and 2023 Asian Championships.