Female Hardin Valley wrestler Kenya Sloan wins national competition

Hardin Valley Academy senior Kenya Sloan just returned from Oklahoma, where she won the USA Women’s Wrestling Championship competing against several hundred women from across the nation.

HVA wrestling coach Marc Giles said Sloan is a unique competitor in that she combines focus and technique with patience to become a force to be reckoned with on the mats.

“Kenya has God-given athletic ability,” said Giles. “She has focus and she’s harvested the best of the best techniques given to her by her Amateur Athletics Union coach Junior Hernandez as well as her coaches here at Hardin Valley.

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“One of her best qualities is her patience. A referee once told me Kenya was the most patient wrestler he’d ever seen. No matter what happens, she doesn’t panic.”

Sloan said for her, wrestling is a mental game where technique counts.

“I never plan on just muscling my way through a match. Wrestling is very much a mental game and it’s technical. When I know who I’m going to wrestle I immediately begin to break apart their technique and adjust mine accordingly.”

An honor student with a 4.0 GPA, Sloan is the only woman on her team and she’s team captain. When asked about the difficulties of being the only female, she said, “I feel confident that I have the respect of my teammates as an athlete whether I’m a woman or not. Men and women are different physically, mentally, and emotionally. I’m a good leader because I can give them a different perspective and I remind them that it’s not all about physicality, you have to have your head in the game too.”

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Sloan said she got into wrestling by watching her younger brother Keenan wrestle when they were 7 and 8 years old.

“I used to stand in the corner and cheer him on until one day his coach, Junior Hernandez, who is my AAU coach now, said that I should put on a pair of shoes and give it try. I fell in love with the sport right away.”

Athletics doesn’t fall far from the tree for Sloan and her brother Keenan. Their father is a manager for National Fitness Center and acts as her personal trainer.

Sloan plans on competing in the Junior World Team trials in May in Texas.

She has signed with the USA national champion Lady Tigers at Campbellsville University in Kentucky, where she has earned a full scholarship.

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