Tamyra Mensah-Stock celebrates winning the women's 68 kg. final at the 2019 World Wrestling Championships on Sept. 20, 2019 in Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan.
Tamyra Mensah-Stock hopes to make her long-awaited Olympic debut in 2020, and, now, if and when that happens, it will be as the reigning world champion.
The 26-year-old from Katy, Texas, blew through Sweden’s Jenny Fransson in the women’s 68 kg. final at the 2019 World Wrestling Championships on Friday in Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan. Mensah-Stock won 8-2 to claim her first world title.
Her victory means that for the first time in history, Team USA has three women’s freestyle world champions in the same year as she joins Jacarra Winchester, who won earlier in the week in the 55 kg. class, and Adeline Gray, who won a record fifth world title in the 76 kg. class on Thursday.
In addition, the win also pushed U.S. women up to third in the team standings with 105 points, behind only Japan with 137 and Russia with 108.
Mensah-Stock was on the attack from the very beginning, coming at Fransson, a 2016 Olympic bronze medalist, with a single leg takedown and following that up with two additional takedowns for a 6-0 lead heading into the break. Fransson scored points on a headlock, but that would be it as Mensah-Stock evaded her attempts to throw her late in the match and the seconds ticked down on her victory.
Mensah-Stock isn’t officially qualified for the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 just yet, but there’s no doubt that she is favored to not only make the U.S. team but also to contend for a medal following her performances over the last year.
In 2016, Mensah-Stock — then just Mensah — won the U.S. Olympic Team Trials in her weight class, but the U.S. could not qualify a quota spot in 69 kg., so she was forced to miss her sport’s biggest event. With her focus now on 2020, Mensah-Stock is now the one to beat in her class in the U.S., with not only this year’s world title but also last year’s bronze medal, her first at the world championships. She also became the first U.S. wrestler to win three Ivan Yarygin Grand Prix titles back in January.
The wrestling world championships continue through the weekend with finals in the men’s freestyle events.
Karen Price is a reporter from Pittsburgh who has covered Olympic sports for various publications. She is a freelance contributor to TeamUSA.org on behalf of Red Line Editorial, Inc.