Originally Posted by RYou

We had talked about it daily when he made his decision, I wanted him to be sure. He had been cutting 7 - 10 lbs his first three years. He told me his friends were about the same size when they were in 7-8th grade. They grew taller and he wasn't growing as tall. He attributed that to the weight cutting. He was convinced it was a cause. It had affected him deeply. I can tell he creid over the decision for a week. He does question how far he could have gone, but he is content with his decision and doesn't regret it.

His buddies on the team talked to him in school and called him nightly trying to change his mind. That fact the coach never made any attempt hurt him, but he was steadfast that he wasn't dropping the extra 5.

He found the strength to go to the district finals to root for a couple of teammates that were in the finals. He hung out near the neutral corner and as his friends won their bouts, they ran over to him to celebrate rather than the coach. Oh what a bunch shit that kicked up in the wrestling room the next week.

Brother RYou,
Man, I am really sorry that your son was forced to make such a hard decision due to the actions of one dullard of a coach. However, I think that being able to make a decision for ones own well being, in spite of immense external and internal pressure, is one of the hallmarks of being a real man. Sounds like even at that early age, your boy proved himself to be much more of a man than his short-sighted "adult" coach. Must be the good bloodlines !

The other issue you raise is kind of a scary one, ie your son being concerned that his weight cutting could have been stunting his development. I have never heard this issue definitively addressed by a MD, but I know our club coaches and I have talked about kids they have seen over the course of 4-7 years on the kids circuit. A number of these boys who are fighting to maintain weights under 90 lbs for several years in a row really do seem like they are being "bypassed" in natural size by there same aged peers, even after hitting puberty! THAT is scary to me, the idea of screwing with a persons long-term metabolism just so he can be the most experienced or strongest 75 lb 14 year old in the state! Yeesh!

spent my sophomore off season wrestling freestyle and greco at 220's and doing very well, making my first international teams, one of which was with Dave Schultz. I was talking with him at some point about weight cutting and he said something to the effect of "the amount of time Americans spend cutting weight and thinking about cutting weight, the Russians spend wrestling and thinking about wrestling. Doesn't make any sense to me."

This says it all. The best in the world don't need to cut weight why should 11 year olds?

Dave Schultz must have cut weight as a senior wrestler.. no? He looks pretty thick at 74 on the youtube videos, at least in my opinion.

I am with you guys. I hated cutting weight. Here's my story, but it is about my son. He was 5th in the state his junior year. He was a late bloomer; late birthday; late to hit manhood. Returning for his senior year, he saw that there was a weight that the school would be weak at and told the coach he could make it. It was only the next weight up from what he wrestled the year before, so I went along with him. He struggled to make the weight early in the season, but he made it. As the season progressed, it got harder and harder. He would go in at 6:00 am to work out with the coach; wrestle hard through practice; then come home at night and head out to the gym to get another workout in just to get his weight down every week. He would hit a wall with about 2 lbs to go, and those last two pounds came off hard. By the end of the season, he was spent. At the state tournament he lost to two kids who had never beaten him before, and he came up short of placing. It turns out that he grew an inch and three quarters between September when he had a physical and the end of February when he was back at the doctors. We didn't even realize it! At Fargo, he bumped up two weight classes and ended up the national runner up that year, beating last years national champ at the same (higher) weight. He was healthy; he had fun; he was strong. What a mistake to work so hard to lose all that weight and what an awful senior year it was! I wish I knew then what I know now.

Originally Posted by arm-spin

Dave Schultz must have cut weight as a senior wrestler.. no? He looks pretty thick at 74 on the youtube videos, at least in my opinion.

D.S. would fall within my 5% rule -174 x .05 = 8.7 . 174-8.7= 165.3
He takes a healthy dump and voila -163. By the time he actually wrestles he's back to at least 170.

The major difference is cutting for one event -say the Olympics -compared to cutting and maintaining the weight for the season. JMO

Everyone remembers Gable -how many people remember Owens or what he did the rest of his career ?

Ahh... ya, I made the cut from 80 kg to 74/76 a bunch of times, not a big deal.

I like that they have added a lot of weight cutting rules. Wrestling for a powerhouse squad in HS it was really tough to make the varsity. As a sophmore I was pounded on every day by state champions above and below. The only way I was going to make the team was to cut. 135 down to 112 and I was 6 feet tall. As a senior I got good enough to be rated #1 at my weight and I only cut maybe 5 pounds. Mom hated the weight cutting worse than I did as I would come home every night and eat an orange or suck on ice cubes as they sat down to a meat and potato dinner.(with 200 beef cattle and 150 feeder pigs we always ate good) My son has chosen Baseball ,golf and skiing as the sports of choice and I really can't say I am too upset about the fact that wrestling was not his cup of tea after 3 years of it. He loves going to Gopher duals with me but that's as far as it goes.