Jesse Thielke provided the only bright spot on a weekend that was not the best for our final Olympic hopefuls attempting to qualify their weight classes.

Thielke ended up taking home the silver, but his road to qualifying for Rio was extremely gutsy as well as impressive. Of his four consecutive wins to make the finals, it was his 17-8 technical superiority win over two-time University World medalist Donior Islamov in the semifinals that punched his ticket to Rio. He gave up a pair of throws early in the match before he began to mount a comeback which was capped off in the second period with a takedown and gut wrench to get the tech.

Jesse Thielke put together a great performance in Istanbul, Turkey to qualify the 59kg weight class for the Olympic Games in Rio and is our FloWrestler of the Week.

Thielke’s Results
59 kg/130 lbs. – Jesse Thielke, Germantown, Wis. (New York AC/OTC), 2nd place
WIN Peter Modos (Hungary), 8-0
WIN Revaz Lashkhi (Georgia), 13-6
WIN Frunze Harutyunyan (Sweden), Fall
WIN Donior Islamov (Moldova), 17-8
LOSS Hamid Soryan (Iran), 0-8

Other FloWrestler of the Week Nominees:

Boris Novachkov: Qualified the 65kg weight class for Bulgaria and won the gold medal at the last chance qualifier in Turkey.