Does anyone know what the significance is of August 31st being the cut-off date for age bracketing? Is it because it runs parallel with the grade that kids are in? If so, does anyone else think that age matters more than grade? I believe that a child can start wrestling before he is in school, but if he is on the first year in an age bracket, that leaves a child with an August birthday a major disadvantage as far as size, ( development, not weight)motor skills and maturity. If I am calculating correctly, there can be an entire 2 year difference (minus a couple days) between wrestlers in an age group. It may not matter when they are in highschool, but on the younger spectrum, wow! The reason I am asking is undoubtedly due to my son having a late birthday, having a great year this year, and going into a new age-group next year. Not that I expect the date to change because of my concern, I am just concerned that the age disadvantage may cause him to lose more matches this year and lower his self confidence. I just think it would be more fair to have the cut-off date closer to "wrestling season", or even December 31st, which would put all kids born the same year in the same age brackets. Thanks for reading and for your opinion/wisdom.

Thanks for the reply, Forvac, July sounds good to me too. After I posted, I realized that there would be the 2 year difference no matter what for some kids, brain freeze I guess.
Too bad for us. Guess we will just need to work harder and know that when we do finally get that championship, we had one more hurtle than those with the early birthdate on their side. I'd really love to see the birthdates of the state placers and see if their is any truth to my complaint.

This is always a topic of opinions. But until a few years ago the cutoff date in kansas was january 1st. I dont know but heard kansas changed this after all the years because one of our higher ups had a kid that would benifit by changing the date. It seems to me the january 1st date was working fine then all of a sudden some kids got the raw end of this and had to wrestle the bottom age group two years in a row just for some to gain a extra year. Other USA wrestling states still have the january 1st.

why couldn't they make it where once you turn 9 you have to bump up to 10 and under...so on and so on?

I believe the Kansas age group has its pluses and minuses. My son has benefited and had dominating years on the top of his bracket, this year as a young 14 yr old, he had a transition year, he had a great middle school season early 15-1, then in folkstyle was 32-10, all of those losses prior to qualifying coming to older kids and state medalists. He qualified for state but was definitely physically behind the kids in his age group. He will turn around and be on top of his age group in freestyle and this creates a real yo-yo that can be tough for kids in the 8 to 14 yr old range.

I have lived in other states where the Jan cutoff is used, with that we matched up well for the USA national freestyle/greco competitions, honestly the emphasis there was the development of freestyle and greco skills as opposed to folkstyle. the emphasis was placed on this for the national exposure for the youth involved and college recruiting. Also absent in these states were any kind of folkstyle competition on the state level for any high school youth. the kids finished in high school and started in on freestyle to prep for the Junior national competitions in mid to late April. In Kansas, we extend the folkstyle competition and the juniors are behind the curve getting in to national freestyle/greco mode.

I have thought that maybe this could happen. a continuation of the usa state wrestling tourney with the cut off being 8th grade. As an alternative for the high school age kids perhaps an open high school tourney immediately following high school state, no qualifier, just an open tourney, solve those best of the best questions.
the tourney could be totally open or divided on classes, freshman, soph, junior--

Have the freestyle/greco season start for the high school kids immediately after state,,so a month earlier than now. We have great high school talent in the state and we need to funnel it to the freestyle/greco national arenas, emphasize the talent we have and force Kansas even more upon the national scene.

This is a major advantage for the kids that have the fall birthday. I have also heard that this was moved back to August 31 to take care of a few special kids

The cut off date is Aug 31st and my birthday is Sept 10...but I still stink so it doesn't help everyone out.

Everyone goes under the same rules sooner or later your son will be on the top of the age group and no longer on the bottom. Tell your son that your day is coming that you will be the oldest and with your experience you will dominate the mat again. My son is four and he is in preschool and even though he only made it to districts and not state we figure that he still has 3 total years in the 6 and under bracket and 5 total years with the 8 and under he will have a definite advantage by the time he is 6 or 8 for state. It doesn't matter when the cut off date is someone has to be the youngest and someone will complain about there son is the youngest so why complain just incourage your son to do his best. We tell my son it doesn't matter if you win or lose as long and he does his best that is all that matters. Just encourage your son and everything will work out.

dagolden,
If your son has a fall birthday he can also wrestle the 8 and under when he is 9 years old.

If a child has a summer birthday or fall birthday really does make a big difference.

It doesn't matter when they have the cutoffs someone will always be the youngest in the bracket. If they moved it to January then wrestlers that have a birthday the next November would be in the same boat so why does it matter. Our son started young, and had a birthday in Sept. he could have stayed at 6 and under for 4 years but in his 4th year he and his father felt he needed to move up because he wasn't having to work very hard. He wasn't always winning but needed more action. There are alot of people who do this.

Some states used to have no age cutoff just weight cutoff so there would be only one 85 pound weight class and it would not matter if you were 16 or 10.

Wow, Zach F Dad, you are a genius! This would definitely make the playing field more even. That possibility never even occurred to me, not that it would ever happen, especially if there is the influence in decision making that is stated above.

My son has an October birthday so he has a good Kansas wrestling birthday but not so good for Missouri with the January 1 cutoff. We live in the Kansas City area so he has wrestled a lot of Missouri tournaments over the last couple of years. He was wrestling 12 & under for Kansas this year but had to wrestle 14 & under for Missouri. He is a 7th grader now so I think he is getting to the age where this is not that significant anymore. He did not lose a Missouri tournament this year and faced several 8th graders including some Kansas 14 & unders in doing so. Two years ago I do not believe that he could have done that and it probably is more of a factor the younger the wrestler is. But like others have stated someone is going to suffer no matter how you set it up. I like our cutoff because it seems to go with the school year and how the schools do their cutoff.

Kansas used to have a December 31 age cutoff until about eight years ago, when it was changed to the current August 31 date. I was the Kids Director at the time, and remember the state body meeting where it was changed. The issue had not been discussed at any of the Executive Council meetings leading up to that year�s state body meeting, and came as a motion from the floor. The principal argument in favor of the change was that it coincided with the school year, so kids would be wrestling the same opponents that they would meet when they reached high school.

It's a little frustrating to see the suspicions and/or allegations that the dates were somehow thrust upon the state by some "higher up." None of the rules in the Kids constitution may be changed without a majority vote at the state body meeting, where every club has an equal vote. If anyone has any special influence, it would be those members who are actively represented each year at the state body meeting.

As a few others have stated, there is no perfect cut-off date that will please everyone. Even the suggestion that it be based on your actual age on the date of the tournament will benefit the child with a birthday the day after the event, to the detriment of the child with a birthday on the date of the event. Someone will lose, while someone else will gain from any change. Therefore, it seems to me that using a school year has as much justification as any other date, perhaps a little more.

Oklahoma primarily follows an August 31 date, while Missouri uses December 31. Kansas uses August 31 for folkstyle and December 31 for freestyle & Greco Roman. One suggestion, if you are unhappy with the age cut-off, is to vary where you wrestle, and the style that you wrestle.

Ultimately, someone is going to be at the bottom of the age cut-off. All things being equal, this is a disadvantage to that wrestler. If this is your child, my recommendation is that you treat this as just one more obstacle to overcome. In the end, this could actually become a positive, as the wrestlers who learn to be competitive with slightly older wrestlers will be better prepared to handle much older competitors when he/she reaches high school.

Mike-
Thank you for the very insightful post. After reading all the replies last night, my husband, son and I all agreed to do exactly as your last paragraph stated "treat this as one more obstacle to overcome". This is the sport our son chose and he wants to be the best. We talked about sacrifice, (not the least being the Friday before weigh-in starvation)and he is willing to do whatever it takes to atleast maintain, if not improve upon his placement at state for next year. Perhaps we are more concerned than he is over the issue of age. I guess we all want to see our children reach their goals, and it is easy to find fault with the obvious uncontrollable limitations, but simply stated, we need to live with it.

Mike, I agree with you that that may have been the logic used, but High School does not wrestle by Grade level. A sophomore may wrestle a senior in the state finals if necessary. Any wrestler must ovecome disadvantages in age, size and strength. I am sure there was no grand conspiracy, but I do understand the frustration of some of the parents. Most of the problems seem to revolve around puberty. Some wrestlers simply out grow their opponents. This happens most between the 12 and under group. An early eleven year old wrestling a late 13 year old is an extreme disadvantage. I am not saying that there is any solution other that yours, to look at it as an obstacle to overcome, but it is a real obstacle and not just a perceived one. The 6, 8 and 10 years olds are for the most part physically the same, with a few exceptions, then by 14 to 15 most of the differences seem to balance out again. There is no easy answer(if any). Just encourage your Kids to give it all they got and keep their heads up, because sometimes it never balances out and the winning is so much better when you have to struggle to get there. My son got literally man-handeled by an opponent at State that was almost a year and a half older and well developed already. After he was over the initial sting of the loss he laughed and said "Man that Kid was Strong", "I wish I had been on the other side of the bracket so I could have atleast wrestled for second" We both hugged each other and headed back to the stands.

It is a bummer but it is true.Every one has to be the youngest sometime.

At most national tournaments the cut-off date is December 31st. A Kansas wrestler who's Birthday is between September 1 & December 31st has to wrestle up at nationals if they are on the top of the age group here. It usually helps my son, because he was born in March. The biggest difference in age could only be two months. That's just how it works.

If you were the one asking about the Reed kid from TOHK, he did NOT wrestle 10U, he wrestled 8u at Reno.

BigDog39 I agree with you that there was probably not a grand conspiracy to change the date but Mike dont you think then this was a major change to be floored and voted on after one discussion.As you stated the kids would get to wrestle the same kids in high school it seems to me you would want to see differnt competion. There seems to be not much of a different of opinions that somebody has to be on top and bottom. Ultimately if this is the way you feel then why didnt you tell them back then that this was just another obstacle for them to overcome instead of agreeing that it was logical decision to change. Our kids season is bewteen december thru march the earlier cut-off seems to me matches up better.