Wrestling Blogs - Joe Williamson

I am sitting in a cafe thinking about the one day I have spent with Iowa. It has been amazing. Growing up, I had this idea about how intense and tough Iowa wrestling was. My brother and I used to watch Gable Supreme before school. My Dad would tell us about the "in your face" Iowa style of wrestling, and I would see them at tournaments pushing the pace. It was not until yesterday that I truly understood, and even now I am only beginning to understand because I am watching from the side with a camera in my hand. What am I thinking? Maybe the only people who understand are out there on the mat, some getting crunched over and over again, and some dishing out ass whippings as if that is what they were born to do.

Before practice coach Brands did his pre practice speech, and he had me turn the camera off. I wish he would have let me film. His speech got my blood boiling, and I wished that I were still wrestling. I could have run through a brick wall after that speech. If this is what it is like before every practice, I can see how those wrestlers put themselves through this pace over and over again.

The camera could have stayed on three groups, in particular, the whole time. The hand fighting and sense of urgency that was running through the room was at an amazing level. Coach Schwab and Brent Metcalf were going and going and going. Both of them looked hungry. Coach Brands was putting the wrestlers through what I thought was the toughest practice I have ever seen. I don't know if it was what he was putting them through or if it was the way the wrestlers turned a practice room into battleground, it seemed as if every short go was the last 15 seconds of the national finals. Coach Brands seemed to have ways to work these wrestlers incredibly hard while raising them up at the same time. He has a definite way with words. I know that many of the wrestlers were struggling. I could hear it, but they kept on going. After practice, the mats were like a pool. Many wrestlers just sat there; I wish I knew what they were thinking. I wonder if they had enough energy left to even think. Coach Brands stuck around the room for a long time after practice. Many wrestlers came to him for advice. He would tell them what he thought in a way that would make them think, too. In my mind, the members of this team go through more demanding workouts everyday than the toughest workout of most people's entire life.