Taking It To The Mat
Girl Grapplers Break Free Of Once-Male Dominated Sport
Story and photo by Reid Neureiter
Special to the GPHN
Colorado girl wrestlers made history on Saturday, Feb. 9 at Thornton High School, participating in the first recognized Colorado High School Girls State Championship Tournament. The Denver East High wrestling squad was represented, with sophomore state qualifier Bemnet Tesfa proudly sporting her bright red East High singlet in two matches.
Girls’ wrestling is making the leap to becoming a full official CHSAA-sanctioned sport. According to East head wrestling coach Randy Gallegos, who is in his 20th year with the East program, until recently Colorado girl wrestlers have had to compete against boys. In this CHSAA pilot program year, girl grapplers were given the choice of competing against boys or only against girls. Once the sport is officially sanctioned, which is expected to come in the next two years, girls will only be permitted to wrestle girls.
East’s 15-year-old Tesfa qualified for the state tournament by finishing fourth in the 100-pound division at the regional girls qualifying meet the week before.
Tesfa explains on the East wrestling Facebook page how she become interested in the sport: “I have never really stuck to a sport and had given up by middle school. I wanted to be more involved with my school and be able to take advantage of what they had to offer. A kid in my class who wrestled started hyping it up and said they needed girls since they didn’t have any. I decided to go to a practice and saw how hard they worked and the lessons I got out of it just from one practice. After that I decided to stay.”
There are four girls who wrestle for East, including Bemnet’s twin sister, Bethel. The girls’ mother, Dinknesh Tufer, was in the audience at Thornton High, providing moral support. Tufer, who is originally from Ethiopia and came to the United States 20 years ago, said that at first she was not happy about her girls wrestling.
“I originally wanted them to play basketball,” Tufer said, “but when I saw how hard they worked at wrestling, and how much they enjoyed it, I found it amazing.” Tufer added she is “really proud” of what Bemnet has accomplished.
In addition to her mother, Bemnet Tesfa was accompanied at the state tournament by her sophomore teammate Kiona Conner, who helped as Tesfa’s warm-up partner, and East Assistant Coach Sylvia Gallegos, spouse of head coach Randy. Sylvia Gallegos explained that having girls wrestling become an officially sanctioned sport with its own championship tournament was “inspirational.”
Sylvia Gallegos noted that although some people might be sad that girls cannot wrestle boys any longer, the reality is that when they become older, it is very hard for girls to compete fairly in terms of strength with boys of the same weight class. In addition, some people are not comfortable with girls wrestling boys. So, giving the girls their own sanctioned sport and their own championship tournament is a good idea, in Gallegos’ view.
Tesfa’s championship tournament experience lasted only two rounds. She lost her first match by pin to eventual 100-pound class state champion Zariyah Alvarado of Prairie View. And Tesfa dropped her consolation round match on points to a tough grappler from Arapahoe High School. But Tesfa will be back wrestling for East next year when, according to Sylvia Gallegos, the squad is expected to have at least six girls.
“I have a goal to become successful by working through pain not just in wrestling but in everything I do,” Tesfa said.