When the weather drops, the intensity rises. Known around the school to be gruesome, hot, and extremely tiring, the wrestling team heats up for the long winter. It is no easy task to throw your body around, cut weight quickly, and stay hydrated (not to mention keep up with school). Days are long for wrestlers who practice 3-5 times a week for three hours at a time, but everyone on the team wouldn’t like to have it any other way. After perfecting their craft during the week, the wrestlers have 18 different meets to showcase their abilities.
Even though wrestling is the most popular sport to some people, the sport is slowly gaining traction at North Atlanta. The team is growing more and more each year with multisport athletes coming to test their athleticism. There is a combination of full time wrestlers, cross country runners, football players, and more. Even though it is a melting pot of all athletes, everyone there is there for one reason: to wrestle. “The community we build is unlike anywhere else,” said senior Cal Rivers. “It has played a major role in my growth as an athlete and person.”
Saying you want to wrestle is a lot easier said than done. The long, demanding three hour practices take a toll on a person’s mental state and of course their body. They focus on everything, technique has to be perfect, conditioning has to be high, and most of all you have to want it more. On top of that, everything they do is at a high intensity. Most people cannot fathom what they do, but to them it is just another day in which they are striving to get better. “I’ve never done anything like this,” said junior Quinn Herring. “Football practices are not even this intense.”
With the season starting on the 15th of November, many wrestlers have goals they want to break this year. With the veterans returning and newcomers that joined, the team looks very strong and ready to have a handful of takedowns this season. Seniors have goals of qualifying for sectionals, while the newcomers have just set their goal of wrestling for varsity. While athletes are focused on personal goals, everyone has come together to set the goal of focusing on one meet at a time, to keep the team focused. “As a senior I want to place on the podium at state,” said senior captain Hayes Harpenau. “I want to leave it all out there for the guys around me.”
With the winter arriving, the wrestling team is not just preparing for a winning season, they are preparing for long hours and countless early mornings. As we lookout for these hard-working Dubs this year, it will be interesting to see what will happen in the trenches of the mats.
