Arian Carpio made the most of her trip to Medellin, Colombia, last weekend. The Todd Beamer High School junior-to-be brought home a silver medal from the prestigious 2013 FILA Cadet Pan American Wrestling Championships on Saturday.
Carpio finished second in the 52-kilogram (114.6 lbs) division for 15- to 17-year-olds. The Pan American Championships featured wrestlers from North, Central and South America. The countries represented were the United States, Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Mexico, Peru and Venezuela.
Carpio lost the gold-medal match to Colombia’s Andrea Gonzales after she won her first three matches. Carpio pinned Mexico’s Brenda Fernandez in the opening round and won in come-from-behind fashion in the quarterfinals over Peru’s Ana Cespedez Lugo, 4-2.
Carpio was trailing 2-0 in the final round before throwing Lugo to her back in the last 30 seconds. The three-point throw and one back-exposure point gave Carpio the win. She then pinned Brazil’s Silva T. Lopes Da in the semifinals.
Carpio’s U.S. team edged host Colombia by three points to win the team title. Four American women won gold, pacing the USA to 82 team points, while Colombia finished with 79 and Venezuela finished in third with 77.
Carpio has had a nearly impeccable two-year career on the Beamer girls wrestling team. Her only loss with the Titans came in the 2012 championship match at the Mat Classic state championships inside the Tacoma Dome as a freshman.
But Carpio got some redemption in February when she won the 112-pound state title, completing a perfect 23-0 season with a pin over Kentridge’s Taylor Lee.
Earlier this year, Carpio won the USA Wrestling Girls Folkstyle Nationals championship in Oklahoma City in March. But last weekend’s second-place finish was her first medal in international competition.
Carpio also finished second at the USA Team Trials for her age group, which qualified her onto Team USA. The entire team trained for two weeks together at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo., prior to the Pan American Games.
Carpio and Puyallup High School graduate, Whitney Conder, were the only Washington women representatives out of all four age-group teams, which are Cadets (1996-98 birthdate), Juniors (1993-95), University (college) and Senior (1992 and up). Conder is on the US senior women’s team.
