Suddenly this topic dies, was it because the facts show otherwise? Or did everyone just seem to lose interest?

The following is a data summary of the entries by weight classification at the recent Brute Adidas National Tournament.

Division - Weight - Entries - % of Entries
Combined - 106 - 56 - 5.79%
Combined - 115 - 71 - 7.34%
Combined - 122 - 72 - 7.45%
Combined - 128 - 76 - 7.86%
Combined - 133 - 79 - 8.17%
Combined - 138 - 62 - 6.41%
Combined - 143 - 77 - 7.96%
Combined - 148 - 85 - 8.79%
Combined - 155 - 80 - 8.27%
Combined - 163 - 79 - 8.17%
Combined - 174 - 69 - 7.14%
Combined - 192 - 62 - 6.41%
Combined - 218 - 52 - 5.38%
Combined - 288 - 47 - 4.86%
Total Entries - 967

Division - Weight - Entries - % of Entries
9 - 106 - 36 - 15.65%
9 - 115 - 30 - 13.04%
9 - 122 - 22 - 9.57%
9 - 128 - 20 - 8.70%
9 - 133 - 17 - 7.39%
9 - 138 - 12 - 5.22%
9 - 143 - 18 - 7.83%
9 - 148 - 11 - 4.78%
9 - 155 - 14 - 6.09%
9 - 163 - 17 - 7.39%
9 - 174 - 12 - 5.22%
9 - 192 - 8 - 3.48%
9 - 218 - 7 - 3.04%
9 - 288 - 6 - 2.61%
Total Entries - 230

Division - Weight - Entries - % of Entries
10 - 106 - 14 - 4.98%
10 - 115 - 24 - 8.54%
10 - 122 - 26 - 9.25%
10 - 128 - 29 - 10.32%
10 - 133 - 26 - 9.25%
10 - 138 - 20 - 7.12%
10 - 143 - 29 - 10.32%
10 - 148 - 25 - 8.90%
10 - 155 - 22 - 7.83%
10 - 163 - 18 - 6.41%
10 - 174 - 9 - 3.20%
10 - 192 - 16 - 5.69%
10 - 218 - 14 - 4.98%
10 - 288 - 9 - 3.20%
Total Entries - 281

Division - Weight - Entries - % of Entries
11 - 106 - 5 - 1.46%
11 - 115 - 12 - 3.51%
11 - 122 - 20 - 5.85%
11 - 128 - 21 - 6.14%
11 - 133 - 29 - 8.48%
11 - 138 - 21 - 6.14%
11 - 143 - 20 - 5.85%
11 - 148 - 39 - 11.40%
11 - 155 - 30 - 8.77%
11 - 163 - 35 - 10.23%
11 - 174 - 35 - 10.23%
11 - 192 - 25 - 7.31%
11 - 218 - 25 - 7.31%
11 - 288 - 25 - 7.31%
Total Entries - 342

Division - Weight - Entries - % of Entries
12 - 106 - 1 - 0.88%
12 - 115 - 5 - 4.39%
12 - 122 - 4 - 3.51%
12 - 128 - 6 - 5.26%
12 - 133 - 7 - 6.14%
12 - 138 - 9 - 7.89%
12 - 143 - 10 - 8.77%
12 - 148 - 10 - 8.77%
12 - 155 - 14 - 12.28%
12 - 163 - 9 - 7.89%
12 - 174 - 13 - 11.40%
12 - 192 - 13 - 11.40%
12 - 218 - 6 - 5.26%
12 - 288 - 7 - 6.14%
Total Entries - 114

Alex,

I apologize to you and anyone else who was waiting for my replies. I posted on this topic ten days ago and after that post I decided to stay off the forum completely for at least ten days. I was getting a little too obsessed with the topic. This is the first time I have been on the website since my last post on the topic ten days ago.

I have read the posts since my last post. Some of my thoughts to them are:

1) Whatever the median weight is for juniors and seniors should be the starting point for making weights. If the median weight is somewhere around 152 then I think half the weights should be up to 152, and half over. Right now we just have 5 weights over 152 (160, 171, 189, 215 and 285) and 9 weights up to 152. At the very least we should have two more in my opinion if the median weight for juniors and seniors is around 152. I believe the median weight is probably actually higher than 152 and closer to 160 for juniors and seniors. I saw the National Health Examination Survey 1999-2002 and it showed that the mean weight for 15 years old boys is 150.3, 16 years olds 163.7, 17 years olds 166.3 and 18 years old boys 166.4. These mean weights have risen from their 1966-1970 survey signficantly when they were 135.5 for a 15 year old, 142.6 for a 16 year old, 149.6 for a 17 year old, and it did not list a figure for a 18 year old. Weights have increased significantly since wrestling's weight classes were first established. Wrestling has not adjusted weights to match this increase in size of high school students. Personally I really believe wrestling should be basing its weight classes on median weights of juniors and seniors which I think is at least 160 median weight. Weights that are dominated by freshmen do no really make sense to me at a varsity level of competition. Even if you take the median weight of all four classes in high school, I am confident that the median weight is signficantly higher than it was 25 to 30 years ago or whenever wrestling's current weight classes were established. Wrestling needs to start adjusting its weights to reflect it. I would prefer wrestling did it by just adding classes for the heavier wrestlers and not dropping weight classes. As a reminder if I could only add one at this time I would change our current heavier weights to this:

from 189 to 185, add a 200, change 215 to 225, and keep 285 at 285.

2) I will come back to this later. This took longer than I thought it would.

I am not sure how Richard's statistics about two out of season tournaments prove anything. Many wrestlers move on to other sports and don't even enter these tournaments. My son decided to play rugby this spring. Many other heavier wrestlers move on to track & field, baseball, and weight training for their upcoming football and wrestling seasons. Besides that at the Senior Nationals I believe that this was the first year for freshmen, sophomores and juniors so their participation will need time to develop in this tournament. The only possible relevant class to look at was the senior class. Look at how low the participation level is at the lowest weight class for juniors and seniors. I wasn't at the Brute Nationals. I was at rugby games but I would think that the Easter weekend had to hold down participation in that tournament, so I also don't see this tournament as some standard to be used for judging in season national weight classes. Remember also one of the main objectives is to increase participation of heavier football type athletes so if anything these statistics would just prove that we need to do some different things to make that happen.

to vince nowak...

thank you

personally, i have a 9 year old son who wrestles to help his football and stay in shape.

my son is a heavy-weight wrestler. he was a heavy-weight wrestler at the under 6 years old division, he is in the heavy-weight division in the 10 years old division and he might be later.

i appreciate your voice to have more heavy weight classes.

thank you

boo,

I appreciate your compliment. I will continue to speak out for more weight classes for heavier wrestlers. I am also going to petition the national governing body for this to happen. I have already e-mailed them asking what I need to do to submit a formal petition. This is something that will probably not happen soon. I doubt anything will happen before my son who is going to be a junior next year graduates, but I hope it happens way before your 9 year old goes to high school. It is going to take the support of a lot of people like yourself to make it happen. I would ask you to stay in touch with the situation and get other parents of heavier wrestlers that your son competes with involved. I would also encourage you to promote the sport of wrestling to his football teammates. We need more of the football players wrestling and is best to start wrestling at your son's age. The two sports compliment each other and in my opinion all football players should wrestle, but I think wrestling needs to make some changes with additional weight classes at all levels from kids to college to attract more of them into the sport of wrestling. Tell the parents of your son's teammates that wrestling is the greatest sport in the world for kids. You would be telling them the truth. My son started in the first grade and these last ten years of wrestling for him have been tremendous experience for him. Wrestling is a character building sport for young people. It takes a lot of character and courage for a young person to get out on that mat one on one in front of all those people. Let all your son's friends know that. And again I appreciate your support on this topic. We are going to have to get a lot of parents of upper middle weight to heavyweight wrestlers voice their support to the national governing body to make this happen someday.

Not sure how this relates,a couple days ago I watched part of a program on PBS showing how kids were heaver than ever in this country.A panel of healthcare experts all agreed this was a very unhealthy trend,infact they called it a deadly epidemic.

My son is 14 (almost15) 6'3" 235lbs...wrestled varsity heavyweight this year and I can tell you...he is not unhealthy...as is most of the varsity heavyweight wrestlers he encounted this year. Yes there was the one every now and then he came across....but for the most part...most heavyweights were big boys that were NOT unhealthy!

It is true that there is an overweight problem in America today but have our extremely low weight classes in wrestling done anything to stop it? Our low weight classes have been in place for years and the rising weights in children continue to climb. The rising weights are not all due to obesity situations. Kids are also taller today. My dad was bigger than his dad, I was bigger than my dad and now my son looks like he will soon be bigger than me.

I also agree with wrestlingparent's comment that most of the wrestlers that my son encountered in 285 this year were not obese but football player type athletes in good muscular condition. Another thing that contributes to the heavier weights in athletes is the fact that they start hitting the weight and strength training rooms earlier and more often today. In the late 1960's when I was playing high school football it was rare for someone to be lifting weights in high school. I was around 200 pounds as an offensive and defensive tackle and I was considered big. Today at that weight that is probably not even considered that big for a running back. Today some schools actually have weight trainers in their high schools and also have weight rooms with a lot of equipment. Athletes are bigger today due to the natural evolution of growth between generations and due to this extra weight training.

Yes there is a weight problem in America today but let's not mix it up with the issue that we need more weight classes for the upper half of our student population over the 50% median weight. If we want to be concerned about a weight problem in wrestling perhaps we should be concerned about how our low weight classes might contribute to excess cutting of weights for our lighter wrestlers and excessive back and forth of their weights during the season. I have seen some articles that point out that this too is dangerous for an athlete's long term health and may also stunt their long term growth development. I think this is a more significant weight problem in wrestling today than an obesity problem with our wrestlers.

They certainly aren't unhealthy in college either...those kids are monsters!

Extra pounds threaten health of teen football players

Wednesday, January 31, 2007

By Jack Kelly, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette


Can you eat your way to fame and fortune? Many high school football players appear to think so.

Two Iowa State university researchers found that 9 percent of 251 linemen on Iowa high school teams they studied were obese.

Overall, 45 percent of the high school linemen were overweight, and another 28 percent were at risk for being overweight. A national survey of boys aged 12-19 found just 18.3 percent to be overweight.

The study, published last week in the Journal of the American Medical Association, was a followup to a 2005 study at the University of North Carolina that found that 56 percent of NFL football players could be considered obese by the most commonly used medical standard.

"Adolescent and teenage athletes are trying to emulate the bodies of NFL and college linemen," said Dr. Joseph Colella, a bariatric surgeon at Allegheny General Hospital.

"We don't know if they're big because of their desire to play football, or because of their lifestyle habits," said Kelly Laurson, lead researcher of the Iowa State study, of the high school linemen he studied.

"We obviously suspect these linemen are being pressured by coaches to gain weight or may want to gain weight because when you watch the NFL, you see these big linemen," said Mr. Laurson, himself a former high school football player.

The standard typically used in medicine to measure obesity is body mass index, and it often is misleading where athletes are concerned.

BMI is body mass divided by the square of height. If you're an ordinary person, and you have a BMI over 30, you are severely obese. If you have a BMI over 40, you are morbidly obese, and in serious trouble.

"It's an inadequate judge, but it's easy," said Dr. Edward Snell, director of sports medicine at Allegheny General Hospital and team physician for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

BMI can be misleading for athletes who do a lot of strength training, as football players do, because BMI does not distinguish between muscle and fat. To determine whether a football player is obese, he must also be tested to determine what percentage of his body weight is fat (anything over 25 percent is not good).

A study by the Scripps Howard news service indicated seriously overweight NFL players are more than twice as likely to die before age 50 than are their trimmer teammates.

The average weight of NFL linemen has grown from 281 pounds 20 years ago to 318 pounds today, the Scripps Howard study said.

Even players whose extra weight is mostly muscle are at greater risk, said Charles Yesalis, a professor of health policy and sport science at Penn State University.

"When you get that big -- regardless of whether your body is muscle or fat -- your heart is stressed," Mr. Yesalis said.

And when football players stop playing football, that muscle can quickly turn to fat.

"Our greatest concern is for those who have gained massive amounts of weight and are unable to control it once their careers are over," Dr. Colella said.

However bad excessive weight is for adults, it's worse for adolescents, Dr. Colella said.

"Adolescent obesity persists into adult obesity," he said. "Adult obesity is essentially incurable without surgical intervention."

The obese have much higher incidences of cardiovascular disease and diabetes than do people of normal weight.

"In a very frightening way, we are seeing pre-diabetic conditions in adolescents who are classified as either severe or morbidly obese," Dr. Colella said.

In addition, the extra weight places more stress on the growing bones of adolescents than it does on those of fully grown adults, increasing the likelihood of injury.

Bone plates are areas of growing tissue on the ends of long bones of children and adolescents. If an adolescent is obese, his bone growth will be stunted, and his bones will be at risk for early degeneration, Dr. Snell said.

"The greater the weight, the greater the stress [on the bone plates]," he said.

Just warning adolescents of the health risks of excessive weight is unlikely to be much of a deterrent to young people who have visions of a free college education or a multimillion-dollar pro contract, Dr. Colella said.

"Until there is a weight limit imposed on those athletes, there will be no stopping anybody," he said. "It's like steroids, until they were banned, everybody used them."

Mr. Yesalis thinks a weight limit of 275 pounds should be set for NFL players.

"It would reduce injuries and have a positive effect on the short- and long-term health of these men," he told Scripps Howard.

Dr. Colella wouldn't go that far, but he thinks the physicals all high school football players must take should include testing for pre-diabetic conditions and other ailments related to obesity.


(Jack Kelly can be reached at jkelly@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1476. )

I consider that to be a basic flaw in the analysis. I got on a Body Mass Index website and saw that the following was the BMI standards:

Underweight=<18.5
Normal weight=18.5-24.9
Overweight=25-29.9
Obesity=BMI of 30 or greater

It had a calculator and I put in wrestlingparents' son statistics of 6'3" and 235 pounds. It came up with a 29.4 reading or borderline obese. My son is around 5'11.5" and his average weight was 220 this season. That came up 30.3 so that is in the obese category. I know an another young wrestler in this area who is close to the 6'3" and 235 pounds that my son and wrestlingparents's son competed against this year. These three young athletes are muscular and I don't think anyone who knows them would consider any of them severely overweight or obese.

Are there football players and 285 wrestlers who are overweight and possibly even obese? Yes, without a doubt there are. But again I would like to know how all these very low weight classes in high school wrestling are helping to prevent that problem or the general overweight problem with young people? If anything I would think you would help all these overweight and possibly obese football players to lose weight by throwing in a 230 to 240 weight class. It might encourage some of them to lose some fat to make that weight class. I wonder if you are really worried about that or are you more concerned about losing some of the lower weight classes or heaven forbid maybe wrestling would extend the lowest weight class differential from 5 pounds to 6 or dare I even suggest it 7 pounds. How can a 140 pound wrestler compete against a 147 pound wrestler? No problem with a 220 pound wrestler going against a 270 pound wrestler though is there?

It really bothers me that a couple of you are choosing to discourage more weight classes for the wrestlers over the 50% median weight by bringing up the overweight problem in America today. If you want to find out what is really considered the weight problem in wrestling today go to a search engine like google and type in this phrase: Wrestling Weight Problems. See what kind of articles come up. I don't think you are going to find too many articles that take the postition that wrestling has too many weight classes for wrestlers over the 50% median weight. I think you will find plenty of articles about the dangers of too much weight cutting, weight fluctuation during the season and the problems of too low of a body fat percentage in teenagers.

I'm all for more weightclasses.Wrestling is a sport where everyone should be able to compete regardless of size. Just happened across part of this show on PBS talking about the rise in weight of children,and remembered you citing this same fact.Came across this article with a google search and was supprised by some of the claims cited. Found other articles that were more shocking such as the expected life span of an X- NFL players to be 55 yrs.with weight being the biggest factor and many more.I don't believe everything I read or see on TV but if I had a son with a football type body I think I would now take a harder look at him "beefing up" for football than I would a couple days ago.Still I think more weight classes would be a positive and never indicated otherwise

Good point and I understand your motive now. This is a sensitive subject though for those with sons in the heavyweight bracket to be considered severely overweight or obese. A 6'3' 235 kid can be well muscled and not even close to obese. Many of these NFL players who have the obesity problems are well over 300 pounds and that is not what we are talking about in high school wrestling with our 285 limit. Could a committment to gaining as much weight as possible for football lead to overweight problems later in life? I think that is very possible if football player is gaining fat pounds instead of muscle pounds during his career. Some football players actually lose or at least maintain weight after their careers are over. That can be done thru aerobic training, cutting back on the heavy bulk weight training and changing their eating habits. Your statement about taking a harder look at beefing up for football though is a valid one. I am going to talk to my son about it and make sure he understands the dangers of putting on fat pounds instead of muscle pounds.

On the lower end of the weight classes, wrestlers and parents need to be concerned with health risks too. There are health risks that can develop from trying to reach too low of a weight class for a person and from getting into a syndrome where a wrestler is constantly having his weight fluctuate during the season by letting weight rise after a tournament and then later in the week cutting severely to make weight for the next tournament.

You said that you are for adding more weight classes. I would like to see that too. If it is impossible to have more than 14 weight classes I think it needs to be changed to bump the mid weight class 140 up at least 10 pounds to 150. I think wrestling needs to do this because I believe the median weight for teenage boys has risen by over 10 pounds since these weight classes were established decades ago. I also think that 103 is too low of a starting point and that is mainly freshmen and sophomores who are in that weight class. Many of these freshmen and sophomores have to severely cut weight to make it.

If we can only have 14 weight classes, I think high school wrestling should consider changing to the following:

1) 112
2) 119
3) 125
4) 131
5) 137
6) 143
7) 150
8) 158
9) 167
10) 178
11) 190
12) 205
13) 230
14) 285

As I said I'm all for more weight classes but would never consider excluding the lightest weight a positive for wrestling.These atheletes because of weight and title 9's devistation of gymnastics and other sports have no other sport they can compete in.I think wrestling should be for everyone regardless of size.This years NCAA champ at 125 wrestled 103 till his jr. year and only moved up then because his skill level was way above most.he wrestled 112 at sr.nats.Should he have set the bench his fist 2 yrs. of highschool so more football types could compete?I don't think so.One of Kansas best wrestlers the last 5 yrs. Seth Metzler was an undersizer 103 lber till his jr. year the list goes on.Most college 125 and 133 lbers wrestled some at 103 in highschool.I know this years NJCAA 125 champ and outstanding wrestler of the tourny did.If more weights can not be added I'm all for bringing back unlimited at heavyweight.Excluding someone because of size is wrong IMO.

A few who wrestled 103- ZAch Roberson,Bo Manes,Tanner Gardner,Eric Luedke,Earl Jones,,Jake Kriegbaum,Bill Gable,Justin Ware,Dustin May,J.B Harding,Austin Devoe,Doug Hoover,Cody Garcia,Luke Metzler,Seth Metzler,Devin Swartz,Daniel Prater,Blaze Bahe,Beau Vest,Levi Younkin,Garret Harding,Aron Patton,James Ball,Beau Tillman,Brett Bahe,Tim Elliott,Clay Madden,Tristan Deshazer,Issac Wall,Blake Fisher,Donnie Altman,Larry Perez,Trent Cox,Nicki Shumate,Nate Furches,John Keller,Paulie Hanson. Some of these may have cut weight severly as you suggest but I know for a fact many did not and plenty were under weight.Makes little difference to me what class they were in as highschool consists of 4 years an each of these guys were(are) a pleasure to watch,and deserved to compete.IMO

I understand both of your points of views, but I will have to go with dropping 103. The big deciding factor for me is this: in the heavy weight division, the borderline kids (from 225-240) have a risk of being seriously injured. Think what it would feel like if someone who weighs 285lbs just lands right on you. Kids at 103 could gain a few pounds by adjusting their eating and workout schedule. Either a 230 or a 240 (what they have in kids) would be a great choice and I'm sure there would be many great matches to watch in that weightclass.

esj:

I have also stated that I would prefer that weight classes not be dropped. My ultimate goal is for more opportunities not less in high school wrestling. So I would prefer to see 103 stay and the rest of the classes change to what I suggested in my last post yesterday on this topic. But ultimately if the national governing board is unwilling to bump the weights up to 15 weight classes than I do believe 103 should be dropped and changed to the ones I suggested which I believe are more reflective than high school wrestling's current weight classes of the 50% median weight level and the increased size of high school students today. Remember a lot of that increased size is due to increased height and improved strength training.

I am not sure why you are saying that wrestling is the only sport available to a smaller athlete since gymnastics was taken away from them. First of all wrestling would not be taken away from them. They would just have to wrestle up 9 pounds to 112. My son weighed 217 at regionals this year and probably averaged 220 for the year. He had to wrestle several kids at the 270 level this year. What is more unreasonable? My son at 220 going against a 270 wrestler is about the equivalent of a 91 pound against a 112 pound kid. I think you would find more sophomore, junior and senior athletes around 220 than you would find at 91 pounds. Secondly besides wrestling still being available to the smaller athlete there are other sports like cross country, soccer, swimming, and track & field.

I am not following your logic at all on your statement that asks if the 125 NCAA champion should have been forced to sit the bench his first two years so more football types can compete. My simple answer to that would be absolutely yes. Why should a lighter wrestler be given favorable treatment over a heavier athletes? I don't know the person's history but let's assume as a freshman that he weighed at least the 91 pounds that I used in the previous example, are you telling us that an NCAA champion would have been unable in his first two high school years to win his school's 1st team 112 position? I have a very hard time believing that statement. My son as a 220 sophomore this year was able to win his school's 285 first team position on the 5A state championship team and a nationally ranked team. I don't think my son has close to potential NCAA championship ability.
My son had to sit the bench last year as a freshman at Aquinas because of the lack of heavier weight classes and he spent the year as the 189 second team guy wrestling JV for the majority of the year. My son was a State kids wrestling champion in the 6th and 7th grade. He was a Liberty nationals champion as an 8th grader. I saw plenty of freshmen 103 and 112 wrestlers his freshmen year who had no where near his kids wrestling record wrestling varsity. Why was it more important for those lighter weight freshmen to have more opportunity to wrestle varsity last year than my heavier son? I played football in the late sixties and it was rare for a freshmen or sophomore to make the varsity team much less start. What is so wrong with a freshmen or sophomore not being varsity?

Due to the reasons that were stated in your article about the NFL, I don't think I am in favor of your statement about bringing back the unlimited weight class to high school wrestling. I think one doctor in your article suggested that the maximum NFL weight should be something like 285 pounds. Someday high school wrestling may need to bump 285 up just like it bumped it up from 275 last year, but for the reasons in your article I do not think we want to be in a hurry about it. High school wrestling certainly doesn't need to raise the upper limit before college wrestling would.

Very impressive list but again are you trying to tell me that these guys would not have been their school's 112 wrestler if 103 was not available. I bet at least over 90% of them would have as freshmen and still managed to had great records in 112.

From my perspective it would also be a pleasure for me and many others who enjoy football and high school upper weight wrestling (from 160 up to 285) to see more of these very fine football players competing in high school wrestling. I see so many great football athletes who do not wrestle and who I know could be great wrestlers. When you mention all these great light weight wrestlers. I can't help but think of how many great stories are we leaving out there of 160 to 285 athletes. Basically it comes down to opportunity. With ten weight classes up to 160 and only four over 160, high school wrestling is unfairly giving more opportunities to lighter athletes. It is just not even close to being fair and due to the increasing 50% median weight of athletes in high school today it is going to hurt wrestling participation unless it is adjusted.

I'd take that 90% bet ,several of these guys were not elgible their freshman year because they were too light,and several others barely made the weight requirment.I'm sure several could of moved up a weightclass,but I know this years NJCAA 125 champ and OW could not make the team his freshman year without 103.These weights are very competitive with a lot of these guys being one sport atheletes, he could however beat many of the heavier guys on his team including the 215 and heavyweight but not the 112 lber.I agree there are many heavier football guys who "could be" good wrestlers but I know there "are" many 103 and lighter wrestlers who train year round because there is no other sport that they can be competitive in.I do however wish there was a place for those who can't make 285 wrestling should be for everyone not just average sized guys.