Miss mat

Female wrestling standouts part of upcoming meet to showcase Chicago Olympic bid

Some of the world's toughest men are heading to Chicago. A few of the toughest women, too.

As part of an effort to show Olympic officials that Chicago can successfully host amateur athletes in its bid to win the 2016 Games, dozens of top wrestlers will battle in Evanston next week.

Though billed as the No. 1 male team in the world -- Russia -- against the best men of the United States, the match also includes American women wrestling females from Canada.

For Mary Kelly, it's a homecoming. Though raised in Downstate Mahomet, she regularly wrestled in Chicago-area meets as a child. As a third-grader, "I had five black eyes and didn't win many matches,'' the 23-year-old said Tuesday from Colorado, where she now lives at the U.S. Olympic Training Center.

Today, she's the top-ranked American in her 105-pound weight class.

Also wrestling for the United States is Iowa's Sara McMann, who, at 138 pounds, won a silver medal at the Athens games in 2004, the first Olympics to stage female wrestling.

"The average-sized man could step off the street and Sara McMann, I guarantee you, would kick their tail up and down the mat,'' said former world champion wrestler and Olympic bronze medalist Bill Scherr.

Scherr, chairman of World Sport Chicago, an organization funded by the Chicago 2016 Olympic committee, described Kelly as "scrappy.''

The daughter and niece of champion male wrestlers, Kelly honed her skill by wrestling boys, though some forfeited rather than face losing to a girl. A wrestling referee once told Kelly's mother that if she wanted her child to wrestle, she should have had a boy.

"It's still a battle,'' said Kelly. "We're definitely fighting for respect'' -- and against stereotypes. "I'm very feminine. I'm into clothes and fashion and makeup and all that stuff,'' she said.

Women's matches tend to have higher scoring because females aren't as adept at defense as men. "But that's why I think women's wrestling is a little more exciting," said Scherr. Women are harder to pin because they have more flexibility, some say.

Kelly supports a Chicago Olympics, but she's not sure she'll be there competing. "I have other goals in life: I want a family, a job, a degree, so we'll see,'' she said.

About 2,000 of the 8,000 free tickets to the Feb. 6 match at Northwestern University's Welsh-Ryan Arena remain available. Call (866) 860-3234.

aherrmann@suntimes.com