Kansas Wrestling Forums General Discussion Kids Folkstyle 2026 HEARTLAND ELEMENTARY DUALS WRESTLERS NEEDED

We need help filling the teams - the participation at the qualifier was down this year and here is what we need

Team 1 needs a 140

Team 2 needs a 112 and 140

Team 3 needs a 50, 112, 140

Team 4 needs a 50, 105, 112, 140

This is open to any 6th grader or below

Dates are Thursday April 2nd to Saturday April 4th

email me if you know of someone who may be interested

dal@matteck.com

Here is our itinerary

Thursday April 2nd

9-11am – meet at The Hotel Topeka (formerly the Capital Plaza Hotel) 1717 SW Blvd to pass out gear and get room/bus assignments. If you aren’t meeting in Topeka, I’ll have your gear at the hotel in Iowa.

11:30am – start loading chartered buses

12pm – buses leave Topeka for our hotel in Iowa

3-3:30pm – arrive at the hotels and start checking in. Check in is hectic – we will have separate areas of both hotels for each group to check in. If your wrestler isn’t riding the bus but staying with the team, they will have to find me later to get their room key.

4-4:15pm – leave for weigh in at the Mid America Center. Weigh in is from 4-8:30 Thursday and you must make weight in that time frame. It is a one-time weigh in so please have your wrestler at weight. Make sure you have your fingernails trimmed and any skin forms with your wrestler. Technically we don’t have to weigh in as a team but it would be nice if everyone was there together. The buses will not be waiting around for anyone to run off weight as we have pizza for the Elementary and girls teams coming to the hotel at around 6pm. Middle School and High school will be going to Pizza Ranch to eat right after weigh-in.

6-6:30pm – pizza at the Holiday Inn Express for elementary and girl wrestlers

8pm – Elementary and Girls Team meeting in the Holiday Inn Express breakfast room – I need everyone there including coaches. Middle School will have their team meeting at the Hampton Inn.

10pm – everyone in their room and lights out

Friday April 3rd

5am wake up call for breakfast – we will be going around knocking on doors shortly after that to make sure everyone is up. We will be running approximately 300 wrestlers thru the breakfast line in 2 hours - so after you are finished eating, don’t sit around and take up table space. Clean up your mess, throw your trash away and leave the room so the next person can sit down.

Approx. 6:30am – buses leave for the Mid America Center – High School and Middle School will be leaving first – Elementary and girls will leave at approximately 7:15am. We will be using two buses and a couple vans to shuttle all wrestlers

8am – wrestling begins and goes until all pool wrestling is completed - approximately 5pm

9am – 5pm – for the wrestlers and coaches we will have sandwiches, fruit, crackers, granola bars, chips and water in my trailer. It will be in the parking lot outside the north entrance of the Mid America Center. We will start making sandwiches at 9:30am but water and other snacks will be available earlier. Outside food isn’t allowed in the Mid America Center so wrestlers will have to eat outside or sneak food in. I always talk to the security workers at the door and usually I can convince them to at least allow the wrestlers to eat inside if the weather is bad.

6:30-7pm – hamburger feed starts for all wrestlers and parents at the Holiday Inn Express parking lot. We will grill the hamburgers outside and the buffet line will be inside.




Saturday April 4th

5am wake up call for breakfast – same as Friday

Approx. 7-7:15am – leave for Mid America Center – same as Friday. We WILL NOT be returning to the hotels after wrestling is finished on Saturday afternoon so make sure your wrestler takes all his belongings with him. We will designate one bus to store belongings in during wrestling on Saturday. For any parents making the trip, it is a good idea to meet your wrestler at the hotel early Saturday morning and take their suitcase – obviously they will still need their wrestling bag. Once the wrestlers are shuttled to the Mid America Center, all but one bus will be leaving. The vast majority of wrestlers ride home with parents and there will only be one bus for the return trip to Topeka. That bus rarely has any more than 15 or 20 people on it.

8am – approx. 3:30pm - wrestling begins and goes until the brackets are complete.

9-3:30pm – same food availability in the Mid America Center parking lot as Saturday.


THE MOST IMPORTANT PART
On Saturday we need to know whether your wrestler will be riding home with parents or riding the bus back to Topeka. Each Teams coaches will have rosters and they will note which wrestlers are riding home with parents and which ones will be riding the bus back to Topeka.

If you currently know that after wrestling is over on Saturday and your wrestler WILL BE RIDING THE BUS BACK TO TOPEKA from the Mid America Center, email me.


Thursday is very hectic – please have patience as we get thru everything. Once weigh-in is over and the wrestlers eat, things calm down a little.


Everyone who requests a roommate normally gets at least one of their requests in their room. I start working on the rooming list the week after the qualifier so I can get it to the hotel. If you are late getting your paperwork and payment to me, I can’t guarantee anything. Once the rooming list is done, sorry there will be no switching of rooms. Same way with buses. Wrestlers will be assigned a bus in Topeka. The buses are full and it would be a huge hassle to try and move people around. Part of this experience is making new friends anyway.

Blue Chip Athletic does our gear sizing and each weight is assigned a singlet, shorts and t-shirt size. We have very few sizing issues. But if one arises, there will be no changes until after everyone has their gear. If I can make a size change accommodation, I will do so.

This dual team event is run as follows;

All teams consist of the same 17 weight classes wrestled at the Elementary qualifier.

Weigh-ins are Thursday April 2nd – it is a one time weigh in.

Each individual dual is wrestled and scored just like a high school dual. On Friday, each of our 4 Kansas teams will wrestle in 5 or 6 team pools. If your wrestler’s team is in a 5 team pool, they would dual each of the other 4 teams on Friday (4 matches). If they are in a 6 team pool, they would dual each of the other 5 teams (5 matches). Occasionally, two of our 5 teams will be in the same pool.

Placement in the pools is somewhat random – however, each state’s teams are ranked – for instance, our #1 team is our best, #2 second best, etc – all other states with multiple teams rank their teams as well. The tournament director seeds the pools based on last year and previous years finishes. Kansas has historically got one of its teams into the championship bracket - so our best team should be seeded. However at least once, our 2nd team has made the championship bracket and our 1st team has not. The pools are sometimes not perfectly balanced.

How your team finishes in their pool Friday determines which 8 team bracket you wrestle in on Saturday. Win your pool and you are in the championship bracket. Take second and your team is in the silver bracket, etc, etc. Pool finish is determined by wins/losses and total number of team points scored. It is very important for each wrestler to score the maximum points per dual – if you win by 8 points(major decision) that is 1 additional team point – if you win by 15 point (tech fall) that is 2 additional team point and if you win by fall, that is 3 additional team points. It is also important to give up the least amount of points if we are getting beat – keep wrestling and never give up because any additional team points given up could cost us a dual. Also, it is important that we don’t have any OPEN weights on any of the teams. A forfeit at any weight is 6 team points for the other team – just like a pin.

If there are 7 pools of teams, then one of the second place teams from a pool will make the championship bracket – if there are 6 pools, the 2 of the 2nd place teams will make the championship bracket.

The Saturday brackets are wrestled like an 8 man bracket – except if you lose in the semi-finals, you wrestle for 3rd and 4th – there is no cross bracketing to the back side. Lose your first dual on Saturday and the best your team can finish is 5th. Be aware that Friday can be a little rough for some of our teams. Once the brackets are set for Saturday, the competition should be a little more even.

There are also individual All-American awards for wrestlers who go undefeated (there is a 6 match minimum). For teams making the championship bracket, there are 2 MVP awards. For all other brackets, there is 1 MVP award. The team coaches are responsible for selecting the wrestlers who get the MVP awards. After your team finishes wrestling on Saturday, stick around for team pictures and awards.

ALTERNATES

We are allowed 3 alternates per team. Alternates get all the same gear, lodging, travel and food etc.

There are two options for alternates to get matches at this event.

One, is to get on the Team USA Alternate team. This team is formed at the event and consist of alternates from other states. So on each of the team, you could have 5 from Kansas, 2 from Nebraska, 1 from Iowa, 4 from Minnesota, etc, etc. The alternate team is put in the pools and wrestle just like all the other teams. There is a possibility that there could be more than one wrestler at your weight on this alternate team. There is no way to know how many or at what weight the alternates will be until just before the event. On Saturday, this team goes into one of the brackets and wrestles just like everyone else.

The other option is to be an alternate for one of the Kansas Teams and hope the other teams we dual has an alternate at or close to your weight. With only 3 alternates allowed per team, the chances of the other team having someone close to your weight isn’t that good. Occasionally, there has been an alternate mat where you can go and match up against similar sized wrestlers but this has not happened every year. It depends on how many alternates there are.

I believe the first option gives you the best chance of getting some matches and over the years, most of our alternates have chosen to go that route.