Madi Parks has another medal to add to her collection of well-earned wrestling hardware.
Parks, a graduate of Assumption College School, recently won silver at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, England.
Competing in the 50 kg division, Parks was defeated by Mercy Genesis of Nigeria in the gold medal match. It was her fourth match of the day for the wrestler with each match lasting a maximum of two three minute rounds.
Parks lost her first match of the competition but battled back in the next two for a chance at gold.
“I’m never really satisfied with silver especially when I go into a competition knowing that if I have my best performance that I could win the tournament,” Parks said. “So for me, it wasn’t my best day because I started off a little slow.
“But I got better as the day went on and there was some good moments.”
Parks said overall it was a decent performance but not her best day. Parks also won silver at the 2022 Pan Am games held in Acapulco, Mexico in May and in June won gold at the Matteo Pellicone competition in Italy.
It has been a hectic return to competition following the two year COVID-19 pandemic.
“It has been a long time for us in wrestling especially, without practice and without any sort of competition,” Parks said. “Now, everything is sort of happening at once.
“This was the fourth tournament in four months and my third international competition in the last four months.”
The pace has been hectic without a lot of time at home because of all the travelling.
“Normally, we would have the national championships in March and then have some time before the international season gets underway,” Parks said. “But once the restrictions lifted, everything just seemed to get started all at once.”
Next month, Parks will be competing in the World Championships in Belgrade, Serbia. After that, Parks will have a bit of a break to get ready for the World Cup in December.
The top eight countries from the World Championships qualify for the World Cup and Canada has a chance to qualify, Parks said.
Trials for Canada’s Olympic team will be held in December 2023 in advance of the Paris Olympics in 2024.
Parks trains at the London-Western Wrestling Club and coached by Dave Spinney. She got her start in wrestling as a Grade 7 student at Agnes Hodge Public School through a teacher who started the program and encouraged students to try it.
“We got going for a couple of months and then we went to a Brant County tournament,” Parks said. “I don’t remember too much about it but I remember that I won.
“When you’re young and you find out your good at something, winning inspires you to keep going.”
Parks said she just remembers it being fun and really liking it.
Parks went to Assumption College School but the school, at that time, didn’t have a wrestling program. However, the school supported her and she had teacher representative accompany her to tournaments.
Parks lives just outside of London, ON.
“I’ve got a couple of days to reset,” said Parks adding she and her coach have “been talking a lot, going over the things that went well and what we need to work on.
“We’re setting up a plan for the next three weeks leading up to the World Championships,” she said.
“We’ll spend a couple of days organizing and planning and then it’s back onto the mat for the tough stuff.”
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