The wrestling season is underway, and the WHS wrestling team’s coaches and players have been working hard to create a successful season filled with camaraderie. 

   Wrestling is often seen as a solo sport, but the WHS wrestlers have learned that their teammates are integral to their success. 

   “The idea that wrestling is an individual sport is partially flawed because the most important thing in progressing is who you train with,” sophomore wrestler Anthony Ohanian said. “If you train with someone who never pushes you, never beats you, or never makes you go 100%, you will never progress as far as you can.” 

   The coaches work hard to encourage their wrestlers to work actively to support their teammates. 

   “I want to see each person on the team looking for an opportunity to tell someone else that they are doing well,” coach Travis Anza said. “Find that wrestler that’s working hard that day and let him know that you noticed.” 

   Their coach’s approach to having team members encourage one another has helped to foster close relationships among team members. 

   “The wrestling team is like a family because we all get along, and we can work hard and still have fun,” senior  team captain Mathew Blandon said.

   This positive environment has been vital to the wrestling team’s creation of successful wrestlers.

   “I haven’t lost a single match at Weston,” freshman wrestler Jisup Shin said, who joined the varsity team when he was in eighth grade. “My parents and teammates have supported me the most.” 

   While records and winning are important to all athletes, on the WHS wrestling mats success is measured differently. 

   “It’s never about whether you win or lose. It’s how you win and lose,” Anza said. “Success is when you can walk off the mat with your head held high and say to yourself that, leading up to that match, you did everything you could do to win it. That means that you practiced as hard as could, you took care of yourself, and you left it all out there. That’s when you’re a successful wrestler.”

   The coaches also foster the relationships between the experienced and inexperienced wrestlers. 

   “We have some really solid wrestlers on the team now. We also get brand new wrestlers every year. The good thing is that everyone benefits from the basics,” Anza said. “In the beginning of the season I empower the experienced wrestlers to walk the new wrestlers through the drills. This gives the new wrestlers an opportunity to learn the drills, and it gives the experienced wrestlers an opportunity to slow down and think about what they are doing right or wrong.” 

   This method has worked well as the members of the team have picked up on the basics of the sport and the camaraderie encouraged by the coaches.

   “As team captain I always like to go and talk to the younger guys and make sure they are having fun and enjoying wrestling and to ask if they need rides home after practice,” Blandon said. 

   This community-building has allowed team members to create fun traditions for the whole team while preparing before matches and celebrating afterwards. 

   “We sometimes may go out for a team dinner to Chick-fil-A or maybe we just celebrate on the bus by blasting music and having fun,” Blandon said. “Before meets and tournaments, after we finish warmups we go to the center of the mats and we have a pep talk and do a ‘Cats on three’ before the event starts. This just gets us in the right mindset.”

   Personal warm-ups are just as important as team rituals, and each wrestler has built his own. 

   “Before every match I try to get my blood pumping by jogging around the mats or skipping in place,” Ohanian said. “I also try to get some fresh air, or take a moment of silence to clear my head and say a prayer.”

   Thanks to team camaraderie and hard work, the wrestling team enters each match with the goal to win, and they have the same goal as they enter this season.

   “I would love the team to have a better team record this year,” Blandon said. “It would give our guys a lot of confidence, and I would also like all our starters on varsity to make it to states or at least have a successful season.”