Native of the Republic of Georgia (former Soviet) now a Permanent Resident of the United States
1996 Olympics 82 kg freestyle
4-time Soviet Union champion
3-time Tbilisi Champion generally regarded as the World's toughest tournament because the USSR, Iran and the USA always had multiple entries at each weight unlike the Olympics or World Championships that had only one entry per country.
1990 World Freestyle Wrestling Championships Tokyo Japan 4th place
Is 2-0 versus Kevin Jackson (1992 Olympic Gold medalist, 1991 & 1995 World Champion), Is 4 -0 versus Elmardi Dshabrailow (World Champion and Olympic Silver medalist) 3-1 versus Lukman Dshabrailow (World Champion) and has a winning record against many former World & Olympic Champions. In 1992, when Avto was in his prime, he was shot in the tbia with an assault rifle during a peaceful protest. At the time he was expected to be Olympic and World Champion but after the shooting he was expected to never walk without a cane but he came back to wrestle and qualified for the 1996 Olympic Games and placed 10th.
5-1 in NHB fights in Russia and Ukraine.
Walking around weight of 178-180lbs
Zviad Abuseridze:
Zviad native of the Republic of Georgia (former Soviet) now resides in the United States
Soviet Union Freestyle wrestling Champion
2 time Sunshine State Games Champion in both Freestyle and Greco Roman wrestling defeated USA All-American Robert Wimberly in the finals via technical superiority in under 1 ½ minutes.
Zviad' s walking around weight is 145 lbs
Georgia is a country about the size of South Carolina with approximately 4 to 4.5 million people and a 80 plus% unemployment rate. Their President, Shevarnadze (the one Avto was shot for protesting against 11 years ago) was just ousted. In September 2003, the Freestyle Wrestling World Championships were held in NYC. The United States finished 2nd the tiny country of Georgia became the World Champions. One month later, in France, the tiny country of Georgia won the Greco-Roman World Championships.
From the outside, Nick Ackerman's 13-11 victory over Nick Slack in the 174 pound National Championship match Mar. 3, 2001 was impressive. After all, Slack was ranked #1 in the country, won 60 matches in a row going into the championship match, and was the defending National Champion. The truly impressive part is that Nick wrestled with a major disadvantage. The disadvantage being he lost both of his legs below his knees when he was 1 ½ years old. He was forced to have his legs amputated to halt a life-threatening form of bacterial meningitis.
As a reward for his National Championship, Nick was named the Outstanding Wrestler of the 2001 NCAA Division III Championships. The crowd of just over 3,000 gave Ackerman a two-minute standing ovation for his victory. The first person he found in the crowd was his mother Cindy, who he brought to the mat, hugged her, and then took her down to the mat in celebration. Needless to say, Ackerman was excited about his victory.
For the record; Avto and Zviad DO NOT want to be referred to as "Russian" or as "Team Russia". They are originally from the Republic of Georgia, and now are representing the Wrestling Club of the Palm Beaches.
Nick Caggia is a rather large gentlemen who has competed at a lot of the Bayonne tournaments in the advanced super heavyweight division(before there was expert). He's quite tall and weighs over 300 pounds, but I don't know much about what kind of style he brings to the table at this point.
Zvizd I think is the guy I judge a fight vs. Rich Crunckilton a few years ago. Even thought he lost via triangle, everyone should pull guard vs. this guy.
I guess there's a few Charles:) Not with those creds though. I want to know if getting tossed on my head by a Georgian feels different than a midwest wrestler.
I think I'm out of this Naga unfortunately, I managed to jack up my only good elbow. Sucks big time...