OLDS — École Olds High School wrestlers are now preparing for the nationals after one wrestler and one coach won medals during the provincials, held March 19-20 in Sherwood Park.
Six wrestlers made the trip. Tyson Prevost and assistant coach Amber Maschke each won bronze. Assistant coach Todd Dalke placed fifth.
Overall, head coach George Grant is pleased with the results for the Spartans. It gives him confidence they could do well in the nationals, which will be held June 9-12 in Calgary.
However, to do so, Grant says the Spartans will have to improve their fitness, strength and focus.
Grant described the provincials as “a good measuring stick” for his team, as it attracted wrestlers from as far as Ontario and B.C. as well as a few from Saskatchewan.
“We’re not as strong as we normally would be. But coming out of a pandemic and having some kids who haven’t wrestled, I was fairly pleased with the results from the weekend,” Grant said during an interview.
“So far, the kids have bought in and want to compete at nationals and so we’ll cut our practices down to just twice a week, just because they’re getting a little tired of facing the same person at practice every time.
“So we’re going to cut it down a little bit and then work more on quality than quantity at practice time and hopefully get ourselves better prepared."
Grant his wrestlers displayed good effort and ability during the provincials, but they just ran out of gas when matched up against stronger, better wrestlers.
“Our biggest thing is our conditioning. We are not in as good a shape as we need to be to be at that level,” he said.
“I think technique-wise, I think we’re as strong as anybody. But some of those kids obviously have either trained throughout the pandemic or they train a lot more often that what we’ve been training. There are some really big, strong kids in there – both male and female.
“And so are we at the bottom of the pack? I wouldn't say so. I’d say we’re more in the middle. But if you want to rise to the top, you have to do the little extras, and we haven’t quite focused that much on that aspect.”
Grant said that means doing things like working out in the gym and running outdoors, now that the weather is getting warmer.
“A couple of times, kids, they hit the wall. They were good and then they got winded and it was -- done. And that, you kind of go, ‘I’ll accept that. That’s more on a coaching aspect, not a personal aspect from the kids,’ so it’s just a matter of doing a little bit of fine tuning there and a little bit more commitment by the kids in that aspect,” Grant said.
“And if they buy in to that and with what us coaches have seen and need to work on, I think we’re going to be in a good situation.”
Another key will be improving the Spartans’ mental focus.
“Some of those kids came in from other provinces, other teams, that were laser-focused, and it showed, it showed,” he said. “And our guys, I’m extremely pleased with how they wrestled. It’s not like they gave up. They put it all out there. Some of them were just absolutely tanked and got beaten that way – and that’s OK.
“Others got – they just got caught in a move that they just couldn’t get out of. And again, that comes down to a little bit of the extra training that other teams must have had in place that we have not put in at this moment."
Grant said one thing in the Spartans’ favour may be that some of those teams from other provinces are about as good as they can get, whereas the Spartans have room to improve, and time to do so before June.
"We’ll catch up and you know, I think we’ve got room to improve where other teams, they’re pretty much at the top already,” he said.
“I don’t know if they’re going to put much more effort in, where we can put in a little more effort, a little more focus and we can narrow that gap between us and them quite a bit between now and June.”
