Strider Wrestling Blog

The new Strider Wrestling Website is online and available for viewing. The address is www.striderwrestling.com. There you can find out more information about Strider Wrestling as well as the new location for this blog. Just click on "Blog" in the menu on the left. Since this blog is moving to our new homepage, this site will no longer be updated, but it will remain online and point to the new homepage.

After 6 weeks of Strider Wrestling, the progress made has been fantastic. The kids who have been with us from the beginning or nearly so have made great strides from the first time I saw them. Those who came on later have also picked it up quickly, and I look forward to the final three weeks with them and hope they will return for our spring session.

If you're reading this and want to help out in any way, here are some things you can do:
1. Bring your kids to wrestle, and stay to help. It doesn't matter if you know anything about wrestling. If you watch and learn as the teaching goes on, you will be able to show your son what to do. With a large group of young wrestlers, the more coaches on the mat, the more successful we can be together.

2. If you have old wrestling shoes that are still in good condition, but maybe your son has grown out of, donate them to Strider for other kids to use. This goes for the future as well. If you buy shoes for your son, when he grows out of them, consider this as an option.

3. Tell other people about Strider Wrestling. It will be more successful with more people involved. Get the word out to your neighbors, friends, church, and schools.

4. Support Strider Wrestling financially. As a 501(c)(3) organization, your donation will be tax deductible and will do a lot to support us as we support youth wrestling in the greater Chicago area. We do not charge our students to attend Strider, so we are completely donor funded.

USA Wrestling has released the Second Edition of the Parent’s Guide to Youth Wrestling. This document explains the sport to parents who may be unfamiliar with wrestling. Among other things, it answers the following questions about the sport:
* What makes wrestling so different and unique?
* What effect will the sport have on my child?
* What about weight management?
* Is my child really cut out for this sport?
* What equipment is needed?

This document is available as a free download in PDF format here. If you have a son who has been coming to Strider or you have considered bringing your son and would like more information about the sport, this guide can answer some of your questions.

Once you learn a double leg takedown, transitioning to a single leg takedown shouldn't be that hard. The step is almost the same. You still lower your level and make your attack. You're still grabbing legs. The main difference is where you step. A double leg is an inside step and a single leg is an outside step. Make a slight adjustment to a double leg, and you get a single leg. This was the concept used tonight at Lawndale to introduce the single leg takedown. It was much easier to teach this move with the foundation of the double leg already in place. As such, the wrestlers picked it up very quickly.

Not every wrestler will have a top notch double leg and a top notch single leg. I personally did not score often with a double leg takedown, though I scored countless times by attacking one leg at a time. I had a teammate who rarely scored with a single leg, yet took down many opponents, even even in matches he lost, with his double leg. Of course, each of us knew and could execute both techniques thanks to the inherent similarities. Our goal in coaching wrestling is not to create a team of wrestlers who all wrestle the same way, but instead we want to show enough technique so that the wrestlers can find what works for them as they learn to be complete wrestlers.

After three weeks at each location, the progress made by the wrestlers is evident. The learning curve for wrestling is initially steep, but it can be quickly climbed if the coaches and athletes are enthusiastic and willing to improve. Strider has coaches that know what they are doing and know how to impart that knowledge to young wrestlers. The wrestlers who continue to come to practice have shown the dedication and attentiveness required in order to learn the sport. I am excited to see where this group can go in the next six weeks of the fall session.

A big part of wrestling is learning to hold your position. It is important to learn single leg takedowns and double leg takedowns, but having a good stance, understanding leverage, and holding your ground is important as well. Thankfully, there is a fun way to begin to learn this. At least, the wrestlers really enjoy it. Two wrestlers face each other inside the small circle. When the coach blows the whistle, each wrestlers tries to push his opponent outside the circle. For now, the wrestlers aren't quite sure how to accomplish this, but as they learn more about the sport, they will learn how to both hold a position and drive an opponent off of his position.

Of course, we didn't leave technique completely by the wayside. A large part of the practice at College Church last night focused on stance, motion, attack step, power triangle, and double leg takedowns. Review is important no matter what you're trying to learn, but it seems to be even more important when you're trying to develop the muscle memory required to perform wrestling techniques.

The wrestlers at Lawndale are making dramatic improvement. Most of the wrestlers who came last night have been to almost every practice, making the improvement expected, yet still enjoyable to watch. Two weeks ago, each of them could barely execute an attack step without a partner, yet yesterday, I watched them take each other down with great execution. We drilled double leg takedowns, a half nelson pinning combination, and ended wtih counterattacks. After learning the Seven S's of a counterattack last week, many of them were obviously paying attention, as they could repeat and execute all seven. In the future, we will do our best to keep the improvement coming.

After the second week of Strider Wrestling's fall session, things are definitely picking up. Thirteen wrestlers came to the College Church location last night, and they were all ready to learn. As usual, we focused on the basics, again refining stance and motion before moving on to the attack step, power triangle, and finishing a double leg takedown. One point I try to get across to them is that even if you practiced something last time you were here, it doesn't mean you are an expert. I've wrestled for fifteen years, but the first thing I work on at every practice is still stance, motion, and my attack step. Only once you are competent at these basic skills can you move on to more complex motions and techniques. As the saying goes, you have to crawl before you can walk.

A lot of beginning wrestling is teaching your body to perform actions that seem unnatural at first. Staying in a good stance is tiring, especially if you've never done it before. In the same way, getting used to moving your own body while controlling another person is a challenge. This is why wrestling takes a long time to learn, and proper teaching is vital.

We had good numbers at both College Church and Lawndale last night. Word is getting out and we are getting the chance to teach a lot of kids how to wrestle. At Lawndale, we worked again on double leg takedowns again. I told the kids about Chicago native Joe Williams, who won three NCAA championships at the University of Iowa, wrestled in the 2004 Olympics, and, just yesterday, won a bronze medal in the World Championships in Hungary. I told the wrestlers about him for two reasons. First, he's from Chicago, just like them. Second, his best move is a double leg takedown, and he's one of the best in the world at it. Following that, we transitioned to defense, and I showed them the seven S's of a counterattack, courtesy of Conestoga Valley High School (Pennsylvania) head coach Trent Turner. They are as follows:
1. Stuff
2. Sprawl
3. Square
4. Slide
5. Sword
6. Spin
7. Score

They made a lot of progress. I was impressed. Over at College Church, Coach Norton took the group through some basic stance and motion drills. Also, he introduced the attack step again and progressed from there to the beginning of a double leg takedown, focusing on the "power triangle." At both sights, the wrestlers are eager to learn. They want to wrestle, and I couldn't ask for more than that.

The second week of training has started well. Fourteen young wrestlers came to Lawndale eager to learn last night. After announcements at two local churches this coming Sunday, I expect our numbers to grow even more. Last night, we focused on two main techniques. First, we worked on our attack step. Driving the knee over the foot and onto the mat in order to arrive at the "power triangle" position is an awkward motion if you have never done it before, but it is absolutely fundamental to a good attack step. Following that, we again practiced double leg takedowns, focusing on using what we had learned about the attack step earlier in the practice. I explained the importance of a good attack step and the "power triangle" position, and then watched the wrestlers put it to use. While none of them are experts yet, they are making great progress. At the end of the day, I introduced the very beginning of defending a double leg takedow so they will be ready to score both offensively and defensively.

Just before calling it a night, I read 1st Corinthians 9:24-27 to the guys. In that passage, Paul speaks of runners striving to win the prize, but they must follow the rules of the game in order to win. Paul spent his life traveling around Asia Minor telling people about Jesus, and he uses the running analogy to explain the importance of hard work and discipline both in his life and in his preaching of the gospel.

The second session at Lawndale also took place on Tuesday night. There, the kids built on what they learned on Monday. We also had four more wrestlers than the day before. On Monday, they learned about stance, motion, and inside attack step. On Tuesday, they applied each of those skills to learn a double leg takedown. Teaching wrestling is like building a house. You have to have a strong foundation before you can move on to more complicated things. It isn't always fun to learn about stance and motion, but it is vitally important to wrestling success, and the double leg takedowns the wrestlers learned on Tuesday are better than if we had ignored the foundation.

We had a smaller group than anticipated tonight at Wheaton, but we accomplished some good things on our first day. As word gets out, more people will come. I think that one difference between the two groups will be the level of experience. Both will have plenty of new wrestlers, but Wheaton is likely to have more who have done this before. Wrestling has a stronger foothold in the suburbs than the city, but the city presence is growing thanks to groups like the Park District, some elementary schools, and, of course, Strider Wrestling.

Welcome to the Strider Wrestling blog. I've started this blog so anyone who wants can keep track of Strider Wrestling's programs in the Chicago area. This fall, we have a program at Lawndale Community Church in Chicago and College Church in Wheaton. Stay tuned for updates throughout the year.

Tonight was the first session at Lawndale Church. The word is still getting out about what we're doing, but we had eight wrestlers at the church tonight. We wrestle in the sanctuary, which is not something you see every day. We are working with these kids, teaching them a sport and then doing our short devotion afterward. The kids are raw and untrained, but I'm trying to teach them focus, discipline, and wrestling skills. Each one of those will serve these kids later in life.

Overall, they seemed excited to be there, which I'm hoping continues for the rest of the fall session. I also hope the numbers expand so we can continue to have good partner matchups. They want to wrestle all-out all the time, but I'm necessarily taking it slow.

Tomorrow is the first session at College Church. The setting and wrestlers is different, but the emphasis on technique, discipline, and focus is the same.