Serhat Balcı
Turkish freestyle wrestler and oil wrestler
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Serhat Balcı (born 15 March 1982) is a Turkish freestyle wrestler and later oil wrestling competitor. In freestyle wrestling, he won a silver medal at the 2011 World Wrestling Championships, a bronze medal at the 2009 World Wrestling Championships, a silver medal at the 2005 European Wrestling Championships, and a gold medal at the 2005 Mediterranean Games. He also represented Turkey at the 2008 Summer Olympics and the 2012 Summer Olympics.[1][2]
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| Born | 15 March 1982 Istanbul, Turkey | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Height | 1.83 m (6 ft 0 in) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Weight | 96 kg (212 lb) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Country |  Turkey | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | Wrestling | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Event | Freestyle wrestling | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Club | Amasya Şeker Sancaktepe Belediyesi | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Medal record
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Freestyle career
Balcı was born in Istanbul and came from a wrestling family.[3] He began wrestling as a child and started out at Haydarpaşa Demirspor.[3] At age-group level, he won the cadet world title in Manchester in 1998, took bronze at the 1999 Cadet World Championships in Łódź, and won the junior European title in Tirana in 2002.[2][3]
His first major senior international medal came at the 2005 European Wrestling Championships in Varna, where he won silver in the 84 kg class.[2] Later that year, he won the gold medal in the 84 kg freestyle event at the 2005 Mediterranean Games in Almería. He reached the final by defeating France's Loïc Bertrand and Italy's Anthony Fasugba before facing Greece's Lazaros Loizidis for the title.[4]
At the 2007 European Wrestling Championships, Balcı won bronze at 84 kg, and later that year he finished fifth at the 2007 World Wrestling Championships.[2] He also enjoyed sustained success at the Yasar Dogu Tournament. Balcı won gold medals in the 84 kg division in 2002 Ankara, 2005 Samsun, and 2007 Ankara. He took silver in 2006 Samsun and 2008 Ankara at 84 kg, and later added silver medals at 96 kg in 2009 Ankara and 2010 Istanbul.[2]
Balcı represented Turkey at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing in the men's freestyle 84 kg event. He defeated Canada's Travis Cross and Cuba's Reineris Salas before losing to Tajikistan's Yusup Abdusalomov in the semi-finals and to Ukraine's Taras Danko in the bronze-medal bout, finishing fifth overall.[5]
In 2009, after moving up to 96 kg, he won bronze at the 2009 European Wrestling Championships in Vilnius and bronze again at the 2009 World Wrestling Championships in Herning.[2] Turkish media described his world bronze as one of the country's main freestyle results at the tournament.[6] He followed that with another European bronze medal at the 2010 European Wrestling Championships in Baku.[2]
Balcı's biggest career result came at the 2011 World Wrestling Championships in Istanbul, where he won silver in the men's freestyle 96 kg division.[7][8] In the tournament, he beat Venezuela's Luis Vivenes, Tajikistan's Rustam Iskandari, the United States' Jake Varner, and Kazakhstan's Taimuraz Tigiyev before losing the final to Iran's Reza Yazdani.[9]
At the 2012 European Wrestling Championships, Balcı won his fifth senior European medal, taking bronze in the 96 kg class.[2] He then competed at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, where he lost his opening bout in the men's freestyle 96 kg event to Kyrgyzstan's Magomed Musaev and finished 16th.[10] After the London Olympics, he ended his senior freestyle career.[3]
Oil wrestling and coaching
After leaving mat competition, Balcı moved into oil wrestling.[3] He later became a başpehlivan and finished joint third at the Kırkpınar oil wrestling festival in both 2015 and 2018.[11][12] He also won head-wrestler titles at several regional oil-wrestling events, including Çan in 2018, Sancaktepe in 2022, and Balya in 2024.[13]
Balcı also moved into coaching. He worked as a youth coach at Sancaktepe Belediyesi and became one of the club's technical directors in 2014.[3] In 2015, that outlet also listed him among the coaches of Turkey's U23 freestyle team.[14] In 2025, Anadolu Agency reported that he had been appointed technical director of the Kocaeli Metropolitan Municipality freestyle wrestling team while also competing in oil wrestling for Kocaeli Kağıtspor.[15]