After overcoming injury, WCAP wrestler vies for Olympics with heavy heart

FORT CARSON, Colo. - Areana Villaescusa suffered pain before, but not like this.

In late 2017, the Army World Class Athlete Program freestyle wrestler ruptured a disc in her neck that threatened to end her career at only 21 years old.

At the 2022 U.S. Open in Las Vegas, Villaescusa tore her right ACL when an opponent grasped her leg during a takedown attempt. She felt something snap in her knee.

Villaescusa thought she had already endured the worst setbacks of her life - until January 2024.

That's when, without one last chance to say goodbye, one final opportunity to laugh and joke with her close friend, an unfortunate twist of fate took Estrella "Star" Dorado-Marin away. Star, a 21-year-old wrestler from Denver died from complications related to blood clots on January 3.

Villaescusa will compete for a spot on the U.S. national team at the U.S. Olympic Trials this week with the Estrella's memory weighing heavily upon her. Following the retirement of WCAP veteran Jenna Burkert, the 27-year-old sergeant enters the Olympic Trials as one of the Army's best chances for making the team.

Fallen Star

Each morning, Villaescusa makes the drive north to Fort Carson on the secluded Old Pueblo Road, south of Colorado Springs. There, along the two-lane passage that weaves through protruding trees near Jimmy Camp Creek, she thinks of Star's bright smile.

Women's assistant coach Jermaine Hodge called Star the hardest worker he'd ever seen. Her work ethic spread to more experienced wrestlers in the program.

"She was the best of us," WCAP head women's coach Bruce Robinson said of Dorado-Marin.

A framed photo of Star sits in a corner of the WCAP wrestling gym, as Army wrestlers grapple on a March morning.

Here, beside the foothills of the Rockies, in the one-story brick building, the Army's wrestlers train with a singular purpose: to make the U.S. national team and compete in the Olympic Games.

After three years in the World Class Athlete program, Star's training primed her to make a push for the games in the 53 kg-weight class in women's freestyle wrestling, making her death more tragic. She won silver at the 2023 U.S. Open and at the 2023 Armed Forces Wrestling Championships.

But her memory hasn't dimmed.

Star made a lasting impression after first walking into the WCAP wrestling gym as a spry 18-year-old in early 2021. Villaescusa didn't know much about the bright-eyed wrestler. Villaescusa said Star would stay in the gym past 5 p.m. long after most women's and men's competitors went home.

"She worked so hard," Villaescusa said. "Like, she'd be in here all day. No breaks. She wouldn't leave the room."

"Her excitement for the sport was genuine."

Coaches would sometimes have to plead with her to leave. But Star would ask again and again to learn a new technique or hold. Or she would be lifting weights or running on the treadmill.

Star's crimson cheeks and warm nature hid a toughness. Villaescusa recalls one afternoon when teammates left drinking bottles and litter in the weight room. Star wouldn't hesitate to speak her mind.

"I'm tired of picking up after you guys," Villaescusa recalled Star saying.

Still she displayed a tenderness and concern for teammates. She often shouted encouragement to peers during matches and would be the first to console a teammate after a tough match.

Concerned that her younger teammate spent too much of her time at the gym, Villaescusa invited Star to visit her Fountain, Colorado, house. She learned Star loved to draw and like Villaescusa, held strong bonds with her Hispanic family.

Desert Days

About 14 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border, in the quiet town of Rio Rico, Arizona, Villaescusa and her family rode bicycles in the dry desert air.

As third generation Mexican Americans, the Villaescusas kept the traditions of a Hispanic family by doing almost everything together. They held outdoor dinners, went camping and hiked at places like Pena Blanca, a 50-acre lake in southern Arizona.

She would apply the same close knit family bonds with her WCAP wrestling family a decade later.

Admittedly a tomboy, Villaescusa spent most of her days outdoors, dribbling a basketball or walking her dogs.

The Villaescusa family tradition eventually drew young Areana's interest. As the daughter of a wrestling coach, she spent many hours at her father's wrestling practices. She often got into scraps with opponents on the soccer field. Wrestling gave her another outlet for her youthful energy.

Her father, Fernando, coached her uncles and brothers. She wanted her dad to do the same for her. Fernando shuddered at the thought of his eldest daughter getting hurt on the wrestling mat. But it didn't stop Areana.

She tried wrestling against boys in 6th grade.

"I thought I was going to walk through and kick everybody's butt," she said. "And I got my butt kicked."

Those beatings would help Villaescusa forge a toughness and demeanor that would eventually make her one of the nation's top wrestlers.

When she grew older, she knew boys would inevitably grow comparatively stronger. So Villaescusa refined her technique. She tried different strategies to gain leverage and the upper hand on her male opponents.

"I knew they were stronger than me in the upper body," she said. "But I knew I was stronger in my legs and my hips. So, I knew my defense was going to be superior to them. And I just had to be careful."

By the time she entered her freshman season at Rio Rico High School, she had already become one of the best female wrestlers in the state and placed second in her weight class at the ASICS Vaughan Nationals in Fargo, North Dakota.

"My dad would always be so worried," Villaescusa said. "When I initially started wrestling, he was so worried about me getting hurt."

Villaescusa assured her father that she would be fine and at 17, Villaescusa then moved to Colorado Springs to train with the national team before enlisting in the Army in 2016.

Her dad's worries proved to be prophetic, weeks after joining the Army's World Class Athlete Program.

Bearing the Unbearable

In the fall of 2017, Villaescusa couldn't shake the pain.

A surging fire radiated through her upper torso. The aches spread from her upper neck to her shoulder blade and from her shoulder to her arms.

The soreness followed her, long after she left the wrestling gym. "It was a pain that I never want to feel again," she said of the November 2017 neck injury.

"I couldn't sleep for like three weeks straight," she added. "And I was so miserable. I was so irritable."

It remained when she slept, the few hours she could squeeze in. She often lay restless in her bed at night wincing in agony. It endured when she grappled in practice or went on a run. She took painkillers, muscle relaxers - nothing brought her relief.

"That might have been one of the lowest moments," Robinson said of the injury.

Doctors told her she might never wrestle again. And if she did, she could permanently lose some mobility. The news devastated Villaescusa, who had just officially joined WCAP's wrestling program weeks before.

"A lot of people thought I was done for," she said. "You can't really do anything with a broken neck, you know? And I was like, 'no, I had just gotten here.' And I just felt like I had so much more to give."

Villaescusa continued to train and tried to compartmentalize the stress on her body. She focused more on therapy and recovery following practices.

Finally, she underwent surgery in January 2018 to repair her neck muscles and spent the 2018 season recovering and working back into shape. Robinson said it took the Villaescusa weeks to return to form but she eventually recovered.

"I told myself, if I was going to do this again, I'd have to put it all in, right?" she said. "I'd have to be all into the training, all into competition all into believing in myself. Because why would I do this? … Why would I put myself at risk to becoming paralyzed?"

"Areana is a smart girl who could have went on and did something else," Robinson said. "She wanted to be an Olympic champion. She wanted to chase [those] dreams and aspirations so I think that will and determination … pushed her past [the neck injury]."

Villaescusa found herself mentally and physically stronger after the injury in 2019, most notably in her upper body. A year after neck surgery, Villaescusa dropped weight and started to wrestle at a higher level. Former WCAP wrestler and six-time U.S. Open champion Whitney Conder helped Villaescusa refine her training.

Villaescusa moved from the 57 kg weight class to lower weight classes at 55 kg and finished second at 53 kg during the U.S. Open.

The Soldier felt ready to take on the best in the nation and poised to make her first Olympic team in 2020.

"I became a grown woman at that moment," said Villaescusa, who made the U.S. senior national team in 2021. "The weight just came off. I was in really good shape. My wrestling technique was superior to what it was before."

However unforeseen circumstances would once again test Villaescusa.

In the spring of 2020, the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic forced the WCAP athletes out of the training facilities and delayed the 2020 Olympics to 2021. She could no longer get the repetition and needed tutelage to continually refine her skills. Villaescusa and her teammates tried to adjust.

She trained outdoors at a nearby elementary school and ran laps on a running track near her house.

"In 2020, I felt ready - like the best I've ever felt," the Soldier said. "I was just like so excited to compete. And then when we had that break, it kind of … stopped the momentum a little bit. We couldn't come in and train …"

"And so I was trying to find different ways of like, staying active outside. It just wasn't the same as being on the mat. And I think that really hindered my performance at the Olympic trials."

Despite the challenges of training in pandemic conditions, Villaescusa went into the 2021 Olympic trials with renewed confidence. She advanced to the semifinals to face Katherine Shai, a wrestler she had defeated before.

She went on to lose a tight 2-1 semi-final match to Shai.

"I'm honestly so shocked at how things unfolded for me," Villaescusa wrote in an April 2021 Facebook post. "My heart hurts because I felt ready for this … This is not my best. The best is yet to come."

However, one year later at the 2022 Marine Corps U.S. Open she suffered the ACL tear against an Air Force wrestler. Her right knee bent the wrong way.

Villaescusa tried to walk but her right leg felt wobbly and unstable.

"I just laid there, and I knew something was wrong," she said. "Because I had hurt my knee prior, like partial tears, and nothing ever felt like that."

Villaescusa endured another difficult, seven-month trek to recovery before returning to the mat in 2023.

Road to Paris

Villaescusa's piercing eyes study her opponent as she pushes strands of brown hair off her face. At the 2023 U.S. Senior Nationals trial qualifier in Fort Worth, Texas, she faces Haley Augello, a lithe former Olympian.

Villaescusa battled Augello to a 2-2 draw at the end of the first period of the 53 kg third place match in December 2023.

Augello jumped to an early 2-0 with a takedown. Then Villaescusa reversed Augello's takedown attempt into a throw to even the score at 2-2 to end the first period. For a moment in period two, she and Augello lock arms in a battle of wills. With the clock ticking and the match on the line, both wrestlers attempt to take shots but miss.

"You be confident! You be confident!" WCAP head wrestling coach Shon Lewis shouts from the sideline. Lewis, sporting a grey WCAP jacket, paces with the same intensity that once made him an elite Greco-Roman wrestler three decades ago.

However, Augello gathers herself to force Villaescusa out of the circle to score the match-winning technical point.

Villaescusa didn't wrestle her best match that day. But throughout her career 27-year-old has displayed tenacity that makes her an Olympic contender Robinson said.

Villaescusa scored wins over Caitlyn Thorne and Elena Ivaldi before falling to Vayle Baker of the West Point Wrestling Club in the semis and Augello to finish fourth at 53 kg.

"She might not be the fastest, most athletic girl," Robinson said. "But she's probably the most mentally stronger out there. And that pushes her through and it … makes up for maybe some other weaknesses."

Less than two weeks after Villaescusa competed at the senior nationals, the sergeant learned Star checked into the UCHealth Memorial Hospital Central across the street from the Olympic Training Center. Star experienced numbness in her arms and extremities. And doctors later discovered blood clots.

Last Goodbye

During the holiday season, Villaescusa and her husband of two years, Army Sgt. Josh Parker, started taking dancing lessons after Star had invited Villaescusa to learn to salsa. The couple looked forward to going dancing with Star when she recovered.

They would never get that last dance.

Star had surgery at the hospital to treat the clotting. Villaescusa last saw Starr at UC Health Memorial on Dec. 29, when she and four other female wrestlers visited her. Doctors released Star four days later.

"She didn't look well," Villaescusa said.

Later that weekend, Villaescusa texted Star. Star replied that she would visit her sister in Denver while she recovered. The complications continued. The team later learned she had to get emergency surgery at North Suburban Medical Center in Thornton, just outside of Denver.

Then on January 3, while Villaescusa visited family at Iowa State University where her dad coaches, she got a phone call from a WCAP assistant.

Wrestling staff called a meeting at the WCAP gym later that day, the assistant said.

Her heart sank a little.

Villaescusa, still in Iowa, messaged her teammate, Spc. Brenda Reyna, "What is this meeting about?" Reyna replied that she didn't know.

Hours later, Villaescusa asked again. Reyna replied that she did not want to say.

Then Villaescusa knew.

The team would later confirm that Star had passed away.

"I still can't believe it," Villaescusa said through tears. "We loved her you know?"

In the days after her death, the WCAP team held a military memorial for Star. When Star's sister and family held their own ceremony for Star in Denver, the women's wrestling team travelled to Red Rock Canyon in western Colorado Springs. The Army women's team held its own vigil at the park. Team members held a specially made candle with Star's face in printed on it.

There next to the park's hilly trails, they said their last goodbyes.

In the locker room inside of the WCAP gym women's wrestlers built a photo collage with photos of Star during trips and at team practices. Team members placed notes of stories they remember about the Soldier.

Star's memory remains on their minds as Villaescusa and members of the Army's women's freestyle wrestling team makes a final Olympic push at Penn State's Bryce Jordan Center April 19-20, 2024.

Villaescusa will now take on her final hurdles to realizing her Olympic dream, the Olympic Team Trials. If she wins her weight class, she will go on to compete at one more Olympic qualifier.

"I do this for my family and my family who is back home," Villaescusa said. "I do this for the people I love, and I do this for me. So yeah, I definitely dedicated it to [Star]."

RELATED LINKS:

WCAP mourns the loss of star wrestler Spc. Estrella Dorado Marin

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