Team USA wrestler makes incredible history at Paris Olympics

Amit Elor, 20, became the youngest American to win Olympic wrestling gold Tuesday when she dominated Kyrgyzstan's Meerim Zhumanazarova in the 68-kilogram final at the Paris Olympics. 

The 3-0 final win capped off a four-match streak in which Elor dominated her opponents by a margin of 31-2, including an opening-round win over reigning world champion Buse Tosun. While Elor's dominance may have shocked non-wrestling fans, those who've followed the sport aren't the least bit shocked by the turn of events. 

Elor hasn't lost a match at any level since 2019, and she scored as many points in her first two bouts at the Paris Games (18) as all her opponents have against her combined in the last five years. 

That's how unstoppable the prodigious 20-year-old has been since high school. 

Elor's coach, Sara McMann, was not shocked at her pupil's dominance in Paris. However, she was amazed at how Elor obliterated opponents with a lot more experience at the Olympic level.  

"She's going to break all the records. I knew that before she even won her first senior championship," McMann said of Elor, via USA Today. "...You see her in action, and you watch what she does to other people who are, on every measure, her equals — how mercilessly she just demolishes every game plan. It's no secret what she does. The fact that she's able to go out there and do that to everybody, and virtually never get scored on — it's untouchable."

With Tuesday's win, Elor became only the third American woman to win Olympic gold in wrestling after Helen Maroulis and Tamyra Mensah-Stock. The Olympic gold comes after she captured the Senior, U23, and U20 world titles within three months in 2022, followed by the 2023 Pan American title. The Senior title made her the youngest U.S. Senior world champion in any discipline or gender (age 18 in 2022). 

Despite all the early success, Elor still feels like "a little kid" and not like the best women's 68-kilogram wrestler in the world. 

"I think I have a little bit of imposter syndrome," she said, via USA Today. "I still feel like that little kid who just started wrestling. But currently, I just became an Olympic champion."

Elor entered the Paris Games as the youngest American to ever compete in Greco-Roman wrestling on the Olympic stage. By tasting gold at 20, she has likely set herself up for a lot of future Olympic glory.