Originally posted by Husker Fan:
I believe Coach Douglas of Iowa State University would be an advocate of Split Tournaments. Go to the College Forum on this website and see the topic I started today on: Coach Bobby Douglas Pushing For Changes Article. You can see the entire article on that topic. He was quoted saying this in an article in the February 8, 2005 Ames Tribune :
"Wrestling people are very slow to change," Douglas said, adding that he feels the sport is stagnant. "In order to keep your sport alive you have to tweak the rules, you have to make changes. You have to experiment.
"Society wants something that's more exciting and shorter. Do we need to shorten the matches? Yes, because parents aren't going to sit in the stands for four or five hours. And you can't expect them to do that. They'll become soccer moms instead of wrestling moms."
I posted that last June 2005 in the Mill Valley Split tournament topic that pretty much was the topic where most of last year's discussion on split tournaments took place. I think it is worth repeating here. It shows that there are wrestling people even at the collegiate and Olympic coaching level who recognize this to be a problem for wrestling.
mom4, Coach Douglas would agree with this statement that you made in your post:
"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."
