Goodhue Freestyle 2011 Summary
The Goodhue Wrestlers completed a successful Freestyle season this past Saturday, May 21, with the State Tournament held at the RCTC University Center Field House in Rochester. Jacob Blattner, Kyle Drehmel, and Matthew Lexvold qualified for State and Kyle placed 5th in his bracket. The level of competition at this tournament is extremely high with some of the best wrestlers in Minnesota participating.
For those of you not familiar with Freestyle, this form, along with Greco-Roman, is one of the two styles of wrestling contested at the Olympic Games. High School wrestling, a third form, is referred to as Folkstyle. Freestyle matches consist of three fast-paced two minute periods focused on exposing the opponents back to the mat. The scoring is slightly different than in high school, but a fall is still the ultimate outcome.
The past two years we practiced in Lake City with a great group of kids from that area. This year, with travel costs extremely high, we held all of the practices in Goodhue. Tim Thompson and Kyle Huneke served as the Freestyle coaches and tag-teamed the role working around their availability due to jobs and school. This worked well and participation was high with as many as 24 kids and an average of 12 attending the practices. We held 15 practices from March thru May approximately two times a week.
The state qualifying tournaments, sanctioned by Minnesota USA Wrestling, are held on Saturday’s in several cities around the area from Owatonna to Apple Valley to Stewartville. Depending on the number of wrestlers in a bracket, one needs to place first through fourth to qualify for the state tournament. The culmination of the year is the state tournament held in Rochester.
Freestyle is intended to be a “fun” program for the wrestlers giving them an opportunity for some more mat-time, learn some new skills, wrestle in a few tournaments(if they desire), and have fun wrestling without worrying about cutting weight or what their record is.
With the great participation this year, we look forward to more kids giving Freestyle a try next year.
Congratulations Jake, Kyle, and Matt for qualifying for State! Congratulations Kyle for placing 5th!
Submitted by: Mr. Bob Drehmel
