It feels like the World Championships just got over and we are already gearing back up for more international wrestling. The stakes are raised this year as the tournament will serve as a qualifier for the Olympic Trials next April in Iowa City. The highest placing American, that is not already qualified, will earn a spot in the Olympic Team Trials. This is true for all three styles.

There will be plenty of great match ups along the way but the weight class that has me the most excited is 65kg men's freestyle. We will finally get see the debut of Aaron Pico at 65kg on the senior level inside the United States and he will be joining a heap of talented and accomplished wrestlers.

Jordan Oliver comes in as the most credentialed wrestler at 65kg but there are a bunch of studs looking to come in and make some noise, including 4x NCAA champion Logan Stieber. Frank Molinaro, Kellen Russell, Jason Chamberlain, Dave Habat and Kendrick Maple have all wrestled in NCAA finals and are all capable. Ganbayar Sanjaa and Nazar Kulchytskyy were both successful college wrestlers but have far more freestyle experience in their wrestling careers and will be fun to watch.

Check out the most recent meeting between Jordan Oliver and Logan Steiber in the mini tournament finals of the World Team Trials



57kg will also have a good amount of talent with 2011 World team member Nick Simmons, 2012 Olympian Sam Hazewinkel and 2010 World Team member Obe Blanc in the field. Enjoy Nick Simmons' wide open style in this 2011 mini tournament finals against Obe Blanc.




In the women's division I'm excited for the 48kg division and in particular I think back to a highly entertaining match at the 2014 U.S. Open between 2012 Olympic bronze medalist Clarissa Chun and 2013 World Team member Victoria Anthony. This one came down to the closing seconds.

Looking at greco there are several things that excite me here too. When I look at the entrants at 75kg my eyes immediately notice Justin Lester and Kendrick Sanders. As we know, Lester is a dynamic wrestler who has been on top of the United States for the last several years. Kendrick Sanders is equally exciting and can bring the crowd to their feet. He is also seven years younger than the 32 year old Lester. Should those two meet up we could see fireworks.

We could also see a rematch of the World Team Trials finals at 59kg between eight time Olympic/World team member Spenser Mango and Jesse Thielke.

Wrestling will take place on Friday November 6 and Saturday November 7 at the New York Athletic Club. Friday we will see all of the greco and women's freestyle wrestlers compete. Saturday will be all men's freestyle. The event will be streaming live on FloWrestling here is the schedule (times are all Eastern):

Friday November 6
9:00am - 4:00pm Greco-Roman and women's freestyle session 1 (Preliminaries)
6:00pm - 8:00pm Greco-Roman and women's freestyle session 2 (Medal matches)

Saturday November 7
9:00am - 4:00pm Men's freestyle Session 1 (Preliminaries)
6:00pm - 8:00pm Men's freestyle Session 2 (Medal matches)