Sure, the Broncos lost the Super Bowl.  But meh.  Satchel took second place at States, beating the number 1 seed from Region 2 before losing in the finals to the same kid he lost to in the Regional finals, in what was a much better match, a fact not reflected in the score so much as it was in a move toward an elevated understanding of strategy and planning. In fact, had Satch’s body the same level and drilling and muscle memory required to go from thinking to reacting in the finals as did his opponent — who has way more mat experience — I believe Satchel would have won.  Oftentimes, these matches hinge on who gets the key turn and when.  Satch was in the right position more often than not; his opponent just countered faster than Satchel decided which move to chain to.

All in all, an outstanding finish to a great an outstanding year of hard work and improvement.

Satch will be competing in a 6-week eastern plains tournament league, coached by UFC grappling coach Leister Bowling among others (myself included), but really at this point I want him to begin working on trying new things rather than accumulating hardware.  We are going back to some of the basics in order to fine tune them, then we’ll be concentrating on chain wrestling techniques and drilling, which take the moves kids know and better contextualize them for easier reaction.

For those interested — and sorry for the viewpoint, but it’s what we had — here’s the video of Satchel’s defeat over the Region 2 number 1 seed, which advanced him to the finals.  Once again, by some quirk of bracketing, Satchel was the only wrestler who didn’t get a bye.