Tamyra Mensah-Stock made history on Aug. 3 after becoming the first Black woman to win an Olympic gold for the United States in freestyle wrestling.
Mensah-Stock won the women’s 68-kilogram freestyle wrestling final against Nigerian Blessing Oborududu with a score of 4-1.
“I knew I could do it. I knew it would be hard. I prayed I could do it. In my wildest dreams I knew,” Mensah-Stock, 28, said after the match, according to a post by Team USA.
“Young women are going to see themselves in a number of ways. And they’re going to look up there and go: ‘I can do that. I can see myself,” Mensah-Stock, whose family’s heritage is in Ghana, also told reporters.
Mensah-Stock’s medal becomes the second wrestling medal for the U.S. at the Tokyo Olympics after Adeline Gray won silver in the women’s 76-kilogram freestyle wrestling.
Mensah-Stock, the reigning world champion, also becomes only the second woman to win an Olympic gold in women’s freestyle wrestling after Helen Maroulis won in the 53-kilogram freestyle wrestling in the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games.