MMU student wins British wrestling competition

A first year BA (Hons) Business student has fought back from injury to take gold at the British Wrestling Association’s Novice Competition. Yousef Alikhasi, 25, beat wrestlers from across the country at the Wrestling Academy in Salford to win the 63kg category.

Bolton-born Yousef took up wrestling four years ago but his hopes of competing in the sport were seriously jeopardised when he dislocated his knee during training last year. Rather than accept his fate, however, Yousef channelled his energies into overcoming his injury and even spent two months training in Iran over the summer.

Yousef said: “In Iran wrestling is as popular as football is in the UK and it was really interesting to train there. Wrestling goes back centuries and some of the Iranian gyms still use traditional training methods, such as performing exercises using replicas of old weapons like clubs and bows and arrows to the sound of drum beats and chanting. I learnt some great new techniques there and was even lucky enough to meet the national Iranian Wrestling Team whilst in Tehran.”

High hopes for Manchester Universities Wrestling Club

He continues: “I’m so excited to have won gold, it makes all the effort I put into training worthwhile and I now hope to be selected for the University Games in Greece next year. I established a university wrestling squad last year to train students from both MMU and the University of Manchester and offer them the chance to wrestle at a professional level. It’s only the third university wrestling club in the country – alongside Oxford and City of London – and my aim is to make Manchester the best in the country.”

The British Novice Competition is the first competition the Manchester Universities Wrestling Club has entered since it was established in September 2006. Yousef took on fellow club member Kosuke, from Tokyo, Japan, in the final.

In addition to keeping his body well fuelled with pasta, chicken and fish, Yousef has been in intensive training for the past month, training six days a week at the Sugden Sports Centre on Grosvenor Street.

Yousef’s winning match can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/uniwrestling and you can find out more about wrestling at MMU at http://www.mmunion.co.uk/Group/Group.aspx?id=40913