Sharon is being honored for her many years of service as a pairing official. She and her husband Michael spent numerous years traveling throughout Colorado and neighboring states as paring masters and being active as part of the Colorado USA Wrestling board.

Maybe more than any other sport, wrestling is a family affair. Sharon Farnsworth and her family are living proof. Sharon’s husband, Michael, was a 2016 inductee into the Colorado Chapter of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. Their son, Kip, was a Colorado state champion at Longmont and wrestled collegiately at Wyoming.

Now, Sharon is receiving her much-deserved recognition for her dedication to the sport. After more than three decades of serving first as a volunteer at tournaments, then working as one of the nation’s top pairing officials at some of the biggest meets in the country, Sharon has earned her Hall of Fame recognition.

“It’s such an honor — but we were involved because we loved it,” Sharon said. “We have always been involved with young people. We have always tried to encourage them to do something constructive and we wanted to help in any way we could.”

“Help” might be an understatement. By the time Sharon stepped away from her regular involvement, her list of accomplishments and tournaments worked was legendary. Along with helping at more than 100 local tournaments around the state of Colorado, Sharon worked more than 100 national championship events, 160 regional tournaments and 12 international events, as well as more than 100 national, regional and international clinics.

That list includes such prestigious events as the 1999 Veterans Nationals, the 1999 World Team Trials, the 2005 Armed Forces Championships and the 2008 U.S. Olympic Trials.

Sharon also served as the treasurer for the Colorado USA Wrestling Board and received numerous awards and honors through the years for her dedication to the sport. No doubt, that kind of dedication required literally thousands and thousands of hours through the years.

But, Sharon said, “It was never really like work. We did it because we enjoyed it, we loved helping young people and we met so many wonderful people along the way. All of our vacations were centered around wrestling for many, many years and we made friends from all over the country.”

Sharon and Michael first became involved with wrestling when Kip took up the sport. Early on, Sharon worked as a volunteer at tournaments, performing a wide variety of necessary tasks to keep operations running smoothly. She was finally talked into becoming a pairing official and soon rose through the ranks to earn the highest designation given by USA Wrestling. She took her duties seriously.

“You had to get the job done and you had to get it done right,” she stressed. “If you didn’t get it done right, it was a mess — and you never wanted that to happen.”

Sharon remembers one year at the Fargo Nationals when the lights went out during a storm. “We never moved,” she said. “When the lights came back on we were still at our seats and still doing our jobs. We never missed a beat.”

And through it all, Sharon and Michael made lifelong friends.

“Wrestling is such a special sport,” she said. “It really is one big family.”

Presenter- Lenny Bachicha