I interviewed Jim Myerhoff who has pushed ladies wrestling in Washington. I also made a video of 4 of the lady competitors. Feel free to use it if it helps the cause. Joe joemcfarland41@gmail Good luck with your effort. Feb 19, 2012 This is Joe McFarland, MD, writing about my trip up to the Tacoma Dome to see how girls have been added to the Mat Classic. I arrived on Saturday, Feb. 18th, 2012, at about 11am. The tourney was already going full blast with the girls competing on 4 mats. We filmed short segments of girls wrestling in the wrestlebacks that occurred in the early afternoon. I interviewed 4 competitors after their matches and asked them about their experiences as lady high school wrestlers. The video can be viewed at: vimeo/38414585 One of the primary reasons for the trip was to interview Jim Myerhoff. who had agreed to meet with me during the tournament to discuss how Washington has progressed with its girl’s program. Jim has been a long-time advocate for women’s programs in the state. In the face of many “traditional” types who have pushed women’s participation away—saying that wrestling is a “man’s sport”—he has embraced it and nurtured it to the point where it has really taken off. The following is a transcript of my conversation with Jim (for ease of reading, I’ve edited out my statements and questions): “In about 2003, there were girls beginning to show up to wrestle against boys in the state meet. These girls were generally in the lighter weights. Because of increasing participation we began an invitational, which meant that if you had 4 matches against a boy or girl during the season then you were eligible for post-season competition. There were no weight classes. They were weighed in and separated into groups of 4 and they got 3 matches. They got ribbons and we had an awards ceremony for them. There were about 50 or so participants. There were also 5 or so girls in the boys’ tournament that year, as well. Next year there were 109, and the year after, 160. At that point there were enough for a real, bracketed tournament. Once they had their own real tournament, participation jumped into the 400s and they had their own qualifying tournaments and a 16-girl bracketed state tournament in the various school divisions. Now there are over 1100 girl wrestlers in the state. “What we see is, now that it is accepted, girls that come from wrestling families want the opportunity to wrestle and compete. There is still a lot of resistance among some coaches that do not agree with the concept of women’s wrestling. When agreeable with both the school and the coach, then the programs grow. Acceptance is better within the cities than in the ranching areas. There are several schools in Washington that have more girls than boys turning out (Sedro Wooley, Burlington). “Boys’ participation is a little down or flat and the reason is that there are so many elite kid wrestlers that are freshmen in high school that other kids can not match up with them so they come out and get discouraged and drop the sport. This is not a problem with the girls. They all begin the learning process together so they can compete for their school right away. “The process starts with two girls of similar weight that turn out. They have their workout partners. If not, they will have to work out with the boys, which isn’t bad, but often the boy might have advanced strength and skill and working with a girl doesn’t help him much. It just works better with the first example. I have yet to get a phone call in 9 years of girls’ wrestling where there is a problem arising from involving girls wrestling with guys. What happens is a healthy process of girls trying out the sport. If they work as hard as the guys for two weeks or so and do the drills and show good toughness, then they travel with the team and can compete with girls from other teams. By then, they are accepted by the guys, and when they travel, the word on the mat is ‘don’t mess with our girls—they are on our team.’ The girl’s part of team will naturally grow—2 becomes 4, and 4 becomes 8. If they get to one more than half of the boy’s weights then they are a “team”. Once a girl gets to the tournament and goes back and promotes it at her school, it can literally explode. “If I were to go back to coaching girls in school—starting a program—I would get the catcher in softball, the goalie in soccer, all the water polo players I could get and then I would go to the vice principle and ask to see the 10 pushiest problem girls that had attitudes. Those will be your best girl wrestlers. Some of these “troubled kids” excel when they find a sport that lets off steam, gets them tired and sweaty. “Different schools handle the coaching situation differently. In my opinion, the best method is to have one head wrestling coach for both boys and girls, like in track, with a separate assistant for both the girls and the boys. Facilities differ, but often boys and girls train on the same mat surface. If there is a very skilled girl, she may need to train against the boys to continue her progress. The girls’ wrestling coach in Kelso is also the soccer coach. The head wrestling coach there takes care of teaching technique, and lets the soccer coach handle the rest. It’s big there now. Other schools have girls practicing separately 4 days a week and together with the boys one day a week. “In the metro areas where there are more girls’ teams, they can compete in dual meets with other schools along side the boys utilizing a second ref. This is rare at this stage because few high schools have full teams. Most competition is on weekends for the girls by traveling to tournaments. They have a website that lists the tournaments for each week. “This process is not going away. It is going to get stronger and stronger. There is a girl from Washington that is on the girls’ Olympic training team. They love the physicality of the sport. A side benefit is that they brought the media back. We are now seeing coverage of wrestling that we didn’t see for years. “Do these girl wrestlers tend to go into occupations that require strength, like fire fighting and police work? Not necessarily. They just like wrestling. They often are recruited by JCs or colleges that have girls wrestling like Pacific. Our JC in Yakima was going to drop wrestling but decided to keep it by adding girls wrestling. They won nationals for two years now. Southwestern CC in Coos Bay has girls wrestling and Bo Icalia is the women’s coach (Ed.—he is up at this tournament recruiting). “At first, starting out, schools have so little money that girls have to wear the boys uniform so they have to add a t-shirt. Later they purchase girls wrestling uniforms. Basically all the girls here wear the girl’s uniforms at this state level tournament. “Headgear? At high school they all wear these new headgear that cover their hair also. So far, no problem with injured ears. “As far as Washington schools to look to for guidance on how to do this—Kelso has certainly done it right. Washougal has a good turnout. Mountain View, Battle Ground and Skyview are all close by. They would love to see some competition from Oregon. It would be easy to begin in the Portland area with so much seasoned competition right close by.” Jim has certainly done a lot to foster girls’ wrestling in the state of Washington. He is, deservedly, moving on with his life to spend more time with his family, and says he looks forward to traveling with them in the family motor home. He has now cut his involvement in wrestling by about 60% and is continuing to phase himself out as he brings in a transition team to take over for him. I want to thank Jim Myerhoff for showing us that wrestling is a sport that women can love and benefit from just like men do. They just need to get the chance. https://vimeo/38414585 (video of Washington women’s tourney with 4 interviews) . #supportgirlswrestling
Posted on: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 05:51:55 +0000