It was a hot and heated first day of competition as 80 wrestlers from 17 nations took to the Italian sand for the first time in the history of the Beach Wrestling World Series. Find out what the 52 men and 28 women were up to on day 1 at Rome’s beach side arena here:

Bulgaria’s Sofiya Hristova GEORGIEVA and Mohammad Ebrahim ZAMANI from Iran impressively kicked off their team’s first showing in the Beach Wrestling World Series with all wins, while the Georgian squad solidly continues where it left off in France. Romania’s Stefania Claudia PRICEPUTU and Mehlika OZTURK from team Turkey also started at full force in their categories following their victories in the season opener on the French Riviera.

Two wins for the women’s -50kg star Stefania Claudia PRICEPUTU don’t leave any doubt that the Romanian wants to continue her World Series winning streak. The same applies for Turkey’s Mehlika OZTURK in the -60kg category. As the only wrestler in her weight class, she defeated both her opponents, including local hero Francesca INDELICATO and Ukraine’s Anastasiya KRAVCHENKO.

The highly contested -70kg class was dominated by beach newcomer Sofiya Hristova GEORGIEVA from Bulgaria. She won the knockout match, plus both her rounds. Only France winner Alina BEREZHNA STADNIK MAKHYNIA from the Ukraine could keep up with the Bulgarian and added two wins to her name before entering Saturday’s business end of the competition.

Probably the most even of all female weight classes, the +70kg athletes did not allow any predictions of who will face off in the final on Saturday.

In the men’s, it was again the Georgians that set the pace across all four categories. With two victories each after two matches Levan KELEKHSASHVILI (-70kg), Dato MARSAGISHVILI (-90kg) and heavyweight Mamuka KORDZAIA proved ready to face their competition from new beach nations like Bulgaria and Iran. 3:1 (knockout), 3:0 and 3:1 – those are Davit KHUTSISHVILI’s immaculate day 1 statistics in the men’s -80kg.

With the return of Azerbaijan’s Oyan NAZARIANI to the World Series after his World Championship title in 2019, the class of the +90kg wrestlers will deliver one of the most exciting competitions going forward. Iran’s Soheil Eisa GHOLIPOURGOUDARZI started off powerfully with a nerve-wrecking knockout match win and two more victories to prove his beach talent in his first appearance.

The wrestling action in Lido di Ostia, another brand-new location on the Beach Wrestling World Series calendar, will continue on September 4 at 10am with more group matches in the morning session. The elimination and medal rounds will start at 3pm CEST. 

Find all brackets and results here. 

Don’t miss out on the action on the beach and watch the live stream.