West Edmonton Mall Arm Wrestling Challenge is a success

By Cheryl Walsh

EDMONTON – An Edmonton arm wrestler beat a heavier opponent than he had expected to face at the Arm Wrestling Challenge at West Edmonton Mall on Oct. 22.

Kelly Leitch, 23, of Edmonton had been practising and preparing to go up against Vancouver’s Marlon Hicks. Hicks is ranked No. 1 in Canada in his weight class.

After hearing the news that Hicks had to cancel, Leitch said he was a little relieved because Hicks posed a more stylistic problem for him. At the same time, he was thrilled to be able to go up against Saskatchewan’s Jason Roy instead.

“[Roy] weighed in at 187 pounds and [Leitch] weighed in at 167 pounds,” said Jeff Miller, Alberta Arm Wrestling vice-president and tournament organizer. “So [Leitch] was giving up a 20-pound weight advantage to [Roy].”

The local arm wrestling team, Edmonton Extreme, did very well in the tournament, walking away with 15 out of the 32 medals.

Although Hicks was unable to make it to Edmonton, Miller was able to set up an alternate match.

“I let everyone know on the arm wrestling forum about this, and Roy immediately volunteered to take [Hicks] place,” said Miller.

Roy is ranked No. 1 in Saskatchewan and is a former national champion.

Fortunately, Leitch won the super match despite the fact that Roy was in a higher weight class than he’d been training for.

Leitch ended up walking away with third place in two different weight classes, one of them being higher than his weight, and Mark Harrison, previously ranked first in Canada won the tournament overall for the right hand match.

Edmonton Extreme did quite well in the tournament , and each member who participated went into a number of matches. The only thing Miller said that he wanted to change was the length of the event. It went on for almost five hours, and he would probably want to reduce it next year by about two hours, he said.

To read the event preview, click here.