As the season approaches, the athletes of the Rocky Mountain wrestling team are ramping up their training.

After a season in which RMHS stayed consistently low in the 5A ranking, the team is turning to new training strategies to improve their chances of moving up. In preparation for an ambitious season, Rocky Wrestling has been training almost since the end of last season. 

The team took a trip to Pagosa Springs at the beginning of summer to attend the wrestling camp hosted by the University of Iowa. Immediately after the Iowa camp, they drove to Paonia where they competed in the summer duels put on by Paonia High School’s team. Those tournaments, along with a half dozen others, attended by a few wrestlers, were just the beginning of the training for the Rocky team.

All summer, wrestlers attended team practice two days a week and lifted individually  another 3 to 5 days a week. During the school year, they are continuing their wrestling and lifting with the team.

To give the wrestlers another edge, the seniors attended  additional training at Ironside Gym on Fridays. This training utilizes a new machine known as a flipper. “It is similar to a tire flip,” said senior Gunner Anderson. The flippers can weigh anywhere from 200 to 500 pounds and are used in conjunction with cardiovascular and strength training to help wrestlers train explosively and increase their overall strength.

Evan Shell, a senior who is participating in the Ironside training, said, “I can already feel a difference in my take-downs.”

The Rocky Mountain senior team is hopeful, despite some negative speculation, that they will be a very competitive unit this year in 5A High School Wrestling.