Athlete of the Month
Mia Shepard

Pictures and Content courtesy of Mia Shepard and AJ Grieves/Mat Focus

My name is Mia Shepard. I am sixteen years old, and I am currently a Junior at Liberty High School in Las Vegas, NV. I wrestled when I was around the age of 4-5 on a team called Junior Wildcats, but I hated it at the time and would cry every day of practice, so my dad pulled me out of it to do something else. My older brother wrestled in high school, so as a child I was around it a lot. As I got older I went through a lot of sports such as Dance, Soccer and Gymnastics but never wanted to join back into wrestling. My younger brother Kaleb Shepard had started wrestling at 4 years old, so I was around wrestling once again and everyone always told me to join, but I was stubborn and didn’t want to.
That mindset changed around November-December of 2020. My parents had gotten Covid, so we obviously could not take my little brother to practice for the two weeks of quarantine. In those two weeks I would always tell my brother “Let’s wrestle!” My parents saw that and saw I had potential and told me once we get out of quarantine that I am going back to practice with my brother. Now I had stopped doing gymnastics in 6th grade, so from 6th grade to the end of 8th grade I hadn’t been physically active, and so I was very much out of shape. But, I decided to do a practice just to try it. At the time, my brother wrestled for Pride Wrestling Club which is run by Richard Rios and Jose Maestes. As well as wrestling for Pride, my brother also wrestled for Aniciete Training Club which is run by my Coaches Napoleon Aniciete, Alex Aniciete and Valyen Rauser.
My first practice I loved it. I felt at home, wrestling was my sport and I knew it the first time I stepped on the mat. I only wrestled for Pride for my first few months, but then I eventually joined ATC so I was doing two practices most days of the week. Pride was a good team to be on, but I eventually joined ATC full-time in April of 2020. As I fully committed to ATC I also took a step up in the program and got placed in the high school room. My second week of being in the high school room I had what we call a “Hell Week.” Hell Week is our regular afternoon practice, but we add a 5am morning practice every morning of that week. Ultimately it pushes your mindset and makes you mentally and physically stronger. This Hell Week–the first workout was Owen’s Hill, I will never forget!
That week I realized this wasn’t a joke anymore; I really was in this sport to do it. I started off with the RMN wrestling tournaments and it was hard for sure. I was in the boys bracket as well as girls, most of the time, so I started off wrestling boys. My first win was in the Arizona Showdown in January of 2021. I won off of the boy stalling on top and one escape. That first win felt amazing! After it, I felt something I didn’t get out of any of my other sports wins. I don’t know how to describe it to be honest. It’s like an adrenaline rush and a confidence rush. It is definitely one of my favorite feelings. Being a part of ATC was definitely one of the best decisions I’ve made in my wrestling career and life in general.
ATC is a very strong team with a family feel to it, and the coaches push us athletes to places and things we didn’t even know we could go to, or do! A couple months of me wrestling went by, and I am made progress and I qualified for Fargo, so my parents decided to send me. My first 6 months of wrestling I was getting sent out to the hardest tournaments for my level and age. I had a lot of people speaking down on me saying I didn’t belong there, and it was a mistake sending me. So, I had a lot of people to prove something to, and prove wrong. I wrestled 112 my first year at Fargo as a Cadet.
My first match I was extremely nervous. My coaches and parents had been talking about this tournament–this moment for months, but I couldn’t let that get to my head. I took a breath in–a breath out, and I stepped on the mat to wrestle, to do what I went there for. I knew there were a lot of eyes on me. My first match I won. I teched her. Not only was everyone else shocked and stoked, but so was I. Knowing people were doubting me and telling me I shouldn’t be here and me winning my first match at that tournament, was the biggest statement I had ever made. That was my way of saying I do belong here no matter what anyone says. That year I went 1-2. I left hungry for more. I wanted that All-American title. I came back ready to train as hard as I needed.
In part of training I also started my Sophomore year at Liberty High School. Of course I joined my high school wrestling team where I met my high school coaches Kenny Porter, Jesse Shriver, Nick Gaitanos, and Gabe Gledhill. I transferred to Liberty before my Sophomore year. I originally went to Desert Oasis High school, but Liberty had better wrestling and academics. Being that I transferred, it then made me ineligible my Sophomore wrestling season, so I had to be on JV, but I was basically varsity just didn’t have that title. State time came around and I was ready to compete. I was seeded fourth.
That Friday of State, at school, I was in my class and my teacher had told me I was on the Virtual lis–which would mean I have Covid, but it didn’t make sense. I soon realized I never got my weekly test results back for that week and the admin and I worked everything to try to prove it was wrong. The people running the Covid Testing Center, in my school, wouldn’t let me test again because it was a red cover–meaning it was false, but since I’ve never had Covid they wouldn’t let me test again. It was all weird! My State was taken away. Everyone was so mad this was supposed to be my time to come out and wrestle my best out of the whole season. Finally, off-season, which is basically just a season for a lot of club wrestlers, came around and it was time to really show up.
Considering my season was taken, and my State Tournament, this was a bigger season than ever to prove to everyone that I have changed and improved. I did tournaments here and there, but we hit Women’s Nationals and that was the first tournament I have ever had to really cut for. I had to make 49 kg which was about 106 with a couple of ounces. I weighed in at 49 kg and wrestled that morning. I won one match, which I wasn’t mad at because my last match was for sure one of my hardest wrestling matches ever. But that tournament went into the books, and then it was time for Western Regionals and States– those were the warm up tournaments for Fargo.
Western Regionals I did alright, wasn’t worried for that one, but Western States I was more focused on with the duals and everything else. I wrestled for Alaska this year, and won and lost some matches. But the individual was the main focus. I took 3rd in Greco, 6th in Freestyle and 3rd in Folkstyle. July came fast, and it came time to focus more than I ever have. I made the cut to 106 for cadets. The cut wasn’t bad. I felt better cutting for that than I had for any tournament I hadever wrestled in–in my almost 2 years of competing. I was nervous but definitely ready.
My first match I teched the girl by second period. My second match was a little harder. I won by one point and the girl was a State Champ of Iowa and was also an All-American. After I wrestled that match my stomach started feeling upset, and I felt nauseous. Our team was staying in the dorms, and I had eggs and a smoothie, but the eggs weren’t cooked right and the smoothie wasn’t my best idea. I ended up throwing-up everything I ate, and I had no energy left in me. At least I thought. My coaches found me and woke me up to wrestle again. My next girl was from New York. As I was warming up, well trying to warm up, and trying to get my body up from doing nothing for a long period of time–my mindset was off. But coach Napoleon had talked to me and told me that I had put in so much work and time and made it so far into the tournament, that I needed to wake up and fight. I checked in, the nauseous feeling still being in the back of my throat. I shook her hand and she got 2 on me, but I wrestled back and got 4.
Second period came, and I woke up and realized how badly I wanted this. I ended up pinning, her with a half, in the second period and that got me the spot in the Quarter-Finals. I am now going on 3-2 feeling more proud of myself than ever. My next match was Ava Ward, the Second in the Nation. I wasn’t going to get in my head for this match. I knew I’d try but wouldn’t beat myself up for losing. I then had a girl from Pennsylvania. I was losing 4 to 0, then she shot a low level and I got back exposure twice which gave me 4, and we were tied. Then I got another back exposure which gave me 6; now it was 6-4. But still being a rookie, I make little mistakes that make a major difference in winning and losing.
I wasn’t looking at the time and didn’t realize I had 40 seconds left in the match, This is known as the Blood Round and would take me to the placing matches. She shot, and instead of down-blocking, I tried to snap-down and got stuck, and she circled behind me and got 2. She was now winning by criteria with ten seconds left, and the clock wasn’t going. We both tried to tell the ref, but he wasn’t listening and I lost. That match broke me the most that whole tournament. The only reason she won was because I didn’t down-block and back out. But I then found out that the girl was the 11th girl in the Nation, so the fact that I only lost to her by criteria made me a little better, but I still wanted that title. I wrestled Juniors at 112. The 100-112 girls brackets were the three hardest in the whole tournament of boys and girls. I won my first match by tech too, but lost my next one to another Pennsylvania girl, and my next to a California girl.
My results in Juniors I am not mad at as it was all strictly for me to see what I should wrestle for next year. I would like to thank my coaches Napoleon and Alex Aniciete and Valyen Rauser for pushing me to be my greatest, and my high school coaches for believing in me. But most of all I would like to say a big thank you to my parents. They do the utter most to make sure I get seen and that I wrestle my best. They are my biggest fans besides my brother. I love all of my friends and family and coaches. They make my life have meaning, and I get to show off the limits they push me to every time I step on the mat. I love every single one of y’all. In my future I hope to wrestle in college to pursue a career in the medical field, make a World Team and All-American at Fargo for my Junior and Senior years, and I hope to one to make it to the Olympics.