We had wrestler who went out to his car to get something to eat after losing first match. He wasn't allowed back in the building and missed his second match. My guess is he wasn't the only one that had this experience.

Hey Jeff who ever your talking about dont,know what he's talking about if we had a survey, split format would be favored 100 to 1.

Wow! Somebody didn't communicate well on that one. Surely they would have let a wrestler back in to finish the tournament.

Okay this was my son's 2nd time to Districts and even though he didnt make it to State this time....I am still happy he got this far.
I do have questions about the District tourney. I am sorta a new one at this so bare with me. Can anyone tell me, do they always make the 1st place kid from Sub District wrestle a 4th place kid from Sub District? Make more since to have the 1st place from S go against the 1st place from N and so on.
I have to agree on maybe get a bigger site to have Districts. (Where was it last year, I forgot?) Or maybe split, older in morning and younger in evening. Just an idea! It was so stuffy in that gym, where was the ventalation? And to do with the police officer at the tourney....he was getting people (mostly kids) to move off the rails. And he allowed ones who were taping or taking pics of their kids stay until their match was done. The problem at the rails was people were standing at them , but after they sat down it was better. I have to admit there was one who got on the mic and yelled at everyone, which was quite rude and unnessary, in my opinion.

That is the way it is done at tournaments that have qualifying tournaments or a seeded tournament. The State tournament does it the same way. I believe the theory is that you want the top wrestlers to meet in the later rounds and ideally the top two in the championship match. Basically the objective of the tournament is to structure the brackets so the best wrestler will finish first in the tournament, the second best wrestler will finish second, and so forth. This would not happen if the two best wrestlers meet in the first round unless it is a round robin bracket.

You earn this higher seed advantage either thru the qualifying tournament (Subs) or thru past performance (which is how the wrestlers are seeded for Subs or tournaments like the Park City Classic). Just about all sports that have tournaments do this like tennis and NCAA basketball as examples. In these qualifying tournaments where the 1st place wrestler from one Sub faces the 4th place wrestler from the other Sub, I have seen the 4th placer wrestler win the match several times. It happens at State too.

Thanks for replying to my question. I am not into sports except soccer. So, this will help me out in the future with other sports too. Again thank you!

I hate to bash anyone who attempts to run something of this size. It is a massive undertaking at least. Anyone who has helped at such an event can attest to this. With that said I do have issues with this year. The facility was not up to size for either the floor space or the stands. I understand that the dimensions of floor space was not communicated well and resulted in overly cramped conditions. This was compounded by the parents that soon realized that there wasn’t anyone controlling the back hall entrance to the floor. Within an hour of this it was almost impossible as a coach to get to the mat to coach a kid. At one point it took 8 minutes to get from the brackets in the hall to mat 2. By mid-day steps had been put in place to correct the situation, but the damage was already done.
The process of weigh-ins was also a joke at best. Only two scales for a district event?
I must agree with Jeff about the hospitality room and the staff. The young lady you were speaking of that was helping could give some manner lessons to the adults running the doors.
The need for a larger facility is at the bottom of all the problems. We have a good problem that our sport has grown to the point that district 1 can now fill something the size of a stadium. Let’s not forget that we are here to support our sport that we dedicate so many hours to and the kids that participate in it.
With all of this in mind we as parents, coaches, and wrestlers need to voice not only opinions, but suggestions for a fix. Mine would be not to run split secessions but to find a larger facility. What about Jo County, Baker, or even Memorial Hall in KC?

Our family used to love split sessions at Kids tournaments. In fact my son always looked forward to the splits at District 1. He liked the shorter waits between matches and the shorter overall day. He really liked a faster paced day. He always did his best wrestling at split tournaments. More than once he would tell me on the way home from a split tournament that he really had fun and enjoyed that tournament because of it being a split tournament.

So my suggestion would be to reconsider the split session for District 1 and maybe schedule the second session to allow for at least a half hour to an hour break between sessions so referees, coaches and table workers can have lunch. It would also allow the morning session wrestlers and fans time to leave before the second session wrestlers and fans need to enter the facility.

I agree Vince. As a coach I'm going to be there all day anyway. The facility at Olathe would work well with a split tournament. I think getting table workers for both sessions can be a problem though. I remember some tables being short handed at Ottawa in the past. But that can always be a problem at any tournament. The cramped conditions made it difficult for coaches and wrestlers to get to the mat needed without crossing other mats in front of other coaches and table workers. It also made the referee's job of protecting the wrestlers tougher. But I believe those responsible for the running of the tournament worked very hard to make the tournament run the best it could. I doubt anyone felt more tension about the tournament the the people running it. The best way to ensure a better run tourament is to volunteer to help. The more help the less pressure there is on each individule and its a good way to see how much work the volunteers do. I dont know of any club director, coach or district volunteer who is trying to make things more difficult. I dont always remember that myself. Good luck to all at state.
Jon Murray
Parsons Wrestling Club

Mr. Nowak you must be the smartest person alive!!
I agree 100%. How can anyone not see the advantage of a split session tournament after
the debacle saturday.

Thank you. I have printed out your post and I have it displayed it in the house to remind everyone.

Jon, I agree with you on this. I know they all worked hard to bring us the tournament. I know a lot of hard work happens to bring a tournament of this size. I think the first time you have a District tournament at a new facility that you encounter some difficulties that are difficult to forsee until you actually have a tournament there. I was working a NCAA volunteer group signup table upstairs in the lobby. I appreciated very much the opportunity they gave me to have a table there that day.

I only went out for a very short time to watch one match while someone covered the table for me. The spectator areas did seem completely full and the wrestling area did seem pretty crowded. I had a number of people comment to me as they were signing up as volunteers that the facility was too small for the tournament. At that time I was wondering if it would be a workable facility under a split tournament format. Jon, it seems that you and some others seem to think the facility would work under a split format so maybe that is the first year unforseen thing to learn this year. Maybe the facility could work for District with a split tournament format.

I think everyone agrees they worked hard and put in lots of volunteer hours. I didn't hear a complaint about brackets or match numbers. The complaints I heard about were facilities, weigh in procedure, scales and staff attitude. I received an e mail from the gentleman who made the insinuation about being removed from this tourney and the next week. He says he wasn't an organizer of the tourney, he was a volunteer. He also stated it was a running joke during the day, not anything he intended to do. This makes me feel a little better about it.

This facility and format still don't work. We don't have anything big enough where I live to take on an event like this. Where should this be next year and in what format?

I think everyone agrees they worked hard and put in lots of volunteer hours. I didn't hear a complaint about brackets or match numbers. The complaints I heard about were facilities, weigh in procedure, scales and staff attitude. I received an e mail from the gentleman who made the insinuation about being removed from this tourney and the next week. He says he wasn't an organizer of the tourney, he was a volunteer. He also stated it was a running joke during the day, not anything he intended to do. This makes me feel a little better about it.

This facility and format still don't work. We don't have anything big enough where I live to take on an event like this. Where should this be next year and in what format?

I am not at all a fan of split tournaments, but this venue screams for a split format. In that particular facility, which was very nice, I think a split format is the only way to have a tournament run smoothly. Thanks to everyone that worked so hard on the District 1 tournament.

I also thought the staff could have made the announcement that they were going to check wrist bands on the mat for those that were not supposed to be down there alot earlier than waiting till the tournament was almost over.

I think it is obvious the facility just didn't work. But I can understand how at first sight it would look to be of sufficient size. So I believe the staff did a good job w/ what they ended up with. So the question becomes next year. I understand there are some facilities big enough but they will cost a little more. With 700 plus kids going, increase the costs by $2 or $3 and get a bigger place.

Or we could just give it back to Ottowa. If they will have us back!