How do I access elements of an ItemTemplate in a DataGrid?

the thing is , that the controls are not strongly typed because they're not predefined, two ways to access a control inside a Datagrid/Gridview..

1) get a reference to the row then to his cells, and from the cell's controls choose the appropriate one, and parse it into the control type u want  : 
((HyperLink)DataGrid1.Rows[RowNumber].Cells[CellNumber].Controls[ControlNumber]).Text;

another way to do it , is to get to the row you want then just try to get the control by it's id :

((HyperLink)DataGrid1.Rows[RowNumber].FindControl("HyperLink1")).Text;