By DAN McCOOL
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
Boone, Ia. ” Is Mother Nature a wrestling fan?
Hundreds of high school wrestlers in Iowa hope she will carefully pick her times to whip up a snowstorm or an ice storm.
A new rule this season will put a crimp in how much food a wrestler can eat, especially if school is called off ” and subsequently practice is cancelled ” the day before a meet or tournament. The first meets are Monday, with the first heavy night of competition Tuesday and the first tournaments Saturday.
“The most noticeable change that fans, wrestlers and coaches are going to see is the scale allowance that we used to give for bad weather is not available this year, “said Alan Beste, wrestling coordinator for the Iowa High School Athletic Association. “If a school doesn’t have practice on a Wednesday because of snow but has a meet on Thursday, we used to allow them one or two pound scale allowance. That doesn’t exist by national rule. The only scale allowance that is available now is for consecutive days of competition, and the limit on that is a maximum of two pounds.”
Some coaches are initially not in favor of the new weight-related changes.
“I just don’t see our system being broke. I don’t know why they are trying to throw all of these fixes at it, “said Fort Madison coach Ryan Smith. “What they have in place is definitely adequate. Realistically, is it in the best interest, and in my opinion I don’t think it is.”
Beginning this season, all wrestlers at the traditional and the dual-meet state tournaments will weigh in as they would at regular-season tournaments ” two hours before each session involving their class at the traditional state tournament in Des Moines, one hour before the dual-meet tournament in Cedar Rapids. In recent years at the traditional tournament, wrestlers had an opportunity to weigh in for the next day’s competition within one hour of the completion of their round.
The absence of a weather-related scale allowance this winter is a harbinger of what’s to come in the 2006-07 season. Beste said next season there will be no more waivers that allow a wrestler to compete at one weight class below his or her optimal weight, based on preseason body composition testing.
Wrestlers will undergo a hydration test based on a urine sample before they get tested for body fat. Once the optimal weight is determined through body fat ” 7 percent for boys, 12 percent for girls ” a wrestler cannot lose more than 1.5 percent of weight each week.
“Everything that’s being done is in the best interest of the health of the wrestler, “Beste said.
Fort Madison had to call off its wrestling tournament last December because of an outbreak of whooping cough. The teams that were scheduled to participate scrambled to find new tournaments, and received a scale allowance because the Fort Madison meet was called off one day before. Smith said weight management has not been an issue with his team.
“We’ve never had any problems with kids making weight, even if they have waivered, “Smith said.
Waverly-Shell Rock coach Rick Caldwell is concerned about scale allowances because teams such as his in the Northeast Iowa Conference have dual meets on Fridays before Christmas break, followed by tournaments on Saturday. Bad weather would reduce an opportunity for practice to get weight-controlled, thus causing problems.
“I’m not a big fan of it, obviously, because kids in our sport are going to cut some weight, “said Caldwell, whose team won the Class 3-A individual and dual-meet state tournament championships last winter. “If they don’t have availability to workout facilities, it makes it very difficult to make scratch weight.
“I understand what the drive is behind this whole push for no weight allowance, the 1.5 percent weight loss a week, no waivers . . . I understand what their idea is but, at the same time, no matter what weight class you’re at or what policy you’re under, kids are going to have to drop some weight. My concern is they don’t have the best interest for kids in the forefront.”
Beste said the IHSAA’s philosophy mirrors that of the national federation: wrestlers who maintain weight properly should have the advantage over those who don’t maintain weight properly.
“We’re trying to make wrestling a healthy sport, “Beste said. “The two biggest black marks against high school wrestling, or wrestling in general, have always been weight and communicable diseases. We’ve come a long way in the last 15-25 years in addressing those issues. (Mandatory) body composition testing in 1998-99 was a huge step for us in terms of the health of the wrestlers.”
Caldwell said he’s not so much opposed to the lack of a scale allowance as he is to having little input into changing rules.
“I wish that the IHSAA would explain it to us and actually gather some input or insight from the coaches in the state, “Caldwell said. “That has never been asked of us, and it’s kind of frustrating. Don’t tell us this is the way it’s going to be, tell us why it needs to be like this. Get our insight.”
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