2/5/22 Getting Through A Muddy District Meet?

     Yesterday was another terribly long and challenging day for the wrestlers and I have to say, the parents who are there to support.  Because of the ice storm, things were moved around and as a consequence, both 5A and 6A schools from district 13 competed on the same day.  The meet was held at Burger stadium, which I do like, but it was a little small for this event.  Three mats fit on the floor, which is not the biggest we have seen.  Bowie had five mats on two gyms for the first tournament, that might have been better, to at least spread the matches.  Another distracting thing was the time start.  Competition usually had started at 8am at other meets, but we didn't start until 11:00am, even though the coaches asked for us to show up at 8:30am.  The final matches for our girls competing were at 10:00pm.  I don't even know what time the girls 6A finished, because we left as soon as the last of our girls competed.  They did the usual rotation, boys 5A, then boys 6A, followed by girls 5A then girls 6A, but they started with the heavyweights, instead of the lightest weight.  I think that may have been because the heavyweight group had the most participants.  There were 10 boys competing in Mijo's weight class, some of the other weight classes got lucky (I guess) and only had four wrestlers, so everyone advanced to Regionals.  The heavyweight girl's division had 1 girl, from Crockett.  She got the district champ title without fighting anyone.

    Wrestlers really have to love this sport because it is such an endurance thing, both while fighting and while waiting to fight.  Baby A, because he doesn't want problems with having to go to the bathroom won't hardly eat or drink until he is done fighting.  This means, like yesterday, he went all day without a breakfast, lunch and dinner (we ate some pizzas and corn dogs when we got home, close to midnight, by the time they heated up).  The fights may not sound long, at 2-minute rounds and three rounds long, but because both competitors are going as hard as they can, Mijo says it leaves you exhausted, and there is only going to be about an hour and a half between matches to recuperate.

    We have been providing snacks the whole season, not because we have to but because we wanted to.  Usually, it is a cooler full of Gatorades, Body Armors, waters, and sometimes even Capri Suns, for fun.  We also buy a bins worth of things like Cliff Bars, Cheez-its, jerky, peanuts, Rice Krispy bars, and whatever assortment of stuff we think kids might want to eat.  I also like throwing in a couple of bags of Gummy Worms and candy because at the end of the day these are still kids and I know they have to be healthy, but come on, they should be able to enjoy something.  Usually, the bins come back with a random mix of leftovers, but last night, there was 1 KitKat, from a big bag of candy (Halloween style), and a couple of Gatorades.  The poor kids went through everything.