Big Trophy Hammer Tournament (Top of the Podium)

First year in a new location, Top of the Podium events will be on the calendar for the Virginia Patriots for the foreseeable future.  There is a lack of youth tournaments in Virginia and Tom Houck is starting to fill the void.  On Friday evening we all got to see Penn State compete @ Carver Hawkeye Arena against the Hawks.  What was interesting about these two teams going head to head was to see that these top two teams are both made up of wrestlers from Pennsylvania.  Virginia, wake up, follow the model.  The model is comprised of a healthy regimen of open tournaments.  Over the past 10 years we've competed @ most of these events at small local high schools throughout the state who have been hosting these tournaments for 30-50 years.  Just go the pywrestling.com and click on an event.  You'll see banners like the Shippensburg 35th Annual...  Biglersville, Mechanicsburg, Milton,  North Allegheny, Canon Mac, etc, etc, etc...  The model WORKS.  Local High School Coaches step up....  We need to start hosting youth tournaments the day after our big high school tournaments.  Leverage the facilities and coordination that you managed to pull together for your High School tournaments and schedule an extra day for the youth.  High School wrestling success starts in elementary school.

We had nine kids at the tournament : Matthew Arndt, Connor Hogbin, Cole Hogbin, Andrew Krajic, Calvin Cardone, Wyatt Carter, Owen Clayborne, Colton Quaker and Carson Stroud.

Tom Houck, owner of Top and Tournament Director makes every competition day unique.  The theme of this tournament was "The Big Trophy".  There was no award for second place.  Kids either won the day or didn't!  This made for heightened anxiety for the wrestlers who made it to the finals.  My day started at 8:30am with Calvin Cardone and ended at 5pm with Wyatt Carter.  Wyatt's final match was literally the last match of the day.  He had won 3 matches in his round robin competition and might had won at that point if another wrestler hadn't been having a similar degree of success and so Wyatt watched this kid decisively defeat the same kids he had beaten earlier and the anxiety started to increase as it became clear that Wyatt would have to face this opponent in a final match.  The stage was set, the day was done for everyone else in the gym and Wyatt had one more to go.  To add to the stress of the day, Wyatt hasn't won a tournament yet this year and his entire family was there to watch.  Wyatt has had a bit of a black cloud over his wrestling results to some extent this year never seeming to pull it out when it mattered.  In the heat of the event before the match I asked Wyatt, so what's the plan?  Wyatt's response "I'm gonna lat drop him".  I looked deep into his eyes and said in a very stern voice "NO YOUR NOT".  Your not going to force anything Wyatt you're going to win this with good fundamental wrestling.  OMG LOL.  The picture below tells the rest of the story.

Another great moment of the day was Colton Quaker, who dominated his opponent in the final against a kid who tech falled him last year.  Tony, his dad, prior to the match said "this kid is good"... after every one of Colton's matches the coaches who were coaching kids for the next match were saying... "that kid is good".  Colton turned some heads.  Congratulations Colton.

Andrew Krajic dominated on the day.

Carson Stroud had a GREAT day only to be stopped in his final match against a stud by the name of Ben Weader.

Billy Tyler ventured to Connelsville, which I believe is the toughest area of the country for wrestling (Pittsburgh area) and placed 2nd on the day.  Billy is on a run after doing well at both Tyrant, McDonough duals as well.

Although I highlight the success here, the day was mixed with success and learning opportunities.  Several wrestlers took losses as opportunities to make adjustments and come back the next time.  Keep on wrestling.