What Number Please?

So let me explain wrestling now, but please keep in mind that I'm no expert, so I will just explain what I confidently understand.

There are three styles of wrestling but two different disciplines; the styles are women's freestyle, Greco-roman, and freestyle wrestling. The different disciplines are the freestyle and Greco-roman, women only compete in freestyle. The difference between the two disciplines is: Greco-Roman wrestling the athletes can only attack from the hips up, they are not able to attack the legs to flip and gain points. Freestyle wrestlers are able to use the legs in addition to the upper body to flip and gain points. There are additional differences but I'm not sure what they are.

Similar to other combat sports, such as judo, the athletes compete in weight groups. The smallest or lightest group to start the Olympics competitions off was 55kg (for those similar to myself who are bad with the metric system that is about 121lbs) Yesterday two weight classes competed, 55kg and 75kg. In order for the athletes to compete they had to weigh in to determine if they matched the weight class they registered to compete at.

As a sport equipment team member we had to prepare the scales for the man who would calibrate them for each weight group. We also stood outside the weigh-in areas with stress balls with the number the athletes had in the draw on them and gave them to them after their weigh in. Just as a souvenir and a reminder as to what order they wrestle in.

Weigh-in always happens the day before they are scheduled to compete, and it seems to be a slightly stressful time for the athletes. They typically let themselves be a little heavier than they want so they wrestle and practice against heavier counterparts, then when competitions come around they do as much as they can to drop weight and get in the category they register in. Once, in Colorado, i saw wrestlers in the saunas on bikes in hoodies and sweatpants, at least for an hour. As far as I can tell, if the athlete doesn't fit in their weight group, or "make weight" they are done. Kicked out I suppose you could say. Here they have 30 minutes from the time weigh-in starts to the time they can't weigh in. We had one wrestler take the whole 30 minutes and we could tell that he was trying to get down to weight. He made it. No one has gotten kicked out yet.