Local girl wrestles to the top

Irene Gentle
Jun 26, 2002
Flamborough's Kim Broten likes to throw her weight around.
And she has been doing it successfully for the past two years since taking up wrestling.
First stepping on to the mat in Grade 7 in her former Calgary school, the Grade 9 student at Waterdown District High School now wrestles with a club at the University of Guelph.
"A couple of my friends were going into it," she said of her decision to join the sport. "I really enjoyed it, so I decided to stick with it."
Since then, she has toured much of Ontario and even the nation, testing her skills at the 50 kg weight class against other competitors.
But don't expect the glitz and glamour of a typical WWE (formerly WWF) match.
"It's more technical moves," said Kim, 14. "You have to learn how to use the person's body and your body. The basics are the best moves to use. And the mental part is very key."
That's because for Kim, wrestling is a thinking game. It starts with her warm up, as she scopes out her competition for hints of how they'll perform in a match.
"Sometimes when people warm up, they show some of their best moves," she said.
Matches are typically in two, two-minutes rounds, separated by a thirty second break. To prepare for the full-out exertion of it, Kim practices five days a week.
She feels her best match was the first one she ever had in Ontario. At the time she was outweighed by her opponent. She was also, in her mind at least, out of shape.
"She was quite a bit bigger than me, but I mostly stuck with leg shots," said Kim. "She had my leg and I was fighting for control."
In the end she got it, and won the match. Welcome to Ontario, Kim.
As brief as the matches are, participants can rack up the points as they go, and Kim is known to be a technical wrestler at times.
A social person at heart, she has also learned how to shelve it all to focus on nothing but the match.
"I don't think about who my opponent is," said Kim. "I just think of what they're going to do next. When I'm in a match, it's just me, the person I'm wrestling and my coach. I just concentrate on my moves."
Practice is often in the form of an all-out scrimmage, where pairs wrestle with no referee or points. And that's good for Kim, who admits she can be a little too gentle at times.
"I'm not very aggressive when I wrestle," she admits, noting it is a common problem with female competitors. "But aggressiveness is a key part of wrestling."
Still, she loves the challenge. Winning doesn't hurt either, and Kim has been known to return with medals as often as not. This year alone, she took home a gold in the Ontario Winter games, a silver in the provincial championships and a fourth place finish in the nationals. Those wins are complimented by five golds, and several other medals from regional tournaments.
"All you have to do is rely on yourself," she said. "And you get to meet a lot people and travel around a lot. I think it's interesting. I'd like to continue it for as long as I can."