Division III Southeast Regional Site Finalized
Editor’s Note; The Southeast Regional will be hosted by Ferrum College and held at Franklin County High School in Rocky Mount, Virginia on Feb. 23rd – 24th.
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The top three wrestlers at each weight will qualify for the 2018 NCAA Championships to be held at the Cleveland Public Auditorium March 9-10, 2018.
High School Girls Wrestling continues growing rapidly nationwide
Editor’s Notes; The outlook looks bright for the growth of girls and women’s wrestling as it is still with a small but continually growing participation numbers. As they say, “You go girl!”
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There is something that perhaps the general public does not yet know. Wrestling has been the one of the fastest growing sports for girls in high school for a number of years. With today being National Girls and Women in Sports Day, USA Wrestling is celebrating girls high school wrestling. Perhaps, the wrestling community can help us get out the word about why so many high school girls are now wrestling. First things first. USA Wrestling is asking high school girl wrestlers and high school girls wrestling teams to post photos and videos on social media today and throughout the week. Go ahead and use Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc. and show the world what girls wrestling is all about, using these two hashtags:
#NGWSD
#GirlsWrestle
So here are the facts. In 1990, there were 112 girls who participated in high school wrestling. For 27 straight years, girls high school wrestling has grown. In many of those years, the percentage of growth was 10% or more. In the 2016-17 high school year, there were 14,587 girls wrestling in high school. And it is well known that that number is too small, because some high school state associations still do not report how many girls they have. In the early years, girls only had the opportunity to participate on the boys wrestling team at their high school. This was not an easy task. It took a great deal of courage to wrestle, not only because of the physical disadvantage, but also because it was not yet accepted by society for girls to train and compete against boys in a combat sport like wrestling. In spite of this, the number of girls competing in high school wrestling increased, year after year after year. They were the true trailblazers for girls high school wrestling. Rest of the story at https://www.teamusa.org/USA-Wrestling/Features/2018/February/07/NGWSD-feature-on-girls-high-school-wrestling?mc_cid=2f11ee0549&mc_eid=2ef7cbca4b
Wrestling Team in Australia Fights to Prove It’s Not an ‘African Gang’
Editor’s Note; A wrestling story from way, way, way to the south and it was in the New York Times! Yet a different look at how much variety there is in the sport and how it can benefit in a variety of ways.
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MELBOURNE, Australia — The men call themselves the Melbourne Lion Wrestling Team.
The name evokes both origins in Africa and a presence in Australia, a fitting title for a team composed of South Sudanese immigrants living in Melbourne, Australia’s second biggest city. Every week, more than a dozen men, ages 15 to 30, meet to practice on an Australian football oval or, if the weather permits, along the beach. A few times a year, they travel across Australia to compete with other teams, trading the animal skins and ash traditionally worn during Sudanese wrestling matches for gym shorts and talcum powder. “We want to keep our culture alive,” Awan Mading, 30, said during a recent practice. “It’s also good exercise. You can see we’re breathing heavily from the cardio.” When not refining their grapples and takedowns, the men are factory workers, bank employees and students. In Sudan, wrestling is a popular sport and an integral part of the culture, melding athletics with dance and song. But here, the men strike an unusual — and to some Australian eyes, threatening — image: tall, black, often shirtless men fighting one another. Rest of the story at https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/06/world/australia/sudan-african-gangs-wrestling.html?mc_cid=70ec74af24&mc_eid=2ef7cbca4b
Calling all female wrestlers: let’s celebrate National Girls and Women in Sports Day on Wednesday, Feb. 7th
Editor’s Note; OK we are a week late but it seems like an appropriate sentiment for Valentine’s Day this week.
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Original story by Gary Abbott of USA Wrestling
This Wednesday, February 7, 2018, is the 32nd annual National Girls and Women in Sports Day, a national movement to celebrate the extraordinary achievements in girls’ and women’s sports and the positive influence athletic participation brings to their lives.
A coalition of wrestling organizations, including USA Wrestling, the National Wrestling Coaches Association, the National Wrestling Hall of Fame, the non-profit Wrestle Like A Girl, the U.S. Wrestling Foundation and many other groups are reaching out to girls and women in wrestling to come together and celebrate women’s wrestling on Wednesday.
Starting tomorrow and going throughout the weekend, we are asking girls and women in wrestling (as well as their families and teams) to be very active on social media, posting photos and videos of girls wrestling online with the following two hashtags:
#NGWSD
#GirlsWrestle
These images on social media can include pictures of individual female athletes competing in wrestling, teams and clubs of women wrestlers posing together, girls and women practicing the sport of wrestling, and other appropriate photos and videos which will show off the sport of women’s wrestling to the world.
Rest of the story at https://www.teamusa.org/USA-Wrestling/Features/2018/February/06/Calling-all-girls-and-women-to-celebrate-National-Girls-and-Women-in-Sports-Day?mc_cid=70ec74af24&mc_eid=2ef7cbca4b
TDR blog
After 20 seasons of publicizing wrestling The TakeDown Report’s (TDR) focus has changed to the collecting of college coaching records from North America since 1903. We will continue to recognize and reward successful wrestlers in eastern North Carolina (east of Raleigh & Fayetteville), assist with schools in starting or re-starting a team and this blog. Join us on our FaceBook Page – “The TakeDown Report” for photos and news. Please send results, stories, links and news to pass along. E-mail us at takedownreport@gmail.com
Martin Fleming, Editor
Takedown Report
Takedown Report 