They walked down library walk in bright jerseys, with numbered sports bags, with jugs of water to hydrate and in peak athletic condition. At the same time, I seemed to get skinnier and nerdier and further away from their bronzed and toned bodies every day. The seemed popular and good at school and I felt a world away. What’s funny is that I was them just the year before.
In high school everyone was involved in some sport and my wrestling coach planed on taping my matches for Cal Poly and UC Davis. His dreams and my parents’ nightmare came to an end when I was tackled by our 189 pounder and cracked my collar bone in two places. That season was over and next year I was splitting time between Academic Decathlon nerdom where our physical activity consisted of racing a stuffed sheep and hacky sack and wrestling for the team a couple times per week. In High School I was with the in crowd but in college, the thought of doing sports did not cross my mind. I was stuck in the mentality that college is for studying and only near Olympic level athletes do sports in college. I learned my lesson by senior year. I picked up Judo and then wrestling again, mostly to get in shape for studying. But I got quiet good at both as a result.
You see, physical activity promotes fitness and blood flow. Blood flow allows more oxygen to reach the brain which helps think better. At the same time, fitness allows one to have the stamina to work longer. Sports create discipline and time management. With a full season and workouts, most athletes find themselves completing assignments in a more efficient fashion than those who have all the time in the world and don’t have the discipline to sit there and work on the problem until they get it right as they would on the mat or a the track field.
In high school everyone was involved in some sport and my wrestling coach planed on taping my matches for Cal Poly and UC Davis. His dreams and my parents’ nightmare came to an end when I was tackled by our 189 pounder and cracked my collar bone in two places. That season was over and next year I was splitting time between Academic Decathlon nerdom where our physical activity consisted of racing a stuffed sheep and hacky sack and wrestling for the team a couple times per week. In High School I was with the in crowd but in college, the thought of doing sports did not cross my mind. I was stuck in the mentality that college is for studying and only near Olympic level athletes do sports in college. I learned my lesson by senior year. I picked up Judo and then wrestling again, mostly to get in shape for studying. But I got quiet good at both as a result.
You see, physical activity promotes fitness and blood flow. Blood flow allows more oxygen to reach the brain which helps think better. At the same time, fitness allows one to have the stamina to work longer. Sports create discipline and time management. With a full season and workouts, most athletes find themselves completing assignments in a more efficient fashion than those who have all the time in the world and don’t have the discipline to sit there and work on the problem until they get it right as they would on the mat or a the track field.
I missed wrestling and I stepped on the mat in my senior year and was hooked all over again. The wrestling team is always a bunch of crazy rejects. I don’t know why, maybe it’s the close contact, maybe it’s the gay jokes making light of the close contact, or maybe we are just a few neurons short of realizing that we are fighting for no reason. Whatever the reason, wrestlers have been known to be an odd bunch. But once you find you are good at something, you realize that you are stuck with it and for better or worse, you keep doing it, keep teaching it and you end up living it.
The UCSD wrestling club was actually almost shut down. No it was shut down. I started a facebook page to bring it back and a guy by the name of Paul Montanez out of the blue contacted me about taking over the page and starting the club. I thought I’d let him, but soon I was running the club and he was gone. It was nice to give 8-10 guys on campus have a place to work out every once in a while, teach them my skills and most of all, I needed other people to work out with. UCSD is not a big wrestling school is a major understatement. UCSD football team is undefeated is a T-shirt proudly worn by many because the school has no football team. Our male sports are a joke while women’s sports are ok. It was an easy transition for me as it was essentially how my high school was. This actually was great because almost anyone could get on a team, and if you couldn’t, there were a plethora of clubs. Some were good like the squids or ultimate frisby A team. Some were not so good but great party and social clubs, like Rugby, BOARD, Surf and the squid B team. There were some clubs that were on par with our actual sports teams like the Volleyball club and some clubs which actually created Olympians like our ping pong, sorry, table tennis team
And there were the bizzare like the inner tube water polo. Probably my biggest regret was not doing that one. It was co-ed, it was in the pool, you just need a keg in one of the tubes and you’re set.
I made a lot of friends as a result of running wrestling club and I others on the team did as well. You could always rely on the surf team to throw a good party. The friends were often made on the long trips to the competitions. A year after graduating, as a coach, I went with three other wrestlers to Lakeland Florida. We stayed at a motel that was constructed around a bar. The bar was owned by a large black man with a sense of humor and he employed a tiny, girl with a loud southern accent. There were nothing but guys visiting this bar. Often laborers like those working on a railroad. There would be all sorts of mayhem. Locking of each other in bathrooms, throwing people into the pool, ice baths on customers and bar owners.
I was taking a video of a massive ice fight. Ice pitchers being poured on the girl, then she would get the pitcher and give it to someone and that person would pour it on someone else and then someone else would get a pitcher from her and pour it on the owner. At the end everyone was soaked but me. The owner looked at me and asked: “Why ain’t you wet?”
“I’m observing” I said.
“We don’t like observers here” And he poured a pitcher of ice and water all over me.
“I’m observing” I said.
“We don’t like observers here” And he poured a pitcher of ice and water all over me.
I walked into the room at two am, drenched, cold and happy. We barely made it to the tournament the next day on time. The guys had a great time, we laughed non stop. We maybe should have competed better but the memories of that trip were better than medals.
That’s what sports are: comradery and physical fitness and that will allow you to succeed in class and maybe a chance to meet girls and have other kids in class envy you, your girls and your grades.
seven year degree 