Took my son out to Southern Plains camp yesterday and have a few thoughts on the camp and summer wrestling in general...

First, looked like a great staff assembled for coaches at the camp, and with Kenny Monday coming it should be top notch instruction. That is a major positive. The numbers seemed way down though. Almost no schoolboy kids since they were just returning from SB duals. As a side note numbers around KS seems way down in summer wrestling in general. We have to figure out a way to better manage the schedules and promote summer wrestling in our state. This is how we get passed as a state in wresting. We wrestle extensively in both MO and KS. I can honestly tell you when we go to MO the FS participation is up 50% at the kids level, when we go in KS it's down the same amount. For those of us who believe this is the key to outstanding future wrestlers, this does not look good for our state.

The Schoolboy team had to almost beg to get a team together. Many of the top youth kids are not wrestling except during kids season. This will hurt us in the long run. The Cadet and JR level seems to have a core group committed to year round wrestling. At the SB age down however there are only a handful. What can we do to get more participation from our SB age and down?

Final note the dorms at FHSU were one of the big selling points last year for having moved Southern Plains camp. They were great. This year the kids were moved to the old dorms and quite honestly there are a dirty dump!!!! I have talked to my son and he does think he is getting alot out of the camp, he loves the workout room and the cafeteria, just hates the rooms.

Just some various ramblings. We have a great state and leadership, but I am fearful we are going to be left behind in the years to come.

Thanks for listening,

24/7

24/7
As the father of 1 and caretaker of another of the cadets currently at the camp I am pleased to hear about the positives from both of them regarding southern plains camp.

I really think the core group of the cadets who wrestle in the summer were bolstered and solidified during schoolboy duals 2 years ago. The experience organized by Barry Disney and energized by Charlie Knox, Coach Napier and Coach Brown jelled a very good group of young men on believing in the benefits of freestyle and greco. Many of these were exceptional wrestlers already but for some like my son Gage, it was the ultimate challenge to maintain character and grow personally while struggling for a level of success. He rates the dual experience as the funnest and it literally has lit a fire under him the past two years to get better and do more summer wrestling. If you listed out those kids involved in that initial dual team, the amount of success in the high school ranks amongst those kids is unbelieveable, everyone one of those young men involved have high succcessful high schoolers and i would venture to bet we have a few of those kids become D-1, D-2, NAIA and Juco wrestlers.

I have talked with Coach Gonzales and heard Mark Anderson talk about starting the freestyle/greco competitions earlier, this will help. Kansas is always a bit slow to change, but i think the trend on the national level is to shift to emphasis on the olympic styles. In San Diego where i lived a few years back, their kids programs wrestled exclusive freestyle.

What i think Kansas can do is this--provide opportunities statewide to have coaches trained in coaching freestyle and greco--lets get a supported home silver coaches college at a time where we can fill it and learn. Lets face it, i can still remember and ocassionally still here some of the old time, old school coaches warn the kids about freestyling and greco. Many of the kids i coach in folkstyle are scared of the new freestyle and greco rules instead of looking at them as an opportunity to be in on a good new thing, they shy away from it. I feel also some of the coaches do to, what you don't know can scare you.

I do think we will hit a bit of a drop in freestyle and greco participation in the next couple of years, it is bound to happen somewhat, but i don't think it will necessarily mean a drop in the quality of the kids doing it.

We also need to make sure we tap in the Kansas connections with guys like Akin, Roberson, and the next generation of national level talent with the Erismans, Taplin, Marrs, Perez' etc. to bring back what they get from their college coaches and wrestling rooms and share with the kansas kids.