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COACHES CORNER


Characteristics of a World medalist


By Zeke Jones, U.S. National Freestyle Coach No one was more disappointed than me after the 2010 World Championships. If you ask our wrestlers if they were upset about our performance they will tell you the same thing but I can promise you one thing. We’re doing something about it. Here’s what we immediately did after the World Championships, and now we want to share it with all American wrestling coaches and wrestlers.


Why and how do we do an analysis of the best wrestlers in


the World? After the World Championships, and after every World Championship and Olympic Games, we do an exhaustive analy- sis of our USA team as well as the top wrestlers in the World and specifically those that have won world medals. After all, the marker of our success is winning medals and specifically World and Olympic gold medals. In order to win medals, we start by breaking down the film. We do this so we can scout the World, know the skills necessary to win World and Olympic medals, provide feedback to our National Team coach- es and wrestlers, ensure we’re working on the right techniques, strategies, and tactics, and to develop laser focused training plans for each of our national team wrestlers. It’s not rocket science – it is good old-fashioned hard work. Not only did we review the entire World Championship on film, but in this study we specifically studied every wrestler that competed for a medal – essentially the top five placewinners in seven weight categories. In addition, we narrowed down the focus to the semifinals and gold-medal matches. We did this to study the best vs. the best when the best tech- niques and tactics will work. We also do this because these are the bouts with the best wrestlers, the wrestlers that win medals, and also represent the best wrestlers in the World. If you focus on beating them, you can beat anyone in the World. We also know these top 35 matches give us a good cross section of technique, strategy, and tactics that the World’s top placewin- ners are using. After you study 35 of these matches and these 42 wrestlers in depth, we start to see characteristics, patterns, and tendencies develop. What we learn is these same wrestlers develop skills on their own but they also learn winning techniques and tactics from other World medalists in other weight classes. Once this occurs, then you have a very good visual of what the best wrestlers in the World are doing. This is how you get inside the head of a World medalist. It’s a labor intensive project that Dave Bennett, our former National Developmental Coach at USA Wrestling, and I did last fall by sitting in front of video several days. We started by watching and recording every scoring action. Once we identify the sequence, we record the setup, attack, finish, and par terre turn that occurred for all 35 matches.


In addition, we recorded general match information like two- period matches, three-period matches, clinch statistics, pushout


26 USA Wrestler


percentages, and percentage of single and multiple attacks for example.


Once every setup, attack, fin- ish, turn, and clinch is recorded, then the statistics are compiled. These statistics tell us what skills the World medalist con- tenders are using and what trends are developing. This also gives us insight on where wrestling is evolving, what we’re doing as a country and most importantly how to project out five years in advance what the techniques and grand strategies of the future will be.


Zeke Jones


In addition, every one of the 155 scoring actions is put into a DVD and broken down into categories and given to National Team members, National Team coaches, and college coaches for visual study. We must be proficient in every technical and tactical area, and the DVD gives them clear 100 percent accura- cy on what these skills are. The faster these skills are imple- mented within the National Team program, our regional training centers, university programs, and developmental programs, the faster American wrestlers climb the podium.


2010 WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS ANALYSIS Here are a few useful and interesting statistics before we look at the characteristics.


There were 155 scoring actions, 83 periods wrestled, 25 two- period matches, 10 three-period matches, and 13 clinches in those 35 matches. On average, World medal contenders wres- tled 2.3 periods per match or four minutes and 20 seconds per match. There were only 14 turns on top in 83 periods, so scor- ing on top is not emphasized by World medal contenders as well as officials are not giving much time to turn on top. They went to the clinch just slightly over one time per match with the average of one clinch per 3.5 periods wrestled. Eighty-five per- cent of the time, the wrestler that started with the leg in the clinch scored.


For folkstyle fans out there, there were 34 pushouts in 35 matches which equals less than one pushout per match. Freestyle wrestlers simply do not go out of bounds. That’s quite a number because the perception is there’s a lot of push- ing out, but the reality is that wrestlers stay on the mat and wrestle. With our team, I don’t call it the pushout rule. I call it the stay on the mat rule. From the numbers, here’s what we’ve learned. World medal-


ists generally either have one attack no one can stop or a bal- anced attack to both sides of the body. They use 2-3 set ups, 1- 3 attacks, 2-3 finishes, 0-1 turn on top all in a series that no one can stop. They use 1-2 clinch finishes in both the first and sec- ond positions. They are extremely technical and/or use mental toughness to win. Their conditioning is good and important, but is not their No. 1 focus. They either go through the World


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