Our New Normal, Volume XXIII

Covid protocols, especially in the early days, necessitated adjustments, created frustration at times, yet inspired creativity from everyone, but when you coach a contact sport where you can’t have contact or even use your dedicated venue (the Jamie Robertson ’04 Wrestling Room) to practice, consider the challenges you face.

 

Welcome, my friends, to yet another installment in the Our New Normal series, a look at how Collegiate folks have dealt with the various obstacles thrown their way, compliments of the pandemic.

Speak about last year’s new normal, I began.

 

“Last year, I wouldn’t exactly call it a wrestling season,” said Stone, whose masked crew worked out in the Robins Campus turf room. “We had the mats out, but we couldn’t touch each other. Mainly, we lifted, conditioned, and did individual drills. It was like learning how to play basketball without a basketball.”

 

But you found positives? I said.

“Sure,” Stone replied. “It was good teamwise. We played a lot of ultimate frisbee. It was still a good active season health-wise.”

 

 

“There was frustration, especially for the seniors who had put a lot of time in and this was the end of the journey where they were going to do their best,” Stone said. “The ultimate frisbee games got very competitive. We enjoyed that. I think that kept an element of fun and competitiveness, but it was totally different. They were enjoying each other’s company and working hard together.”

 

You’re a veteran wrestling coach. Coaches take care of their athletes. What did you do to take care of yourself during this very different time? I asked.

 

“I played ultimate frisbee with them and did as much with them as I could,” he replied, “but as a coach, it was a matter of letting go and accepting that that’s the way it was. I just didn’t think about it that much.”

 

 

“It’s interesting,” he continued. “When you’re away from something for a year, you almost approach it with a fresh and beginner’s mind. It allows a different approach, a different perspective. As a coach, that’s been very helpful. It’s an ongoing process.”

 

What, I asked, does "beginner’s mind" look like?

 

“For me, I had a system in place, a way to run practices: what we did first, second, third and a reason for those things. I had a process for after meets: how we identified and approached problem areas and taught. So now, coming back into it, it’s letting go of those past patterns and trying to rethink new ways to do things.

That’s been interesting. I’ve enjoyed that process. It’s been invigorating and refreshing. Because we missed a year of competition, these kids have a long way to go to find big successes, so we’re just looking for the little successes: maybe not winning the match but doing well in certain situations and having that constant improvement mindset.”

 

 

“In the past,” he said, “with wrestlers that understood the drills, we could go to a set number of drills and common situations that they would understand, do that quickly, and then branch off into some new techniques. Now, we have to go slower. I’m rethinking basic drills that we do every day. I’m very uncomfortable right now in that process, but that’s OK because when you’re doing something new and it’s challenging, it’s going to be uncomfortable. That’s the nature of it.”

 

The numbers for varsity and JV are small (11), so filling each of the 14 weight classes will be impossible. There’re 19 wrestlers in the cub program.

 

“Low numbers make it tough,” he said. “It’s an individual and a team sport. The individuals can still have great success, but as a team, we’ll struggle. It’s almost like starting fresh.”

 

Yet coaches and athletes persevere, I offered.

 

“Last year was one of those peak years we’d been building towards, and that would have carried on the momentum,” he said. “The guys we have now have great energy. They support each other. They make each other better every single day and every single match. That’s exciting for everybody.”

 

“Yes, very much,” he said. “There’s excitement in the room. The intensity of the competition is great. They’re asking questions. They’re focused on getting better. When they come off the mat after a win or a loss, their focus is not so much the outcome but what they need to do to get better. That, I think, will carry everyone forward. They support each other. They help each other warm up before the matches. They talk to each other. If they see someone down, they try to pick them up. That helps everybody out. We’ll see the benefits of that as we go forward.”

~Weldon Bradshaw