BEIJING — Railway worker Steeve Guenot won France's first Olympic wrestling gold medal in 84 years by taking the Greco-Roman 66-kilogram weight class Wednesday and denying Kyrgyzstan its first gold.

Guenot defeated Kanatbek Begaliev 3-0, 3-1 in the best-of-three format.

Minutes after Guenot won a gold, his older brother Christophe Guenot won one of the two bronze medals at 74 kg.

France hadn't won gold in any discipline of wrestling since Henri Deglane (82 kg) in the 1924 Paris Olympics, and Steeve traveled a lot further than that — and not by train, either — for this medal. He celebrated by performing a back flip, drawing big cheers.

"This is the most beautiful day of my life," he said. "I don't realize what's happening. It's the first gold for France (in Beijing) and I'm very proud. It's a crazy stuff."

The gold medalist drew a congratulatory phone call from French president Nicolas Sarkozy minutes after leaving the medal stand.

Winning the bronzes were Ukraine's Armen Vardanyan and Mikhail Siamionau of Belarus.

Just as in the United States, wrestlers in France aren't well-compensated and often work full-time jobs. The 22-year-old Guenot and his 29-year-old brother work for the national train system, Steeve in security, yet have become elite wrestlers.

Wrestlers in the prominent countries in the sport, including Russia, usually are full-time athletes and get considerable financial support from their national federations.

"There is no secret (to the family's success)," Christophe Guenot said. "Our father taught us the value of hard work. I always trained with my younger brother. Training together is very good motivation. It pushes me to succeed. ... Hopefully, this will start a new era in French wrestling."

Begaliev wasn't happy that a video review in the second period gave Guenot two points.

"I don't think it was very fair. The first round I lost, but the second I wasn't so sure," he said.

The field became wide open when Farid Mansurov, the 2004 Olympic champion from Azerbaijan, lost 3-0, 3-0 to Vardanyan in the first round. Mansurov didn't lose a period while winning last year's world championship, including a gold-medal match win over Steeve Guenot.

Guenot won a tight match Wednesday in the round of 16, defeating Hungary's Tamas Loerincz 0-2, 1-1 and 1-1 without winning a period outright, only to win his semifinal and final matches by a combined score of 10-2.