Thank you, Jim. I really like the Triple Crown idea too. I think anything we could do that potentially could encourage more freestyle and greco roman participation would be a good idea.That is the type of feedback positive or negative I hoped for in listing the seven differences above between USA Wrestling Iowa Kids and Kansas Kids State tournaments.
The one I am most interested in hearing others thoughts on is this one:
Originally posted by Husker Fan:
[2. They finished 3 weeks earlier than us on March 5th. I really like this possible earlier folkstyle season finish. Actually the previous 2 years they finished around Feb 10th. This year's difference was that they included the Cadet division 16&U with the Kids in 2005. In 2004 the Cadets had a separate tournament. In 2003 it does not appear that they had a Cadet folkstyle tournament. This earlier finish is something that our high school coaching association the KWCA advocated to Mike Juby 2 years ago so the high school and youth kids could go right into Freestyle after the high school state tournament.
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I really like this earlier finish March 5th for a couple of reasons. First I think the season goes a little long and it always go thru their Spring breaks. This can interfere with potential family vacations. I have heard from a number of people during our eight years that they chose not to do the State tournament series due to planned Spring break vacations. There are other things that kids miss out on potentially during Spring break due to their training like staying over at a friend house or not worrying about what they are eating (if they have to be concerned about making weight).
A second advantage to the earlier finish to the season is that I think it might encourage some more freestyle/greco roman participation. I think the season just goes a little too long for the majority of the wrestlers. They get a little burned out by the end and they do not feel like spending more time in gyms at wrestling tournaments during the freestyle season. Maybe if we would end by the first weekend in March and give them a couple of weeks off, they would get enthused about wrestling again and give freestyle and greco roman a try. At least this is what the KWCA proposed to Mike Juby a couple of years ago. It seems to me that we might want to give it a try to encourage a little more freestyle and greco roman participation after the folkstyle season.
Another smaller benefit to an earlier finish would be that for there was be less overlapping of two sports for the kids who do Spring sports instead of freestyle. Many Spring sports start their seasons during our State tournament series.
