Okay Köksal

Okay Köksal — Biography

Okay Köksal was born on 6 May 1987 in the village of Ferhatlı, in the Ardanuç district of Artvin. He took up wrestling in primary school after coaches visiting his class selected him for the Artvin Yusufeli Wrestling Training Center; strong results in high school earned him a place on the Junior National Team, and he won his first international title at the Cadets Grand Prix tournament in Lyon, France. In 2004 he began university at the Physical Education and Sports Teaching Department of 19 Mayıs University's Yaşar Doğu Faculty of Sports Sciences; national-team coaches Murat Atmaca, İsmail Zurnacı, Yüksel Şanlı and Yakup Topuz then invited him to Ankara Tedaş Sports Club, where he turned professional.

In 2007 he earned a national-team place by winning the International Champions Tournament and the Turkish Youth Wrestling Championship, then took gold at the European Cadets Championship in Belgrade and silver at the World Championship in Beijing that same year. In 2009, competing for the Bursa Metropolitan Municipality wrestling team, he won the European Champion Clubs Cup; he graduated in 2010 and began working as a physical education teacher. He returned to competition with a placing at the 2012 Turkish Championship, combined wrestling with teaching at Ankara İlbank Sports Club from 2013 to 2017, and transferred to Balıkesir Metropolitan Municipality Sports Club in 2018. Married and 1.65 m tall, he became widely known in 2019 for representing Turkey against Greece on the TV8 competition show Survivor.