Refugee Day

With Support of Community, Al Obaidi is Painting a Bright Future

Saturday, June 20, 2020 - 11:58 By United World Wrestling Press

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INZING, Austria (June 20) -- Aker Al Obaidi had been working as a painter for two years before Benedikt "Mo" Ernst finally convinced the young Iraqi refugee to move to the small town of Inzing, Austria.

The small town, population 4000, intimidated the former Baghdad resident. He'd always known bigger cities, and found comfort in wrestling. 

To help, Coach "Mo" furnished an apartment for Al Obaidi and set up the young Greco-Roman grappler with a series of training opportunities. After a few weeks of acclimating to the new city, Al Obaidi invited Mo over for dinner and showed him the job he'd done painting the apartment.

It was not what Coach was expecting. Greeting him in the living room was the large five-ring logo of the Olympic Games.

"I painted the Rings on this wall because I want to see them every day," said Al Obaidi. "This is my motivation to work as hard as I can and reach my goal!“

Shortly after painting the Rings on his wall AL Obaidi and Coach Mo received word from the IOC that they had chosen Al Obaidi for the IOC Refugee Athletic Scholarship and would be supporting his Olympic journey.

Members of the Austrian national team who live in Inzing have helped provide Al Obaidi the training he needs to prepare for the Olympic Games, as he also attends every camp and tournament of the Austrian wrestling federation.

Al Obaidi's training during COVID has been difficult since he's not allowed to train in the training hall. Instead his coach has organized a special program for him to maintain his shape.

"He is one of the motivated guys I have," said Mo. "He has developed his strength and endurance very well during this hard time."

Like most of the wrestling world Al Obaidi isn't quite sure what will happen with COVID-19, but for now he plans to start wrestling training once cleared by the Austrian government - maybe as early as July.

The plans then include training camps and possibly trips to the U23 Europeans in Bucharest at the beginning of October and the U23 World Championship in Finland. If he's very lucky with travel arrangements, maybe some international training camps in Hungary, Germany and Ukraine between tournaments.

"He works hard and I know if Aker qualifies for the Olympics in Tokyo 2021," said Mo. "His dream will come true."

Development

New Referee and Rules Courses coming to the UWW Academy

Monday, December 9, 2024 - 13:34 By United World Wrestling Press

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CORSIER-VEVEY, Switzerland (December 9) --- The Development Department and Referee Commission will launch a series of courses centered around Olympic wrestling and refereeing rules. Evaluating holds and situations are not always easy and can be very complex.  These courses are designed to highlight specific and more complicated rules in hopes of providing a better understanding of how situations are being evaluated. Over the next year, will be 10 courses developed and published on the UWW Academy site.

“We are excited to announce new courses on the UWW Academy Platform, designed to elevate refereeing standards and promote excellence across all levels. These courses cover essential topics such as attack-counterattack actions, evaluation of holds, takedown and control, and out-of-bounds situations," said Antonio Silvestri. "As Head of the Refereeing Commission, I encourage all referees—experienced or starting out—to take advantage of these courses. Continuous learning is key to our success, and these courses will help us maintain the highest standards of integrity, fairness, and professionalism in every match. Let's keep raising the bar together." 

The first course on Attack vs Counterattack situations has been published on the Academy site. Attack vs Counterattack situations are referees' most complicated and challenging situations to evaluate. This course will try to highlight how these situations are evaluated and what questions referees must answer during an action. While this course and the others are centered around referees, they are available and encouraged to be completed by all wrestling stakeholders.

The Attack vs Counterattack course will begin with background information and the rules which include video examples.  Then the course will provide 10 specific video examples along with explanations. Next the participants will practice their video analysis with 10 videos.  The course will finish with a 15-video quiz. All the courses that will be published will follow a similar format.

The UWW Academy is the official educational platform for United World Wrestling. It offers numerous courses on coaching, referees, rules, sports administration, and beach wrestling. The academy also offers additional resources, performance analysis metrics from major UWW events, videos, and the Wrestle4Fun curriculum. It is free and available to all participants. To get started and create your free profile, please visit  https://academy.uww.org/.