I feel that youth state hasn't improved in several years and is possibly getting worse.
Things that should change imo.
1. Assigned seating. Only half the seats are actually used, but the other half have tape or jackets on them. Sell tickets with seat numbers on them or extend the tournament to 3 days.
2. Have weigh ins earlier than 7pm. No reason to make a 3rd grader weigh in this late. Makes for an unnecessary late night.
3. Have weigh ins on Friday at a satellite location. No reason to bring in more people than necessary to the center
4. Make it more obvious that coaches will have to wait an hour to get pass if not bought before hand. The printing of passes was an unnecessary step that made things more frustrating and complicated.
5. Place 8. Why not. We take 24 kids now, and don't use 2 mats the last round.
6. No break before finals. No one wants to be there longer than they have to get it done.
7. Start small brackets at same time as big brackets.. again, no one wants to be there longer than I have to. Don't make a kid wait 6 hours to wrestle 2 matches.
I know that seems like a lot of complaining, but I'd like to see this tournament improve. It is a great opportunity for kids to compete and be recognized for their dedication!
I agree with seating for sure. We showed up 1 hour and 45 min before the start of wrestling to try to get a decent seat but ended up near the top row because everything had tape covering it and people saving entire rows of seats. Some of the saved seats I don't think ever got used.
Earlier weigh ins and also longer than 1 hour.
Not paying for parking was definitely an improvement this year and it was nice having more concessions. It is great that they do the grand march every year. The kids really think that is cool. I think they should break out the smoke machine for the finals like they did in the Dells a few years ago.
Are the results posted anywhere?
https://www.trackwrestling.com/tw/opentournaments/VerifyPassword.jsp?tournamentId=684311132
Quote from: Scramble_king on March 25, 2023, 06:03:52 AMI feel that youth state hasn't improved in several years and is possibly getting worse.
Things that should change imo.
1. Assigned seating. Only half the seats are actually used, but the other half have tape or jackets on them. Sell tickets with seat numbers on them or extend the tournament to 3 days.
2. Have weigh ins earlier than 7pm. No reason to make a 3rd grader weigh in this late. Makes for an unnecessary late night.
3. Have weigh ins on Friday at a satellite location. No reason to bring in more people than necessary to the center
4. Make it more obvious that coaches will have to wait an hour to get pass if not bought before hand. The printing of passes was an unnecessary step that made things more frustrating and complicated.
5. Place 8. Why not. We take 24 kids now, and don't use 2 mats the last round.
6. No break before finals. No one wants to be there longer than they have to get it done.
7. Start small brackets at same time as big brackets.. again, no one wants to be there longer than I have to. Don't make a kid wait 6 hours to wrestle 2 matches.
I know that seems like a lot of complaining, but I'd like to see this tournament improve. It is a great opportunity for kids to compete and be recognized for their dedication!
1. Probably not in the control of the WWF
2. That makes sense. They do it for freestyle/greco and it works for sure.
3. See 2 about this. Again a good idea but since most of the workers have to be down for set up it is going to be hard to find another set of workers to do weigh ins. Remember alot of the weigh in people do set up, table workers and so on.
4. This has been going on for years. Yes there is some problems with getting coaches passes but club coaches do get things done ahead of time to lessen the low at the door.
5. You can argue that all day long and for many tournaments. High school places 6 sa does many national tournaments so.....also refs, table workers need breaks. Factor in the workers time and they also need breaks.
6. See the comment about workers need breaks and also rent to the venue probably wants.concession sales so breaks for refs and workers and concession all.play into behind the scenes stuff.
7. It isn't all about you on this. Some kids get caught in the backside and have 6 matches on the day. These tournaments are worked out on a time formula. Yea I agree with you but it is far easier those get every bracket on the same round due to keeping track and consultation stuff.and time constraints with wrestle backs and so on. Using trackwrestling sometimes tournaments are totally controlled by situations that trackwrestling controls. Next time your at the youth state ask a worker there your questions. They will gladly explain some things that are out of their control and why they do such things. You want some change get involved this summer and fall and propose change to the youth state and I bet any WWF official will listen and do things the best they can!
Valid points and not being a pain, lots of these point you brought up are great but there is also some.behind the scenes stuff that cannt be controlled also.
Great tournament. Lots of people doing alot of great things for Wisconsin wrestling. The seating is a joke however not sure what can be done about it but something needs to change.
Change it back to 16 man brackets. Refs had a long day and started calling
pins when clearly was no pin.
Have parents wrestle it out for seats, bc the it's just terrible how some WOMEN were behaving over some Dang seats.
Seats are fine.. just get your seats, respectfully argue when someone is wrong, ( in front row too long?? shutting down the tourney??) and just because someone put tape over a seat doesn't mean you have to obey the tape. Gotta be aggressive to get seats you want that are open.
Actually hiring a few more security people to manage the seating to make sure people are being fair to each other would be a good thing. The event brings in a ton of money
Quote from: rankwizard on March 26, 2023, 01:47:59 PMSeats are fine.. just get your seats, respectfully argue when someone is wrong, ( in front row too long?? shutting down the tourney??) and just because someone put tape over a seat doesn't mean you have to obey the tape. Gotta be aggressive to get seats you want that are open.
Actually hiring a few more security people to manage the seating to make sure people are being fair to each other would be a good thing. The event brings in a ton of money
Friday most of the seats that were open later were filled by wrestlers and coaches that were wrestling! Just because you get there after 9 in the morning doesn't mean you can not find an open seat up in the third section.
As far as shutting the tourney down because of that reason, maybe they should not have over loaded the Alliant Center with all those extra people! How many people does that place hold?
Quote from: Bigfellow on March 27, 2023, 09:18:15 AMQuote from: rankwizard on March 26, 2023, 01:47:59 PMSeats are fine.. just get your seats, respectfully argue when someone is wrong, ( in front row too long?? shutting down the tourney??) and just because someone put tape over a seat doesn't mean you have to obey the tape. Gotta be aggressive to get seats you want that are open.
Actually hiring a few more security people to manage the seating to make sure people are being fair to each other would be a good thing. The event brings in a ton of money
Friday most of the seats that were open later were filled by wrestlers and coaches that were wrestling! Just because you get there after 9 in the morning doesn't mean you can not find an open seat up in the third section.
As far as shutting the tourney down because of that reason, maybe they should not have over loaded the Alliant Center with all those extra people! How many people does that place hold?
Doors opened at 7am Saturday, a group of 11 of us were there at 7:20 roads were worse then we thought, 11 in person not coats, tape etc... we found 11 seats not saved in section 3 2 rows from the top but the building was 3/4 empty, seating is a problem, or maybe I should say people are a problem causing a seating issue.
I think overall it was a very well run tournament. It started on time, and it ran well. The seating thing is an issue for sure. All the teams want to sit together, but you don't want grandmas and grandpas, and aunts and uncles to have to get there at 7am just to get a seat for an event that doesn't start until 9:15am. So, what ends up happening is people save seats for their loved ones. Unless there is assigned seating, that is never going to change.
The bigger issue is what do we do about the length of the day for these kids and spectators. We had kids show up at 7am on Saturday who were in a full bracket not wrestle their first match until almost 1pm because they won their regional and had a first round bye. Then, their last match came at 9:45pm. I was exhausted by 6pm and I was just coaching. I couldn't imagine how tired those kids were, experiencing the same day I was, but also having to compete.
Now let's look at the numbers... There was a huge increase in girls numbers from last year to this year. I thought they said 200 girls, but I may have misheard. If we take that in to account and then look at the girls brackets knowing there is still room for another 285 girls, we could have a huge problem for next year running this event in 2 days. Even if they split the girls in half and run half of them on Friday and half on Saturday, you are now talking about 2 extremely long days for the athletes, coaches, and officials. I could see this event running in 3 days in the near future.
In addition above mentioned things:
Need a 3rd Day!
1: With girls added and hopefully gowning maybe this needs to be spread over 3 days. 7:00-9:00pm is way too long, especially for younger kids.
2. Adding a 3rd day would also hopefully allow fewer mats to be laid out, thus these crappy "full" mats could be replaced with real full mats. I saw kids get dinged for stalling many times as they "backed out". IMO many times they were not backing out, just stepping backwards after a tie up that started 2' from the edge.
3. Adding a 3rd day would allow 5/6th graders to at least get 1:30/1:00/1:00 matches, minute matches are too short for kids this age.
All in all it was a great time, with much more positives then negatives!
All sound like good ideas on the surface but remember this is a statewide event with people coming from distance.
By third day I assume you mean Sunday? Thursday would mean more school time missed.
I assume you mean all age groups start and finish on one day?
Do you think all will be happy to pay more than $50 for the increased facility costs for another day? Is that $25/day so would three days cost all entrants $75?
Are coaches and families and teams with multiple wrestlers going to be able to afford to stay over another night? Volunteers and paid staff affording another night?
Going another day would have a huge effect with maybe more negatives than a "long day" and I agree it is a "long day"
I have been fortunate enough to attend this tournament for many years as well as many national tournaments. The WWF runs a world class tournament and tries to make the needed changes each year. As I sit back and think about changes that I would make I can only think of the problems that would arise due to them as a result.
The WWF does a great job year in an year out, this year obviously the explosion within females wrestling and the number of participates made Saturday go longer than normal. I'm guessing that the WWF is already making plans to prepare for that next year. I can't wait to see the changes.
For those that complain, all I can say is get involved and help out. Normally events and programming comes down to the amount of volunteers that they can get. It takes a grand effort by those that give up the end of their week and an entire weekend to make this a great tournament!
Thanks to the WWF and all they do.
GET INVOLVED, and VOLUNTEER!
Personally I believe going back to two qualifiers solves all the problems.
With the girls brackets getting bigger I believe this is the only way to do it.
Scott, Jeff and the whole crew do a great job and are always trying to make it better.
Most of us don't want a third day.
Quote from: padre on March 28, 2023, 11:45:12 AMPersonally I believe going back to two qualifiers solves all the problems.
With the girls brackets getting bigger I believe this is the only way to do it.
Scott, Jeff and the whole crew do a great job and are always trying to make it better.
Most of us don't want a third day.
Or do we need state for 1st and 2nd graders? Has to be a choice to either reduce qualifiers or an age group. Heck I'm sure there is some place out there that holds an unofficial preK-K state championship, they could add to their tourney :). The seating has always sucked but I don't think I've heard complaints you couldn't see your kid with the seating rules.
A bit of foresight is probably needed it sounds like at wwf since this is the second thread in a couple of weeks on facilities/size of tournament.
Quote from: padre on March 28, 2023, 11:45:12 AMPersonally I believe going back to two qualifiers solves all the problems.
With the girls brackets getting bigger I believe this is the only way to do it.
Scott, Jeff and the whole crew do a great job and are always trying to make it better.
Most of us don't want a third day.
Yep. A lot of brackets aren't even full at 16. There were 39 brackets that were either at 16 or less wrestlers, which means all wrestlers qualified to state. 74 of the 128 brackets were not full brackets. 58% of brackets were not even filled at the state tournament.
Were talking about cutting weight classes in high school, but adding more and more kids per bracket and extra brackets to the state tournament. With 18-26 brackets in each boys age division compared to 14 in HS, and 24 wrestlers qualifying in each bracket compared to 16 in D1 and 12 in D2/D3.
I like the 3 qualifiers for the oldest 2 age groups... talent is deep and I know a lot of quality kids in 5th-8th grade. I saw a lot of high quality wrestlers not make state that put in a ton of off-season time.
The future of WI can be bright if people cooperate in a positive manner.
This year's 8th grade class is pretty deep
Quote from: rankwizard on March 29, 2023, 08:52:24 AMI like the 3 qualifiers for the oldest 2 age groups... talent is deep and I know a lot of quality kids in 5th-8th grade. I saw a lot of high quality wrestlers not make state that put in a ton of off-season time.
The future of WI can be bright if people cooperate in a positive manner.
This year's 8th grade class is pretty deep
Who are your top three for this class
Quote from: statman on March 29, 2023, 05:15:42 PMQuote from: rankwizard on March 29, 2023, 08:52:24 AMI like the 3 qualifiers for the oldest 2 age groups... talent is deep and I know a lot of quality kids in 5th-8th grade. I saw a lot of high quality wrestlers not make state that put in a ton of off-season time.
The future of WI can be bright if people cooperate in a positive manner.
This year's 8th grade class is pretty deep
Who are your top three for this class
Do not know a lot of these kids but these 3 were impressive at State.
1. Bryston Scoles
2. Cade Aaberg
3. Josiah Beltran
Quote from: harley25 on March 30, 2023, 10:19:29 AMQuote from: statman on March 29, 2023, 05:15:42 PMQuote from: rankwizard on March 29, 2023, 08:52:24 AMI like the 3 qualifiers for the oldest 2 age groups... talent is deep and I know a lot of quality kids in 5th-8th grade. I saw a lot of high quality wrestlers not make state that put in a ton of off-season time.
The future of WI can be bright if people cooperate in a positive manner.
This year's 8th grade class is pretty deep
Who are your top three for this class
Do not know a lot of these kids but these 3 were impressive at State.
1. Bryston Scoles
2. Cade Aaberg
3. Josiah Beltran
I could give a list of a few dozen 8th graders, these 3 are definitely young men that will be ready to compete at a high level next season.
One possible way to decrease number of wrestlers is to decrease number of weight classes in the younger groups by a few.
The oldest group starts at 80 and goes up by 5lbs at first. That is good in my opinion.
The younger groups have 3 lb increments for most of the weight classes ... Maybe stretch half (or all?) of them to 4lb increments.
It is a kids event so it's great for kids to get that feeling at wrestling at state for sure. If people don't want to add a third day, this could be an option.
BLASPHEMY :o !
was there saturday and sunday.. Way too long... Either go back to 16 man brackets or host girls on a different day. Has the tournament ever been this long?
You weren't there Sunday ;D ;)
I liked the idea of keeping it at 24 wrestlers but have fewer weight classes. No need at any age group for a weight class every 3 lbs.
Quote from: DocWrestling on April 06, 2023, 03:03:37 PMI liked the idea of keeping it at 24 wrestlers but have fewer weight classes. No need at any age group for a weight class every 3 lbs.
Thanx man. I like 24, but yea, lets decrease number of weight classes for the 2 younger age groups is my best advice.
Let the kids battle in 4 or 5lb increments, too many kids getting a free pass to the state tourney with this set-up.
I like the older groups as is... a ton of older kids battling well
Quote from: qbit on April 06, 2023, 09:39:41 AMwas there saturday and sunday.. Way too long... Either go back to 16 man brackets or host girls on a different day. Has the tournament ever been this long?
They did start a bit late Saturday probably due to weather.
Tourney could start at 830am instead of 930am.