Concordia was very crowded this year in the stands and especially in front of the mats. Many of the younger kids had to sit for hours just to get a turn to wrestle. One of my sons was in a 16-man bracket and he is only 7. Too many kids and not enough facility to handle it. Maybe next year they can look at moving it to the college or cutting the number of entries. Another possibility is the split format. Gets some people in and out vs having to spend all day on a beautiful Saturday crowded in a gym.

I too would love to see more novice tournaments. I love the way Topeka handles it with Novice and Open on the same day. Novice is in one gym and Open is in another. We have mostly brand-new wrestlers in our kids program this year and some are getting frustrated losing all the time to experienced wrestlers. If they competed in a few tournaments against other novice wrestlers-it would help their confidence. After all-isn't everyone trying to get as many kids to try wrestling and to keep them in the sport? It is really hard when the kid and his parents spend almost 5 hours in a crowded gym just to watch him wrestle two matches.