Ryan Mango wins bronze, Ildar Hafizov places fifth on final day of Hungarian Grand Prix

Ryan Mango with the 59 kg/130 lbs. medalists at the respected Hungarian Grand Prix. Photo by Matt Lindland.


SZOMBETHELY, Hungary – Ryan Mango (Colorado Springs, Colo./U.S. Army WCAP) won a bronze medal at 59 kg/130 lbs. in Greco-Roman, the top U.S. performance on the final day of the respected Hungarian Grand Prix.


Mango opened with a 7-11 loss to 2015 Asian champion Shinobu Ota, then was pulled into repechage when Ota reached the championship finals. He won his repechage match over Dawid Ersetic of Poland, 8-1. In his bronze-medal match, he won by forfeit over his Army teammate, 2008 Olympian Ildar Hafizov (Colorado Springs, Colo./U.S. Army WCAP).


Mango was an NCAA Div. I All-American at Stanford before joining the U.S. Army World Class Athlete Program. He was second in the 2013 U.S. World Team Trials.


Hafizov got on a nice run in the preliminaries, with three straight technical fall victories, putting away Qiye Tian oif China, Erik Torba of Hungary and Mate Krasznai of Hungary. He was defeated in the semifinals by Ota. Hafizov competed many years for Uzbekistan before receiving his U.S. citizenship.


Mango and Hafizov were the only Americans to reach a medal match on Sunday, as four other U.S. athletes competed. Winning a first-round match before being eliminated was two-time Olympian Spenser Mango (Colorado Springs, Colo./U.S. Army WCAP).


Ryan Mango became the second American to win a medal in this year’s Hungarian Grand Prix, after Geordan Speiller (Oviedo, Fla./Florida Jets) won a bronze medal at 75 kg/165 lbs. on Saturday.


HUNGARIAN GRAND PRIX

At Szombethely, Hungary, Feb. 7


Greco-Roman results


59 kg/130 lbs.

Gold – Kohei Hasegawa (Japan)

Silver – Shinobu Ota (Japan)

Bronze – Lumin Wang (China)

Bronze – Ryan Mango (USA)

5th – Ivan Lazatov (Croatia)

5th – Ildar Hafizov (USA)


71 kg/156 lbs.

Gold – Balint Korpasi (Hungary)

Silver – Robert Fritsch (Hungary)

Bronze – Miklos Tompa (Hungary)

Bronze – Dominick Etlinger (Croatia)

5th – Tomi Claudiu (Romania)

5th – Jan Zizka (Czech Republic)x


80 kg/176 lbs.

Gold – Pavel Paminchuk (Belarus)

Silver – Rajbek Bisultanov (Denmark)

Bronze – Patrik Szabo (Hungary)

Bronze – Zoltan Keri (Hungary)

5th – Michael Wagner (Austria)

5th – Norbert Ubrankovics (Hungary)


98 kg/215 lbs.

Gold – Xiao Di (China)

Silver – Daigoro Timoncini (Italy)

Bronze – Adam Varga (Hungary)

Bronze – Armin Majoros (Hungary)

5th – Radoslaw Gryzbicki (Poland)

5th – Balazs Kiss (Hungary)


U.S. Greco-Roman performance on Sunday


59 kg/130 lbs. – Spenser Mango, Colorado Springs, Colo. (U.S. Army WCAP), dnp

WIN Eduard Barsegjan (Poland), 3-1

LOSS Mate Krasznai (Hungary) 0-6


59 kg/130 lbs. – Ryan Mango, Colorado Springs, Colo. (U.S. Army WCAP), 3rd

LOSS Shinobu Ota (Japan), 7-11

WIN Dawid Ersetic (Poland), 8-1

WIN Ildar Hafizov (USA), forfeit


59 kg/130 lbs. – Ildar Hafizov, Colorado Springs, Colo. (U.S. Army WCAP), 5th

WIN Qiye Tian (China), tech. fall 8-0

WIN Erik Torba (Hungary), tech. fall 9-0

WIN Mate Krasznai (Hungary), tech. fall 9-0

LOSS Shinobu Ota (Japan), pin

LOSS Ryan Mango (USA), forfeit


70 kg/154 lbs. – Bryce Saddoris, Sneads Ferry, N.C. (U.S. Marine Corps), 7th

LOSS Jan Zizka (Czech Republic), 9-12


70 kg/154 lbs. – Patrick Smith, Minneapolis, Minn. (Minnesota Storm), 8th

LOSS Miklos Tompa (Hungary), 2-6


98 kg/215 lbs. – Joe Rau, Minneapolis, Minn. (Minnesota Storm), dnp

LOSS Siarhei Staradub (Belarus), 5-10