Personally,I am in the same boat as Mike in many ways. My family foregoes vacations, volunteers to work tournaments, and raises monies in many different ways. We cut many corners to make sure my son and group home kids that wish can participate in the offseason activities. My wife and I are blessed that we have convinced the people we work for and with of the great lessons that can be gleaned from the sport. That could turn on a dime anytime and there would be no way i could even think about affording participation. My wife is going to learn to be a pairing official to help out our efforts. I have never had to tell my son or group home kids NO-We can't think about participating because of the costs, but we are mighty close at this point.

I think we should get creative in perhaps hosting a true fundraising tournament for our national teams--Our costs now are very reasonable compared to many states, but still they can be a great deterrant to participation.


I think we need to think about a fundamental change that needs to take place. At this point in time we emphasize folkstyle in our USAW efforts. We have great numbers, great wrestlers, great parents. We need to see if we can carry that over to the international styles.

Having personally seen, coached and parented in Nebraska and California where the USA program emphasizes Freestyle and Greco, it can work. If our kids get acquainted with the styles early then they can enhance folkstyle as well. We do need to emphasize educating coaches in how to coach freestyle and greco, the southern plains camp idea is a great one, but not an option for a lot of dads and potential coaches just due to time and cost.