In the lead-up to OFSAA we had our largest turnouts of the year. In fact, February's turnout was the heaviest in our recorded history. While we have wrestlers preparing for Nationals, we are also evolving to post-season, concentrating on technique and reinforcing the efforts by our newer wrestlers.

Monday, February 18, 2008

26 attended practice; we had:

Clint Kingsbury
Dean Stinson O’Gorman
Courtnay Kingsbury
Chris Schrauwen

Ben Sayah
Matt Deschatelets.
Ilya Abelev
Mike Carrier
Eamonn SO
Connor SO
Scott Doucette
Sarah Stringer
Nicole Curry
Emily Bekolay
Thierry Whalen Robinson
6 from Chelsea
Nils Rohde
Ali Houmani
Ivan Toshev
+2 others

Technique

…Then fine tuning techniques - focus on foot work, hand position and closing the distance.
…Then we did
3 matches:
-7minutes
-10minutes
-10minutes

(PS Clint went 3 in a row.....)

Saturday, February 23, 2008

We had 15 for a post-Cities practice…

Monday, February 25, 2008

Notes from "Big Dean"

10 kids plus me - 5 from the Spartans, plus Ben, Phil, Jairus, his friend John, and Thierry. Worked on the over-under series, incl. throws and then scrimmages.

Tuesday, February 26

This was our traditional "Pre-OFSAA" practice held at Algonquin and we invited any OFSAA-bound wrestler to attend:

We had 17, led by Clint Kingsbury and Mike Smith...
Dean Sherratt
Chris Schrauwen
Mike Carrier

Ben Sayah
Mike Carrier
Celeste Antoft-Finch
Sarah Stringer
John Goodyear
Ilya Abelev
Mariano Santo
Matt Lessard
Connor Rockwell
Sean Ryan
Mathieu Deschatelets
Tomio Clark
Michio Clark

OFSAA Results (February 28-29)

A great result for Ottawa, possibly our best in history:

John Goodyear, 77 kgs, GOLD
Sarah Stringer, 57.5 kgs, GOLD
Ilya Abelev, 61 kgs, BRONZE
Nigel Sayah, 72 kgs BRONZE

Also…

Alan Walsh, 41 kgs, LBP (also Tsunami), BRONZE
S. Sabourin, South Carleton 5th
Kellie Heney, South Carleton, 4th

Also…

Celeste Antoft-Finch (Brookfield) 0-2
Fadhl Abu Ghanem (Brookfield) 0-2
Sherry Sheritan (Brookfield) 1-2
Sabrina Romolock (Brookfield) 2-2
Scott Doucette (Brookfield) 1-2
Nick Bradley (All Saints) 1-2
Emily Bekolay (All Saints) 3-2 - top 12
Mariano Santo (Saint Patrick’s) 4-2 - top 12
Michio Clark (Colonel By) 3-2 – top 8
Tomeo Clark (Colonel By) 3-2 – top 8
Chris Galley (Canterbury) 0-2
Chris Peters (Canterbury) 0-2
Sean Ryan (Canterbury) 0-2

Saturday March 1

Practice was cancelled by “Big Dean”…with only six attending (us and four kids)

Monday, March 3

Algonquin cancelled (post-OFSAA)

Tuesday, March 4

6 attended

Wednesday, March 5

Algonquin cancelled (snowstorm)

Thursday, March 6

We had a good turnout of 12…

Saturday March 8

14 attended for a great technical practiced led by Mike Smith…

Mike Smith
Dean Sherratt
Chris Schrauwen

Sarah Stringer
Brian Nolet
Mike Carrier
Chris Galley (Canterbury)
Phil Staniewski
Conor Stinson O’Gorman
Nicole Curry
Amy Laidlaw
Jason Papailiadis
Matt Lessard

We started by doing wall to wall “foot sweeps” and “double legs” against partners.

The practice was devoted to the “other options” than the gut wrench and cross ankle which are the highest performing moves on the ground.

If these two options are being stopped by a tenacious opponent, then you should have a third option and tilts can be very effective.

First, you need to keep your weight on your opponent, either resting on his legs or covering his back. You start the tilt by grasping his wrist, cupping all your fingers around it to get the strongest hold and then leaning your forearm against his triceps which will already start to turn him as he pulls up on his far hip…Grab that far hip and keep your knee into his near side to prevent him from moving. Roll him to his back and use your near leg to grasp his nearest to keep him immobile for 2 + 1 points.

When the offensive wrestler is fighting for a wrist, the defensive wrestler will often counter by “swimming” the arm around, behind and straight out again. Your “counter to his counter” is to straight arm it behind as it reaches that position of his rotation and pull it across and plant it against your opposite side, pinning it there. Move up on your opponent, to his middle back and step over on his caught arm side, circling to the head till he moves to his back. If he keeps fighting, grasp his chin as a further form of “persuasion”. If caught like, this, your only defence is to crawl forward to give extra room for you to trap your caught arm.

If he is successful in “swimming his arm straight” that, in turn, will open up that side to a tilt. Hook your hand on his opposite armpit and tilt towards the straightened arm while blocking that side with your knee. In this case grab the two points and go back to on top since you are in a vulnerable position yourself.

Mike’s technique of brilliance is based on a greco-roman move and can be described as a “reverse head and arm”. Again, based on your opponent keeping his arm straight (to fight off an attempt to grasp his wrist), you overhook his other arm and underhook his straight arm. Sit-out and roll over, keeping your body tight to his – the power for this sit-out is provided by the inside leg. You will rotate him over and expose his back for two points.

We went with three period matches, followed by a series of offensive/defensive matches.

Monday, March 10

22 attended…a great post-OFSAA practice led by Clint Kingsbury

Clint Kingsbury
Dean Sherratt
Dean Stinson O’Gorman
Mike Carrier
Chris Schrauwen
Dennis Walker (observed/Spartans)
Nick Bradley
Michio Clark
Jason Papailiadis
Nicole Curry (observed)
Mike Carrier
Thierry Whalen Robinson
Ben Sayah
Sarah Stringer
Chris Galley (Canterbury)
Celeste Antoft-Finch
Conor Stinson O’Gorman
John Goodyear
Brae Walker
Keil Walker
Tate Walker (observed)

Clint’s emphasis was not so much on teaching new technique, but to give a wrestler options when an intended move doesn’t work or only partially.

For example, the offensive wrestler executes a duck-under but is caught half way, with his opponent’s arm pressing down on his head. You can still succeed in this move by grabbing the near leg and far waist and drive forward, hooking the far leg to finish a takedown.

If you have cleared the head, but not been able to “turn the corner”…your opponent tightens his arm around your head. You counter explosively by moving your hips in closely to his, grasping his leading leg “elbow deep” that is, wrapped thoroughly…use your free hand to grasp his hip and you can lift him up into the air, taking him down to table on your outstretched leg.

Clint’s third technique was most interesting and unique. You start by taking a two on one, but move in frontally to your opponent, popping your head underneath his caught arm while retaining the two on one. If you move in tightly, you can use your head and his trapped arm to lift him up off the mat, drop to your knee and finish like a “no leg fireman’s” carry on the side of the two on one.

Big Dean finished with speed/water drills, two sets of three minute matches and conditioning…

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Yesterday was good.

Clint Kingsbury
Mike Smith
Chris Schrauwen
Ben Sayah
Matt Deschatelets
Ilya Abelev
John Goodyear
Mike Carrier
Sarah Stringer
Michio Clark
Nigel Sayah
Jason Papailiadis - Colonel By
Celeste Antoft-Finch - Brookfield
Nick Bradley - All Saints

We worked on specific technique - going through each more 10 times each - under my direction with as many setups as possible.

High crotch, single, double, head and arm, front headlock, shoulder throw, fireman.

Then we did parterre technique - followed by parterre wrestling scrimmage - then conditioning.