The wrestling competition at the 2024 Paris Olympics is coming to its final stretch as the Greco-Roman tournaments are all complete and only men’s and women’s freestyle remains. On Friday, Aug. 9 another three sets of medals will be awarded in men’s and women’s 57kg freestyle events and the men’s 86kg freestyle.
Fans interested in catching every moment of the 2024 Paris Olympics live should sign up for Peacock, which will be streaming every event of The Games.
The medal events are scheduled to start at 1:15 p.m. EST and will be broadcast on Peacock. Fans looking to watch can do so at any time after the competition took place if you missed it live.
Spencer Lee will be competing for the gold and representing the United States in the men’s 57kg event. American Aaron Brooks will be going for the bronze in the men’s 86kg and Helen Maroulis will also go for a bronze medal in the women’s 57kg.
You can see a list of other prominent US athletes competing in the Olympics and the schedules for their events here.
What: Women’s 57kg freestyle, men’s 57kg freestyle and men’s 86kg freestyle
When: Friday, Aug. 9 at 1:15 p.m. EST
Stream: Peacock
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Wrestler Vinesh Phogat appeals to get Olympic silver medal after disqualification for missing weight
PARIS (AP) — Indian wrestler Vinesh Phogat has asked sports’ highest court to award her a shared silver medal after being disqualified from her Paris Olympics final for missing the weight limit,
The Court of Arbitration for Sport said a judge in Paris is holding a hearing Friday on Phogat’s appeal.
The decision is “expected to be issued before the end of the Olympic Games,” the court said.
The closing ceremony is Sunday and medals already were awarded in Phogat’s event.
Phogat barely missed the weight for the 50-kilograms final on Wednesday and the disqualification also cost her getting a medal of any color.
CAS said Phogat filed her appeal Wednesday seeking a new weigh-in and to be allowed to compete in the final but there was too little time to process a hearing.
Phogat beat defending Olympic champion Yui Susaki of Japan on Tuesday, then won quarterfinal and semifinal matches to advance to the final.
She announced Thursday she would retire from the sport.
Helen Maroulis can strengthen case for greatest U.S. women’s wrestler with success in Paris
By CLIFF BRUNT AP Sports Writer
PARIS (AP) — As Helen Maroulis’ career winds down, she has a perfect opportunity to strengthen her case for being the best women’s wrestler in U.S. history.
Maroulis was the first American woman to win a gold medal back in 2016, when she upset three-time gold medalist Saori Yoshida in the 53-kilogram final in Rio de Janeiro. She came back to earn bronze at 57 kg in Tokyo, despite numerous injuries in the lead-up to those Games. She’s a three-time world champion with seven world championship medals.
Now 32, she could become the first U.S. woman to win gold twice and the first to claim three Olympic medals. She’s currently the only one with two Olympic medals and the first to make three Olympic teams. She begins her Paris Games on Thursday, and the medal round for 57kg is on Friday.
Days ahead of this year’s competition, she was asked if she thinks this will be her final Olympics and she responded: “I don’t know, but I think so.” She said when she visited family in Greece for her 30th birthday back in 2022, her grandmother and her father told her they wanted her to settle down.
“I told them, ‘I think it’s easier to go for a gold medal than find a husband,’ and we made a compromise,” she said. “So, here I am wrestling.”
Adeline Gray is the only American woman who can compete with Maroulis’ resume. Gray is a six-time world champion who earned a silver medal at 76 kg in Tokyo. She nearly made it to Paris, but she lost to Kennedy Blades at the U.S. Olympic Trials in April.
If this is it, Maroulis has achieved most of her goals. But ever the competitor, she remembers her perceived failures vividly, too. She’s still disappointed about coming up short in 2021.
“I wanted to experience what it would be like to come back and be the returning champion, what kind of pressure that would be to win two gold medals, and I didn’t achieve that,” she said.
She earned another opportunity by defeating Jacarra Winchester, a Tokyo Olympian, at the U.S. trials.
Maroulis is seeded fifth in her class. The top seed is three-time world champion Tsugumi Sakurai of Japan. No. 2 seed Anastasia Nichita of Moldova was a world champion at 59 kg in 2022. Nigeria’s Odunayo Adekuoroye is the No. 3 seed, and Poland’s Anehlina Lysak, the No. 4 seed, is at her third Olympics.
But U.S. women’s coach Terry Steiner said Maroulis is capable.
“When Helen’s hitting at all cylinders, she’s very hard to deal with for anyone,” he said. “She’s another one of these people that just has generational talent. She is a gamer. Helen — when the lights are on, she performs. And she, almost at this point in her career, it has to be an event like the Olympic Games or the world championships to really get the best out of her. But she definitely rises to the occasion.”
Maroulis also has another chance to help shape the team’s younger members. She is the oldest member of the team at the Olympics — a squad that includes 20-year-olds Blades and Amit Elor.
Steiner said Maroulis values her role as a mentor for wrestlers in a program that has emerged as a world power.
“She is a leader, and she knows that,” he said. “And she knows that the rest of her team is also looking her way. And so I think that helps her actually. I don’t think it hinders her at all. I think she kind of wants to be in that in that moment or that spot with the rest of the group. So, I think she has high expectations for herself. I think the team has expectations for her as well.”
The Associated Press contributed to this article.
