As the sweat dried on the wrestling mats in The Convo, Jacob Ison, among other young wrestlers, continued to work out regularly because he extended his season into spring tournament action.
Ison has qualified for the University Nationals World Team Trials, which started yesterday and run through Friday, after placing sixth in the University Freestyle and Greco Nationals last month in Akron.
Along with Ison, freshmen Tim Samson, Andy Hartshorn and Nick Purdue also qualified for the four-day event in Colorado Springs, Colo., but only Ison will compete because all the other wrestlers had scheduling conflicts.
Any time you can make an event like this
it's pretty prestigious coach Joel Greenlee said.- but (Ison is) a good one to go out there and represent us.
If Ison wins, he will receive a bid for the Olympic trials, and if he places in the top two, he will qualify for the University World Team and wrestle against other wrestlers in his same age group around the world.
Ison tallied a 13-9 record during the 2007-08 season and finished third in the Mid-American Conference tournament in the 175-pound weight class.
For the competition, Ison added to his weight and will compete in the 185-190 pound class, which is more of his walking-around weight
as Greenlee described.
I'm stronger
Ison said. I'm quicker than everyone else I've been wrestling
and I'm not cutting 20 pounds a week
so I feel a lot better.
Since the season ended, Ison has been practicing every day and lifting four days a week as opposed to three times a week during the regular season.-
Ison said.
Contrary to the collegiate style he practices during the regular season, Ison has wrestled Greco-style this spring.
The main difference between the styles is that in Greco Wrestling, wrestlers can't attack at the legs, focusing on the upper-body and throwing one's opponent.-
Ison said, but the ones who do it are not college athletes; they are training for the Olympics
and it's all they do.
A salute to the recruits
According to an article in Wrestling International Newsmagazine, Greenlee signed the 23rd best recruiting class in the nation. Greenlee noted that there were even a few more wrestlers signed after the ranking's release, so the Bobcats could have landed even higher on the list.
This follows last year's strong recruiting class, which ranked 17th in the nation.
One of the bigger names to join the Bobcats is Tyler Mashkow, a transfer from Hofstra, who had a 9-4 record wrestling at 125 pounds.
