Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Freestyle week #2

It’s Saturday afternoon and I’m sitting on the bleachers at a local high school gym watching a wrestling meet. There are four schools attending the match today and I’m here cheering for my friend’s nephew. If he were to win all three of his matches today he would receive his 100th win. I don’t know a lot about wrestling however I do know that is a great accomplishment.

He began the day with a pin, meaning one win down and two to go. Unfortunately, on his second match of the day, he tore a muscle in his shoulder. Although he didn’t get pinned, he lost the match by one point. You could certainly tell that he was in pain during the match. With his mom, dad, sister, aunt, uncle, cousin, grandparents, and friends looking on from the stands, a look of disappointment came over his face. Knowing what the 100th win means to him, we were all feeling his pain. My heart went out for him as I looked across the gym, and saw him with the trainer. After his father came back and told us that he wouldn’t be wrestling for the rest of the day, we decided to leave. He has worked so hard over the years, and it would be a shame if he ended his career just two wins short of the 100th. Not knowing the severity of the injury, my mind went back to last year. He was wrestling in the regional competition, one step from the states, and had an arm injury which put him out of the running for states. After a few days rest, his arm seems to be better.

We are back on for Wednesday night, and hopefully he will get the two wins needed to accomplish his goal. He is a very dedicated athlete and hopefully things will work out for him. We will all be there cheering him on.

2 comments:

johngoldfine said...

My wife has run in a local footrace 30 consecutive years and is always terrified of an injury right before she puts another notch up there....

Mandy said...

I just feel so bad for him - he is one win away from getting his 100th - and everything just seems to keep getting in his way. He is such a good kid - my heart goes out to him.