MIT wrestlers Viveca (left) and Veloria Pannell practice with each other. PHOTO: KEN RICHARDSON
Just ask the Pannell sisters, Viveca ’25 and Veloria ’26, both engineering majors and, as stars of the MIT Wrestling Club, perhaps the Institute’s most accomplished tag team.
“At MIT, people joining in the practices really enjoy the technique stuff,” says Viveca, an electrical engineering and computer science major who is also a two-time National Collegiate Wrestling Association (NCWA) champion and three-time All-American in the 130-pound weight class.
“There’s so much coaching about how your lever arm’s longer if you grab the guy by his wrist instead of his armpit, or if you shift your weight, you get your opponent over the pivot point,” she says. “A lot of our team members really like the mechanics of it.”
Adds Veloria, an electrical engineering major, two-time NCWA champion in the 143-pound class and 2023 winner of the association’s Most Outstanding Wrestler Award: “In engineering, you’re used to failing over and over again until you can perfect it and get it right. You learn to improve, and that’s really helpful.”
The hours of practice may be grueling, they say, but the reward comes in the hand raised in victory and the knowledge that you have done your best. “The best feeling is when you’re losing in points throughout the match and you fight your way back and finally triumph in the last minute,” says Veloria. “That feels great, because you’ve earned it.”
“You will become talented and skilled”
The Pannells are enthusiastic participants in the vast universe of MIT club sports, with thousands of individuals competing for fun and the love of the game.
A complement to 33 intercollegiate varsity sports at MIT, the Institute’s 34 club sports range from archery, badminton, and cricket to triathlon and ultimate frisbee. Club sports are open to all students, faculty, staff, alumni, and spouses with a Department of Athletics, Physical Education and Recreation membership. (That’s in addition to the more than 20 intramural sports offerings, with in-house league competitions in basketball, soccer, flag football, and esports, among other recreational activities.)
PHOTO: KEN RICHARDSON
Sport taekwondo, golf, and gymnastics are the three most popular club sports at MIT, says Nicholas Jewell, associate director of club sports, intramural sports, and sports camps. “We have some clubs that are trying to win national championships, and some that don’t compete at all and are purely instructional,” he says.
“As I tell parents at orientation, MIT will prepare their child for a successful career when they graduate,” he says. “But it can be a struggle for a student coming to a new city, not knowing anybody, not having any friends, or having trouble socializing. Mental-health barriers can be overcome by picking up a hobby or a sport, even casually.
“My whole pitch about club sports is if you do this even for just two of your four years at MIT,” says Jewell, “you will become talented and skilled enough at a sport so that no matter where you move in the world or what you end up doing, you will be able to integrate yourself into a community of friends.”
According to Jewell, some 3,300 of the more than 4,000 members of the MIT community who participate in club or intramural sports annually are undergraduate or graduate students. He estimates close to a third of the total student body takes part in club or intramural sports before graduating.
Sometimes the club athletes even give their varsity counterparts a run for their money. Jewell recalls the remarkable performance of the MIT Rowing Club’s men’s eight at the Head of the Charles Regatta (HOCR), the world’s largest two-day rowing event, in 2022 when the club rowers finished only three seconds behind the MIT men’s varsity heavyweight “C” eight over the three-mile course.
“They were this close—probably only a boat’s length away,” he says. “I think it fills them with a little bit of glee. There’s a lot of camaraderie in that spirit of competition.”
“A community I appreciate”
Maarten Peters, a doctoral student in materials science and engineering, rowed in the boat that set a club record at the 2022 HOCR with a time of 16 minutes, 11 seconds. “It just clicked that day,” he says.
Rowing in the two seat, Faraz Faruqi SM ’22, a PhD student in computer science, was competing for the first time in the HOCR. Faruqi had never set foot in a shell before signing up for a learn-to-row class with the club the year before, he says. Now he is a regular at practices on the Charles at six in the morning.
“Rowing is a good motivation to wake up, but it has very quickly become a community I appreciate,” he says. “I know that once I’m at the boathouse, I will not miss my bed.”
Among other noteworthy accomplishments by MIT club athletes, Karyn Real ’23, MNG ’24, a member of the MIT Sport Taekwondo Club, competes for Team USA in the sport. She has medaled at the Pan American Games and US Open, among other competitions, and was ranked second in the world in 2022. Specializing in poomsae, a non-contact technical sequence of blocks, strikes, and kicks in the Korean martial arts, Real will compete at the 2024 World Taekwondo Poomsae Championships in the fall.
Meantime, NASA astronaut Warren “Woody” Hoburg ’08 so fondly recalled his experience with the MIT Alpine Ski Club that he asked for a club patch to take to space with him aboard the International Space Station. “He’s got a picture of himself floating in space with it,” Jewell says. “It’s just really cool, the impact club sport communities have on students, even after they leave.”
“MIT gymnastics will be in my life for a long time”
PhD biology student Molly Carney, co-president of the MIT Gymnastics Club, started in gymnastics as a five-year-old in Arlington, Massachusetts, and competed through high school and then with the gymnastics club at the University of California, Los Angeles. Carney has kept up with the sport at MIT, focusing on balance beam and floor exercises. In April, she traveled with some 20 teammates to Albuquerque, New Mexico, to compete in the nationals hosted by the National Association of Intercollegiate Gymnastics Clubs.
“The friendships and relationships I’ve made are going to last beyond my time at MIT,” Carney says. “Alumni are allowed to be part of the team, and there are people who went here for undergrad who are still active in the club in their thirties. I feel like I could be here forever, if I wanted to. So I think MIT gymnastics will be in my life for a long time.”
“It has taught me mental resilience”
“I like going to practice as a stress relief,” says wrestler Veloria Pannell. “It’s a way to connect with people and take your mind off school. When you’ve been stuck in a study session for hours on end, it’s a good break.”
The Pannells said their two younger brothers had been wrestling for a couple of years when, with the introduction of a girls’ wrestling team at their high school in Los Gatos, California, the sisters decided to take up the sport. “We stuck with it because we enjoyed it so much,” says Veloria. Both sisters have excelled.
“The thing I enjoy about wrestling is it’s fun,” says Viveca. “It has taught me mental resilience, that it’s OK to fail and keep going. Plus, wrestling people are just really fun to hang out with. I like to tell people, wrestling keeps me grounded.”
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