GUELPH, Ont. – Jessie MacDonald and Jessica Brouillette defeated the Russian and Chinese visitors to take gold at Canada Cup.

MacDonald, 32, defeated Russians Nadezhda Sokolova and Anzhelika Vetoshkina and China’s Jiang Zhu China en route to her 50 kg victory.

“I was pretty excited when I saw my draw because I was hoping for the opportunity to wrestle them all,” said the Brock wrestler. “It’s definitely a privilege to get to wrestle them in Canada.”

MacDonald is a three-time World Championship medallist and two-time Commonwealth Games medallist.
“I think I wrestled well, I think I wrestled composed. I was patient and didn’t try force anything.”

Brouillette had to get through Chinese opponents Hongli Yan and Ying Zhang before finishing with a pin against Uliana Tukurenova of Russia.

“It was nice to be able to wrestle different people close to home. They were really tough competitors, I had to be scrappy and fight a little bit more than I’m used to.”

Brouillette and MacDonald are teammates at Brock Wrestling Club.

“I haven’t won many international matches, so this will definitely be a confidence booster for me.”

The W.F. Mitchell Athletics Centre at the University of Guelph hosted 120 wrestlers from Canada, USA, China, Russia, Puerto Rico and Mongolia.

Erica Wiebe also won Canada Cup gold on Saturday. Wiebe, of Calgary Dinos Wrestling Club, defeated Justina Di Stasio in the 76 kg final.

Dillon Williams of Team Impact defeated Michael Asselstine on criteria 8-8 in a nail-biting 65 kg final.

Despite the many nations attending Canada Cup, Alex Moore only had to get through Canadian competition to win gold at 86 kg. Moore defeated Saskatoon’s Hunter Lee, Burnaby Mountain’s Ajay Gill, and Hamilton’s Ahamed Shamiya.

Montreal’s Jordie Steen won gold at 92 kg. The Montreal YMHA wrestler won all four matches of his round robin.

Richard DesChatelets of Brock Wrestling Club took out Lester Calderon and Dalton Webb to sweep the three-man 97 kg round robin.

Aly Barghout of Montreal YMHA took down Sean Molle in the 125 kg final to secure gold.

Danielle Lappage of the Calgary Dinos Wrestling Club won her 68 kg round robin, only a day after winning the 65 kg weight class at the World Team Non-Olympic Weight Trials.

The Canada Cup of International Wrestling was initiated in the fall of 1980 by the Federal Government to provide Canada’s wrestlers with an alternative to the boycotted Olympic Games held in Moscow.

WCL would like to acknowledge the Government of Canada’s support for the Canada Cup and would like to thank the event hosts and organizing committee including the Guelph Wrestling Club, as well as provincial wrestling partner, Ontario Amateur Wrestling Association.

Full results can be found here