Wrestlers Cutting Weight Essay examples

My freshman year of high school I went out on a limb decided to take a physical education class called "Advanced P.E." This may not seem too crazy, but the class was taught by our varsity football coach and only really taken by junior and senior football players. The teacher even admitted he used the class specifically to bulk up his team. I had never lifted a weight a day in my life and I was more than frightened to even take a step inside the weight room.

At the beginning of seventh grade, I would always joke around that I would do wrestling, like with all the other guys. Later on that year when wrestling season was starting I decided to sign up. I didn’t know what being in wrestling was going to be like because it would be like nothing I’ve ever done before.

Wrestling has been a very important factor in my life ever since someone suggested it my freshman year of high school. Even though I have not wrestled a lot I would say I am very literate in the sport.

Being an athlete I know the struggles of strength and conditioning. Many athletes are pushed in the weight room and during conditioning, however are they being taught the right way? Effective weight training depends on proper technique. Many coaches try to go off of what they know and force their athletes to lift weights. This improper way of lifting often causes injury. The athlete should also lift the proper amount of weights. Athletes today need to know the right way to lift weights. This will allow them to actually gain muscle, power and speed instead of just being sore. There are many factors in weight lifting which include diet, frequency, intensity, and specification. All of these factors play a vital role in developing muscle.

Eating disorders have become very common today, not only with women but men too (Bordo 2). This fixation with being skinny can be seen most often with modeling. Men and women both are required to be a certain weight if they want to be accepted to a modeling agency. Failure to stay under the weight limit will most likely terminate their contract with that agency. Not only do we see this in modeling or fashion but professional sports. I will never forget watching the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders show a few years ago and watching how big of a deal that the cheerleaders stay within their set weight limit. One of the cheerleaders was five pounds over that limit and was called in for a warning or she would be kicked off the team. Her response, “I guess I’ll have to cut out my favorite snack, PB and J’s.” That moment forever stuck out to me, and made me realize I would never wish to be put under a weight limit for sports, jobs, etc. People often forget starving your body of nutrients is another form of an eating disorder. Bordo claims that, “Eating disorders are also linked to the contradictions of consumer culture, which is continually encouraging us to binge on our desires at the same time as it glamorizes self-discipline and scorns fat as a symbol of laziness and lack of willpower.” (Bordo 2). With the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders as just an example, it goes to show also how much of an effect

I started wrestling in sixth grade. Even though I didn’t win one of my first seven matches, I developed into a successful wrestler. In high school I won tournaments and beat high-quality wrestlers. During my junior year I was determined to become a great wrestler. I worked harder than ever and didn’t let anyone stop me. That year I lost the Illinois state wrestling tournament championship match by one point. Over the next six months between my junior and senior season I was runner up at AAU national tournament and wrestled at Disney Land in Florida at the Disney Duals with over 50 other teams and only lost 1 of 8 matches. These are a few of my achievements in high school. Now that I am in college there are many

Wrestling is a sport about hard work and dedication. Some people say that wrestling is the hardest sport in high school because the sport is mostly a mind game. If you let someone get in your head or the workouts get in your head, then you have already lost the fight. Just like in any situation in your life, if you let the situation get the better of you, you lost.

1,445 student athletes from multiple different Division 1 schools participated in order to see the prevalence of eating disorders in a variety of different sports. The student athletes were asked questions about their athletic involvement, eating behaviors, drug and alcohol behavior and attitudes about their body image. The first set of results showed that 16.19% of females and 12.57% of males binge ate monthly (Powers, 1996). 81% of females reported feeling out of control of eating while only 45% of males reported feeling out of control. 23.9% of females reported vomiting as a form of purging but only 5.93% of males reported vomiting. When it came to diet pills, 14.30% of women reported usage while 2.16% of males reported usage. Although males’ results were always smaller than women, they are still at rise and suffering from eating disorders. With this study it is obvious that all athletes experience demands that push them to turn to abnormal and dangerous eating patterns.

Numerous studies have shown that athletes are more prone to developing eating disorders than nonathletes, as well as female athletes being more at risk than their male counterparts. Disordered eating is seen in athletes of all sports. (Johnson, 1994). The prevalence of eating disorders in the female athletic population ranges from anywhere between one and forty percent, depending on the athletes questioned, and the methodology used (Sundgot-Borgen, 1994). Rosen and Hough (1988) found that 32 percent of athletes practiced at least one pathogenic weight-control technique(141). A study done by Sundgot-Borgen, in 1994, controlled for the possibility that self-report data could be unreliable in numerous ways, including not informing coaches of their intentions, and assuring 100 percent confidentiality to the athletes who participated. It found that the risk for eating disorders is increased if an athlete's dieting is unsupervised, if there is an early start to sport-specific training, and/or extreme exercise (Sundgot-Borgen, 418).

If any of you are television wrestling fans (WWE or any other league) you'll see that most of the men are literally huge. Not many are less than 250 pounds, and that's just the starting weight. It's utterly impossible to be as big (muscle-wise) and not weigh at least 250. That's all well and good for the pros. They're mostly on display and we all assume it's fake. But I'm talking about the kids in this sport. They range in age from 14-18 years old and for the most part it's a great sport. It, as in all competitive sports, teaches camaraderie, sportsmanship and working with others. Wrestling is a sport that builds character and strong bodies. So where's my beef? That's just it, in some cases there's just not enough of it. Take the 103-pound class. How is a grappler supposed to maintain this kind of weight throughout a high school career? He isn't. Most kids as they mature go on to the next weight class. Now that's all well and good if everyone moved up as they progressed through school, but that's just not the case. I'm sure if any high school coaches are reading this piece I've now caught their attention. My problem starts right here. I'm not accusing any coach or parent of purposely trying to

The desire to compete — and win — is as old as history itself. From the beginnings of sport, athletes have sought out foods and potions to turn their bodies into winning machines. As early as 776 BCE, the very first Olympic games, there are records of attempts to increase testosterone levels (“Steroid Abuse in Sports”). Ancient Greek wrestlers ate vast amounts of meat to gain muscle mass, and Norse “Berserker” warriors took hallucinogenic mushrooms before battle. The first competitive athletes to be charged for doping, however, were swimmers in 1860s Amsterdam. Doping of all kinds, from caffeine to cocaine to anabolics quickly spread to other sports (“Anabolic Steroids, a Brief History”).

Famed writer Grantland Rice once wrote, “When the great scorer comes to mark against your name. He'll mark not won or lost but how you played the game” (World of quotes, 1). That buoyant attitude of selflessness and heart has slowly diminished throughout the course of time. Now, George Allen’s booming voice, former coach of the Washington Redskins, runs throughout head of America, “Only winners are truly alive. Winning is living. Every time you win, you’re reborn. When you lose, you die a little” (Harris, 67). It is with this frame of mind that athletes are pushed beyond the edge of reason. Although peer pressure and pressure from coaches are central reasons why one may use steroids, most users begin using in order to improve their self image or excel in sports. Ethics, integrity, and legality aside, some athletes will stop at nothing to attain “that extra edge”.

The sudden deaths of three wrestlers calls into question if something else is causing the deaths. Dr. Wang suspects creatine supplementation might be the culprit. Research studies have shown that the dietary supplement does improve power and strength, apparently with no known side effects. Creatine helps the muscles to retain water. For wrestlers using the supplement, "creatine works as an opposing force" when the wrestler tries to shed weight, causing problems in the body's cooling system (Younge, 1998). Although no direct connections have been made, Jeff Reese was reported as using creatine when he died trying to make weight (Younge, 1998). My investigative report is aimed at uncovering the potential dangers of combining creatine supplementation with the excessive weight loss practices used by competitive wrestlers.

In addition to the pressure to reduce weight, athletes are often pressed for time, and they have to lose weight rapidly to make or stay on the team. As a result they often experience frequent periods of restrictive dieting or weight

The idea of always having to win is not the only concern in which I find to be true. Anorexia, as well as poor dieting is another one of my main concerns. Something must be done about these two issues which hold very true within the gymnastics world today. But there are “ no comprehensive frameworks that represent the complex reality within which coaches work.”(cote pg. 2)