Irina Ryngach once again lost the gold medal to Norway's Grace Bullen // Photo: uww.org
Moldova’s first ever world champion in wrestling, Irina Ryngac, was defeated in a bout with Grace Bullen (10:16) from Norway in the final of the competition in the weight category up to 65 kg. The same opponent prevented the 23-year-old Moldovan athlete from winning the gold medal at the European Championships, held in June in Bratislava (Slovakia). Ryngac became the only representative of the Moldovan women’s team at the tournament. Her medal allowed Moldova to take the 13th place among 19 national teams. The leaders are the women’s teams of India, USA and Hungary.
The vice-champions of the Greco-Roman wrestling tournament in their weight categories were Vitalii Eremenko and Valentin Petic. Yeremenko lost in the finals of the competition in the category up to 63 kg to Sergey Emelin (0:5) from Russia, who performed under a neutral flag. Petik was represented in the up to 67 kg category, the 25-year-old wrestler lost the gold medal to Joni Khetsuriani from Georgia (0:7).
In the team standings, the Moldovan Greco-Roman wrestling team took sixth place among the 25 participating countries. Above Moldova are the national teams of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Hungary and Turkey.
In total, eight Moldovan athletes performed at the tournament. Grand Prix of Budapest is a prestigious tournament, also called “Imre Poyak and Janos Varg Memorial”. It is part of the World Series of Olympic wrestling.
