Wrestling is a bit of a hidden gem at Maggie Walker. Despite our school going undefeated last year, and having a state champion in RJ May, attendance is notedly lower at wrestling matches than at other sporting events such as basketball or volleyball. While some may attribute this to the fact that there is only one home dual in a year, even that event, which was also senior night, could not fill the stands. I would wager that the real reason is two misconceptions that people have about wrestling. First, that it’s a meathead’s sport, with no technique or tactics, but a lowly numbers game of who can lift more. Second, people think of WWE, where the outcome is predetermined.

Addressing the first generalization, nothing could be further from the truth. Captain RJ May, the first NCAA D1 wrestler from Maggie Walker, is also a finalist for the Walentas Scholarship at the University of Virginia. Just about everyone I talked to described wrestling as a chess match, where you wanted to make sure that you weren’t just throwing yourself into your opponent and hoping for the best. RJ starts out his morning watching film of previous matches to learn his opponent and see what he could be doing better. There are about 1,000 different moves in wrestling, all of which have 10 variations depending on the situation, according to coach Donald Blanton.

The way one goes about wrestling is also rather important. I heard over and over that if one thinks they’re going to lose, nine times out of ten they’re going to lose, and conversely, if one thinks they’ll win, they’re giving themselves a better shot. The mental preparation that goes into a match starts 15 minutes before it starts as wrestlers begin to pace back and forth in silence, emptying their head of distractions. A few wrestlers noted a sense of nervousness from the uncertainty before the match, which evaporates as soon as time begins. All the careful planning goes right out the window. For six minutes, one can either give in and get pinned, or keep fighting through. It’s not an easy decision to make, evident from the fact that of the twenty who showed up to the first practice, nine remain today, and a third are out with injuries. Some are wrestling in spite of their injuries, such as a broken finger or a knee in need of surgery. “For all stepping on the mat, wrestling is their life,” Captain Zachary Wooden put it.

The second assumption is a bit more complex. Wrestling matches cannot be staged, but they are a show and a half. For instance, I can remember taking photos right on the mat when RJ May would do something flashy and look straight into my camera, not just for show, but to get his opponent off balance. There were numerous matches that went down to the last second, all in one night. There’s always a level of drama on the mat, where “anything can go wrong at any time,” in the words of senior Timothy Graff. You get to hear the other wrestlers shouting at the guy who is up, giving him advice in the hopes of sparking a fire in them. And that reaches what I believe makes wrestling special.

If you think about clubs at Maggie Walker, the unfortunate reality is that many people use them as a stepping stone to get better odds at getting into an Ivy League university. For instance, in debate, oftentimes some will take measures to prevent other members of the team from stealing their research. However, in wrestling, that selfish attitude is noticeably and refreshingly absent. All people involved with wrestling described the team as providing a sense of “family,” which Jack Laroche, a senior and lifelong soccer player, hasn’t seen anywhere else.

That sense of family can be seen on and off the mat. For instance, people will wrestle far outside of their weight classes to help someone improve or keep someone who’s cutting active. They’ll arrange bowling nights and dinners just to hang out with each other. Upperclassmen wil tutor underclassmen if they’re struggling with a class. They’ve kept each other safe from danger. Even when asked about their personal experiences during the interviews, they would compliment each other without any prompting.

That family would not be complete without their coach, whom all wrestlers interviewed asked me to thank on their behalf. Tim recalled in his sophomore year that Mr. Blanton personally drove the JV wrestlers to their first tournament in his truck. Zach listed a myriad of things that Mr. Blanton does, to make sure the team has the best chance of winning. I remember at one meet, Mr. Blanton had a bag full of chicken wraps without the lettuce made specifically for Tony Caramucci. When RJ’s mother was diagnosed with breast cancer, Mr. Blanton bought pink headgear for the entire team to wear in a sign of solidarity. “In order to succeed at wrestling, you just need heart,” Captain Tony Caramucci said.

While there are no more home events for the wrestling team, I would highly recommend that all students attend a wrestling event this year. It might be slightly difficult, but the motto of Coach Blanton, which all members of the team live by, is apt here: “You can't get much done in life if you only work on the days when you feel good."