I run therefore I am. I am therefore I run.

Or perpetual fucking whining. "My life sucks, I suck, no one loves me, I don't love anyone, I'm sick, no one cares, I hate other people, other people hate me..."

My new sport - telling people on the ledge to jump.

 

At the start of the season we were required to have a doctor come in and measure our body fat content, and then your minimum weight class limit was determined based on a 6% body fat cutoff. It was easy to fudge the numbers and settle on the weight class a step below the 6% limit. Saunas and sweat suits (the vinyl ones) were illegal but we didn't notice. My last season was 2007 so I dunno if things have changed since then.

Even though I was smaller and athletic I still had to lose weight to be competitive. In Minnesota unless you naturally have 6% body fat and The Rock's body type, you cut weight or you get your ass kicked. I wrestled from 119-160 lb. classes in high school and could tell right away if my opponent was at his natural weight and unconditioned (soft). I have long limbs and muscular legs, and it had some advantages but generally was tough to handle guys who were more compact and had more upper body strength at the same weight. I was basically wrestling at 140 lbs. with a 135-lb. class upper body and 145 lb. class legs. My junior year was the worst, when I dropped from 155 to 135. At the time it seemed to make sense (cut weight = win matches) but in retrospect I went too far. Everyone on the team did it too, even the JV squad. Coaches didn't directly pressure us but you were expected to perform.

What made it especially tough is how the sport became my lifestyle. With track or basketball or whatever, you train and go home and resume whatever you were doing. In wrestling season, you never got a break. My mind was consumed by what I weighed, what I was going to eat, and taking a day off training or going on an eating binge was unthinkable. I was running 3 miles every night, training on Sundays and holidays (wrestling ruins Thanksgiving and Christmas), and between my training and temper I was pretty antisocial too.

I still love the sport but not everything about it. Time on the mat was worth it, but I was always relieved when the season ended and I could resume a normal life.

 

Our coach used to make the team throw on garbage bags and go do jumping jacks with the showers on full blast. For hours on end.

I remember kids getting abused like jockeys. I never did more running in my life than that sport. We would run for miles through the halls after school in those mute, utterly flat-soled shoes on solid linoleum. All that shit works for the sake of the sport, but I was no fatigued I fell asleep in class a lot over the winter. After my second year I made it my only high school sport, it was just so much to prepare for and keep up with. I still loved it, though. Probably because I had a TV movie finish: rookie year I was destroyed by all, my last year I won city. I never did it again after high school, but coached piblic school on occasion.

 

Re: Re: I run therefore I am. I am therefore I run.

I went to a big wrestling school and I am a big dude so naturally I got pressured pretty hard to wrestle, all it took was watching/hearing wrestling practice once to make me say fuck that. Kids running miles in layered trash bags, surviving on 300 calories a day, passing out in class, tell me how any of that is supposed to be fun?

I played basketball and loved every second, being 6'7 made it a lot of fun playing the post. I haven't picked up a ball in a decade but I have great memories of it in high school.

Personally if I ever have boys they'll be welcome to play basketball/baseball/soccer, but I'll be dammed if they play football, watched to many of my buddies get seriously injured playing in high school. Didn't seem worth it at the time and if you ask them now the vast majority wished they never played, its hell being 30 years old with blown knees and ankles.



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I was never really good at anything when I was little.
I was one of the kids who always got picked last because I usually wasn't much of an asset, to put it mildly.
When I started university I began lifting for the first time because my back killed me and have been doing that more or less for the last 4-5 years, but just enough to have an athletic look and not be too bulky.
I also enjoy going to indoor cycling classes every week or so.
I did BJJ for 1-2 years, but I was never that good at it, loved it though.
Getting to class was hard without a car, and between exams I slowly started to let it slide, partly because I didn't want to phone 20 people just to see if I could carpool with someone every thursday.

 

It seems anymore youth football have a questionable future. I know if I ever have kids, they'll be allowed to play any sport but football. Too many knee/head/everything else injuries.

I know hockey has its injury risk, but that seems to pale in comparison to football.

 

Re: Re: I run therefore I am. I am therefore I run.

Beating up other people is fun.

Really, the six minutes on the mat you got each week were beyond exhilarating. Winning was a huge rush and as its such a physical and individual sport to the core, it is more rewarding than the instant gratification of just staying on the couch or eating whatever you wanted. The sacrifice was worth it more times than not.

If my kids want to wrestle that's great, but I will not let them cut weight like I did.

 

I think thats what I loved about hockey, there was no dieting. Yea you had to be in shape, but no one required you to run 10 miles in a sweat suit or eat a strict diet. The hockey diet is largely fast food and burritos, and know what, guys do pretty good eating like that.

If Juicy's kid steals my kid's lunch money I'm bleaching a penis into his lawn.

 

I had to give up sports. Old foosball injury.

 

Any stats on this? I mean obviously there's more injuries and long term damage with football if for no other reason than more people play it, but I would figure per-capita the rates would be about the same. Not saying that's definitely the case, just wasn't sure if it's been proven or if a much higher correlation has been established with football.

 

So you think your a "jumper" eh? Well I have 32 "helpful leaps" in the last three weeks alone!* Let's see you top that, amateur!


*Protip: Target the unemployed and follow them around, being overly pessimistic the entire time. Fish in a barrel.

 

Re: Re: I run therefore I am. I am therefore I run.

Winning a match was an enormous boost because everybody is watching just you. Plus, I found the sport was great for non-violent self defence. It's all about countering your opponent and using their body weight and leverage against them. I used to work as a bouncer and it was a great thing to use to subdue lunatics instead of having to stoop to punching or chokeholds.

 

Re: Re: I run therefore I am. I am therefore I run.

Mine were the opposite- they wouldn't let me go to practice if I had any Cs on my report card. There was only one time a sport was pushed on me, back in first grade when my mom signed me up for a YMCA basketball league without mentioning it to me. I hated it and still don't like basketball. There's a reason I don't do sports that involve throwing, catching, or hitting.

Wrestling was always present because it was big in my dad's family. He had five brothers and they could only pick one sport in high school so all wrestled and were very good. When I was in 3rd grade and my brother was in 5th my dad asked us if we'd like to try it (yes!) and signed us up for a youth sports program. We enjoyed it and stuck with it.

 

I'm not shocked in the least that wrestling is up there, but what interests me is how there's just over 2.5x more football injuries in spring practice than fall practice.

 

I played ice hockey from the time I could walk until high school because I loved it. I was on the swim team because my dad made me do it (in retrospect, I'm glad he did). I also dabbled a bit in hunter/jumper horseback riding stuff in that time period because my sister and my mom were into it and I was stuck at the barn all the time anyway.

The only athletic thing I do now is Crossfit (which is basically a sport at this point) and running (because I have to for work).

I fucking despise running. I do not understand people who run for fun. It's so boring. Every time I run my inner thought process is "ugh... it's only 45 minutes, put up with this for five more miles... four more miles... three more miles... two more miles... one more mile... that stop sign in the distance... the next intersection... 100 more yards... 50... 20... 10... DONE!"

 

I'm not too surprised by the difference between hockey and football. The majority of body contact is different between the two. Don't get me wrong hockey has some big hits, and the speed that they happen at is pretty high. But the contact in hockey is generally initiated by two players traveling in roughly the same direction and the intent is to gain inside body position on or separate the puck from the puck carrier. Not the same contact as forcibly tackling somebody to the ground.

 

I loved wrestling. I started when I was 8 and continued until about 22. I started H.S. at 6'2" 210 lbs and finished at 6'6" 275 lbs. I sucked the first half dozen years, literally got my ass kicked a few times. By H.S. I was dominating all my matches. What I like most about wrestling is that it is a team sport, but its all about individual effort. You get what you earn, glory or failure. I wrestled all four years at the heavyweight class. Anyone familiar with the sport will know that a lot of times the outcome of the meet would fall to who won the heavyweight match, and I loved that pressure. I was not the slow lumbering blobs that are far to common at HW. I was speedy as all hell for my size (at the time I could run 5.4ish sec 40m dash, 35 in. vertical leap) and surprised all of my opponents. I liked "toying" with them, waiting for them to attempt a double underhook with poor technique, so I could launch them 10ft across the mat with a double overhook, landing with all the force on their chest rendering them helpless & breathless. I LOVED doing that. That shit was fun on a level most people wouldn't understand. More than 60 of my 72 pins my senior year came from that specific move.

That said, I wasn't perfect. I got beat by the #1 college prospect that year 3 times, it was a humbling to say the least.

In my state the upper limit of the class was 275. I had the luxury of never having to cut weight, but rather trying to bulk up muscle mass. I hope my son decides to wrestle, and when he does I'll support every choice he makes, except drastic weight cutting. As already mentioned it has horrible effects on day to day life.

I dabbled in all of the common sports as a child. Baseball, football, soccer, and basketball. Of those, the only one I took a fondness to was football, and I ended up playing for about 8 years before and during highschool. To give you the gist, being a very physically dominant guy I played what they call Ironman Football, meaning I was the starting center & starting nose guard. FUCK. THAT. SHIT.
I grew to hate my coaches, because they expected me to play virtually every play of the game (also the back up kicker & punter) with no break and only the encouraging "suck it up, Pussy!" I grew to hate my teammates because they all thought I was lazy or half assing it when I got tired. I had never hated people more in my life than I did those people because of the tormenting I got there. I ultimately quit to focus solely on wrestling.


Edit to add:

The only "sport" I play now is golf, I'm decent at it, and its a great excuse to get drunk on a Tuesday afternoon!