I am very excited about the competition tommorrow, but why do all of the other ditricts have 65 to 80 matches per mat and Ditrict 3 has up to 141 matches on certain mats?? That is poor planning..... Is Mcpherson not big enough? This is something that we may want to keep in mind while voting on locations next year. Like I said, My boys are super pumped for things to get started but I hope we will get out of there by 7pm.

You should be fine. I know District 2 is running a split format. I seen some morning sessions mats in the middle 50's and some afternoon session mats also in the middle 50's so thats 110 matches throughout the day. I have a kid in the morning and the afternoon so Ill be there all day also. GOOD LUCK TO ALL!!!!!!!!!!!

I heard that D1 was done by 2pm. Nice Job on planning..D3 lasted roughly 12 hours. Got there at 7am- left at 6:45 pm. Might want to add a couple of more surfaces next year!

I would be curious to know how many wrestling surfaces each district had.

Just looking at brackets D1 had at least 14 surfaces running.
D2 had ten in the am and 7 in the pm session.
I have not looked at D3 to see how many they had.
I found it interesting that D4 did not assign their brackets to mats in TrackWrestling or assing bout numbers.

Nine (9) surfaces. D3
With usally over 600 entrants per ditrict event, it should be mandatory that each site have a minumum of 12 surfaces if not more. I know that wrestling is a all day event but we should not be in a gym for more than eight hours. Average of two hour round trip and an hour for dinner and then you are up to eleven (11) hours.

fisher4, are you new to this? When your kids are wrestling just plan on all day Sat. I have 4 boys wrestling and split or not I just plan on the whole day, even if my boys finish early (and they never do) there are other teammates still wrestling stay to support them and enjoy the cometition.

Thanks for your input! No we are not new to this sport and yes we stay until all of our teammates are done wrestling. Congrats to your boys on not getting beat out of the tournaments early you should be very proud!

Fisher4 - not sure why you didn't leave until 6:45. If you were helping clean up we appreciate it. Wrestling was done before 6 pm. I know it's a long day. We could have had more mat numbers, but in order to do that the mat surfaces would have been down to the minimum allowed. We have tried that before but the day went even longer because of wrestlers going out of bounds so much. It also doesn't seem fair to the wrestlers to have to compete on a smaller surface. District one went to the expocentre because their tournament use to last so long. That is why they were able to have 14 mats. If we vote next year to still allow the 6 and under championships there aren't too many places that can hold it in District III. Every year the site is voted on at the District meeting. We appreciate being able to hold it this year and thanks to all that came. Any suggestions are always welcome.
Thanks!!

Lance,
You guys always do a great job! We were on mat #6 and believe us my son greatly appreciated having a full mat compared to the half one at subs! He had been wrestling on full mats all middle school season and it was hard for him and others to re-adjust to the half mats! We where at 14u and done by 4pm! I sure hope that everyone votes to keep it in Mcpherson! We enjoy coming there for districts!

Also any word on that young girl from Manhattan that was injured? We have been praying that everything is okay with her!

Thanks for the kind words, we couldn't have handled the computer end of it as well as we did without Erica and Jim from Manhattan. They were God sends. Thanks to them, and of course all the parents and other clubs that volunteered their time. I haven't heard anything on Haleigh Harper from Manhattan. We are praying for her as well as, Tristan Meadors from Clay County who received a broken arm, and Cale Rogers from Smith County who dislocated his elbow. There were more calls for the EMT's than I can ever remember in the 20 years we have been hosting tournaments. That is by far more my concern than finishing any earlier. Thanks to everyone again and lets keep these young wrestlers in our thoughts and prayers.

Over all it was a well ran tourney. Yes it lasted longer than some, but I don't like to watch middle schoolers on half mats stand up and take two steps and be out of bounds. It takes longer and it's not watching the quality of wrestling that you get on full mats. If you are there all day, you had a good day, for your kid, or others in the club.

Haleigh Harper is just fine didn't you see her jumping out of the stands and running and dancing in the bleachers behind Mat 5 & 6 later in the afternoon. I didn't want to comment on this. I just wanted to let it go. But, you ended a young wrestlers season over nothing. I've watched the video several times and there was nothing there to warrant her from finishing the match. Both my son and Haleigh were on their knees when he attempted a headlock. He had the arm the first time and he slipped off. There wasn't even much of a throw. I'm sorry for what happened but, I've seen worst and kids keep wrestling. Next time decide if your really hurt or just a little shook up before you decide you can't continue. My son was so upset he doesn't want to wrestle ever again. I even asked him to go to practice tonite to work with my younger son and he said he isn't wrestling ever again.

Mark Baldwin
Russell

Actually I didn't ! I was seated right behind mat 6 and didn't see her! Sorry 'bout your sons season ending, but an illegal hold is a illegal hold! I was told that your son had put a full Nelson on her, if that wasn't the case then I'm sorry I was misinformed!

I don't know if the wrestler has to be determined by the referee to be unable to continue or if the wrestler him or herself can subjectively determine that they are unable to continue. I have seen this occur for many years where an illegal move occurs and the "victim" of the illegal move is not able to continue as a result thereof. I don't think the fact that the young girl may have been able to function hours or minutes later is evidence that should be held against her. If the kid I'm coaching is injured by an illegal move and I determine the kid is going to have substantial difficulty finishing the match due to the consequences of the move, I would take the same course as the Manhattan kid. I don't think the consequences need to be paralysis or broken bones. If the kid is shaken up significantly by an illegal throw, or their neck is sprained by an illegal full nelson, I don't think it is fair to make my kid continue wrestling at a disadvantage. The person performing the illegal move must face the consequences, however unfortunate. We had a kid when I was in high school perform an illegal slam on a kid who was unable to continue and it ended up being our kid's only loss in 2 years during a 2-time state champion run. He finished third in the tournament, put his shoes back on the next week, and won the state title. Probably a good lesson for your kid and an opportunity to confront adversity that will be present in every aspect of life, fair or unfair.

I didn't see this one either so these are my feelings in general.

AJ75 says an illegal hold is an illegal hold. Not exactly. Many illegal holds are technical in nature and rarely cause injury and usually are not even painful. For example, in all the years I have been around wrestling, I have never seen a full nelson cause injury or even pain really. They are almost always done accidently and they are almost always immediately stopped by the referee. If an 8 year old injured another kid with a full nelson (not from the feet), I would blame the referee.

Illegal arm chops, slams and throws can and do cause injury and pain. Not necessarily serious or long lasting pain or injury, but the kind of pain or injury which may decide a match when two kids are equally matched. In these cases, it is unfair for the innocent to wrestle at a disadvantage.

In these situations, coaches should be bound by integrity to the sport. If the wrestler can reasonably continue without disadvantage, they should and as coaches we should encourage them to. By the same token, if the wrestler is injured, even if it's not necessarily a go to the doctor type of injury, the match should be stopped.

I have seen what seemed like mistakes both ways. I have seen coaches clearly instruct wrestlers to take a dive, and I have seen wrestlers continue and lose matches when they were in fact injured.

In any event, no one knows for certain how someone else feels and we should err on the side of safety. While it is a very difficult to lose a match, I think it's important to stay on high ground.

"Any suggestions are always welcome."

With usally over 600 entrants per ditrict event, it should be mandatory that each site have a minumum of 12 surfaces if not more.

I am not suggesting making mats smaller. I am suggesting adding mats.

"District one went to the expocentre because their tournament use to last so long."

Lets copy their success, Bicentenial Center??

McPherson was great and the tournament was great too. I did last a very long time and my son had 1/4 mat to wrestle on, he is use to 1/2 mat and had long wait times between matches (over 50 at one time). Oh well. It is still a good tournament.

I don't know... Expocenter / Bicentennial Center... I think $3 for a bottle of water is way too much!