Blog Post

New Chapter for the Wildcat Faithful 

  • By Aaron Bruce
  • 01 May, 2017

Bruce tapped as new Rockbridge County Head Wrestling Coach

Former VMI associate head wrestling coach, Aaron Bruce was recently announced as the new Rockbridge County head wrestling coach.  Shortly after the announcement, the program leadership  organized an informal "meet and greet" at the Maury River Middle School cafeteria to introduce coach Bruce and have him lay out his vision for the program.  Most notably, emphasis was placed on the overarching goal of the program being focused on character development of everyone involved in the program.  Victory will be pursued with great passion no doubt, but through this endeavor, all those involved will stretched in the pursuit of strengthening the  "total person".

During the presentation. Coach Bruce introduced a leadership document found at rockbridgewrestling.com.  3 underlining goals will form the foundation of the program: Hard Work, Smart Work, and Team Work.

Coach Bruce also laid out a specific checklist of goals he would like to see accomplished this summer/fall before the 2017-18 season begins.

o  Have a team camping/canoe trip in summer

o  Send 10 kids to VMI camp (subsidize $50/wrestler)

o  Have 10 kids compete in 2 fall pre-season tournaments.

o  Get 2 parents from middle school/elementary on Team Hammer Board.

o  Get a functioning web site. We currently have the backbone for the site at rockbridgewrestling.com.

o  Set a realistic fundraising goal with a detailed budget plan.

o  Recruit! Everyone in program (wrestlers, parents, friends) needs to keep a sharp eye out for athletic kids who do not play a winter sport.  Pay special attention for the smaller kids who will never play basketball/football. Also, we have to get our football big guys out. I am convinced that in the last 3 weights, a sessional wrestler who is a good athlete can be a high state placer. Specifically, next season we need 113, 126, 220, HWT.





By Aaron Bruce 03 Apr, 2019

Rockbridge Wrestling is proud to announce that two of its members were inducted into the Rockbridge Chapter of the National Honor Society. Brothers Anthony and Nic Marando have show that hard work in the classroom pays off and now have this prestigious honor to be proud of. If you have ever taken a look at our Leadership Mentoring Program, you will see that academic achievement is a prominent focus of our objectives. If you haven't had a chance to read the Leadership Program, click on the "About Us" tab and click on "Leadership".

Congratulations guys, you’ve made our family proud!




By Aaron Bruce 22 Feb, 2019
Team Hammer is excited to announce an awesome upgrade to its weight training facility!  Through an anonymous gracious gift, we now have a new and improved squat rack, more plates, and an upgraded floor.   With these improvements, the Team Hammer facility now has the following:
~ Over 2000 lbs. of free weights
~ Dumbbell Pairs starting at 5lb. up to 115lbs.
~ Olympic caliber Squat Rack
~ Olympic "Rubber Weights" for Cleans and Snatches
~ Climbing Rope
~ Multiple Pull-up Bars
~ Bench Press
~ Professional Treadmill
~ 875sf of wrestling mat area
~ (1) Professional "Spin" stationary bike
~(1) Quality "Weight Cutting" stationary bike



By Aaron Bruce 16 Dec, 2018
Congratulations to the Wildcat Grapplers on a job well done over the weekend.  Soon we will get Tomlin in the lineup and Stearns back.  When we are 100%, look out.  Here are a couple of awesome highlights over the weekend:

1) Kaden Wagner winning his 100th high school match.

2) Soph. Seth Youngblood Crowned 2018 Turner Ashby Holiday Classic Champion at 152lbs.

3) Entire Soph. Class Stepping up bigtime- Clark 8th place, Youngblood 1st place, Tyson 6th Place, and Lakicevic 5th place. 

Wednesday is our final home dual against Alleghany County.  Middle School will first compete against Alleghany Middle at 5:30 and then the High School will begin at 6:30.  We have a little bit of paybacks to give Alleghany!  Thanks parents for all you do to ensure that our guys have what they need to be prepared to do battle.  Let's go Wildcats, you ROCK!
By Aaron Bruce 15 Nov, 2018
Due to winter weather, all school activities have been cancelled tonight.  We will reschedule the parent meeting for Tuesday, Nov. 20 from 7:00-8:00 PM.  Please spread the work  Keep Safe!
By Aaron Bruce 12 Nov, 2018
Here we go! The leaves have fallen, you know what that means...IT'S TIME TO WRESTLE.  First week of practice went great as we picked up right where we left off.  The guys are excited and we look forward to getting the football players back on the mat.  

MANDATORY PARENTS MEETING is this Thursday, November 15th from 7-8 PM at Maury River Middle School Cafeteria.  Please go to:
https://rockbridgeathletics.com/ 
and scroll down to "Quick Links" section.  Parents will need to fill out the following forms and bring them signed to the meeting:
HIPPA, Ride Home, Emergency Data, Concussion, Social Media, and Handbook

See you Soon!
 


By Aaron Bruce 04 Jun, 2018

MAT PACK   WRESTLING

 CAMP

    June 14 – 16

Cost:   $100   9:30 – 3:00

           

Held         at     Parry McCluer Middle   School at    

2329       Chesnut Avenue, Buena     Vista,       VA 24416

 

Host Coaches

June 14 Nathan Shearer - Coach Shearer is in his seventh year as Head Wrestling Coach at

Washington and Lee University. He has coached 16 place winners at the Centennial Conference Championships.

Shearer came to Washington and Lee from Heidelberg University, where he served as the head coach during the 2010-11 season. He earned the National Wrestling Coaches Association (NWCA) Rookie Coach of the Year Award after leading Heidelberg to a second-place finish in the Ohio Athletic Conference (OAC) Championship. Three of his wrestlers qualified for the NCAA Division III Championship, while four of his athletes received Scholar AllAmerica honors from the NWCA. He helped coach six Scholar All-Americans and four NCAA Championship qualifiers, including one All-American.  

 

June 15       Alex Radsky - Coach Radsky is in his third season as the Assistant Wrestling Coach at

Washington and Lee University. His first two seasons advanced three wrestlers to the National Championship and produced all-time best results in conference action. Prior to W&L, Coach Radsky was an assistant wrestling coach at the Virginia Military Institute (VMI). Radsky was a four-year letter winner at Davidson College, where he became a Southern Conference Champion at 133 lbs. in 2010.

June 16     Jesse West – Coach West has 35 years of wrestling experience as an athlete and coach. He was a four time state finalist, two time State Champion, and was named the #1 high school wrestler in the nation at 125 lbs. as a senior by Amateur Wrestling News. Coach West went to Iowa State University as a scholarship athlete wrestling unattached his first year and a varsity starter his second under legendary coach Bobby Douglas. He transferred to the University of Missouri where he was also a varsity starter. As a freestyle wrestler, Coach West was a Cadet National All-American, Junior National All-American, University National and US Open Competitor. He has trained multiple high school state champions, national all- Americans, and collegiate wrestlers. He is a member of the US Wrestling Official Association.  

Contact: Brian Crews @(540) 784-3921 for more information

                          After each session campers can choose to go to

             

Glen Maury park pool together. Rates for tent sites at glen maury park in Buena vista are

$20 per night              

By Aaron Bruce 22 Feb, 2018

2017-18 will go down in the books as one of Rockbridge Wrestling's most exciting years ever.

Dec. 1-2, 2017: We began the season with the Shoemaker Classic. Wrestlers, Parents, Fans, and especially coaches will never forget the brutally long event! Many of us had the "look of defeat" on our faces towards the end of Sat. night. But...to our surprise, the Cats were crowned champions. Little did we know, this was only the beginning of a trophy filled season!

Dec. 5, 2017: Our first mid-week duals of the season showed signs that our Shoemaker Classic championship was no fluke. We smoked Lee 68-10 and the followed that match with a commanding 48-30 victory over James River. It was after this match that the coaching staff also began to realize the exceptional captain leadership the team had. Without any direction from the coaching staff, the entire team began the dreaded after match clean-up process...The Rockbridge Wrestling Family was beginning to see that we had something special on our hands.

Dec. 8, 2017: The second weekend tournament, The Harrisonburg Inv. proved to be another challenging event for everyone involved...incoming inclement weather forced us to cram the 2-day tournament into one LONG night...dang it man! Our men fought hard no doubt but because of the single elimination format, team scores didn't truly provide indication of our strength that we would prove through the rest of the season.

Dec. 13, 2017: This event was our first opportunity to square off against some of our district opponents. We dueled both Harrisonburg and Turner Ashby. First up was Harrisonburg. Although they are a much bigger school and are actually in the bigger classification, our men handed them a humbling defeat! Final score: 66-15. The second match of the night was against the always tough Turner Ashby. Although tradition suggested it would be a rough outing for the Wildcats, we sent the message, "there's a new sheriff in town!". Final score, Rockbridge 56 Turner Ashby 19.

December 15-16, 2017: Two days later, we showed up to do battle once again against Turner Ashby at their annual tournament. As usual, the competition at this tournament was fierce. Poquoson (State Champions), Warren County (State Runner-up), Liberty Bealton (State 3rd place), Wilson Memorial (State 4th place) were all in attendance. In the end, 8 men from Rockbridge walked away with medals and we ended up in a respectable 6th place finish.

Dec. 19, 2017: A date we would rather forget (haha). This was a rough night for the Wildcats. We travelled to Alleghany to wrestle Staunton River and Alleghany in duals. Unfortunately, we were out gunned by Staunton River 24-45 and Alleghany 30-39. The Staunton River pill was a little easier to swallow when they proved to be the 4th best team in the Group 3A State but we all would really like to get the Alleghany match back...there’s always next year!

Dec. 29-30, 2017: The prestigious Big Orange Classic. Since this competition is directly after Christmas, it often proves which teams have the most dedicated athletes. As we all know, practice is even more difficult when the guys know that their buddies are hitting the ski slopes and hanging out with their girlfriends. Our guys stepped up during this training phase…BIG TIME. We had solid attendance at practice and the work ethic was unprecedented. Team Scores ended up showing the hard work we put in and The Rock took home the runner-up trophy, placing only behind Group 2A state champion Poquoson in the 19 team field.

Jan. 5-6, 2017: For the second big test of the holiday season, we travelled to Lynchburg to compete against many of the private schools at the LCA Inv. Although our training sessions remained impressive during the week after New Year’s Day, this competition was substantially more challenging.  Group 4A State Champion Eastern View won the tournament followed by 4 other teams who ended up in the State top-10. Rockbridge finished in a respectable 6th place with 8 medalists.

Jan. 10, 2018: Back to the district duals as we faced off against Waynesboro and Spotswood.  It was after these duals, we could see that bringing home the Valley District Championship trophy was a realistic goal. Rock 61- Spotswood 15, Rock 60- Waynesboro 16.

Jan. 12-13, 2018: 2 Days later we hopped on the bus to travel the 3 hours to Bristol in order to do battle at the 30 team Ed Cressel Classic. No team from Virginia beat us as we took home the 3rd place trophy finishing behind Tenn. State champion Cleveland High School and runner-up Tennessee High.

Jan. 17, 2018: Our final two district duals. Up to this point, we had been beating our district opponents convincing, after this night we would realize that the district championships were “ours to lose”. We beat Fort Defiance 63-18 and Broadway 43-30.

Jan. 19-20: Our toughest tournament of the season, Christiansburg Big Blue. The Christiansburg program has proven over the last 20 years to be one of the best in the state receiving national accolades along the way. This season was no different, the 18-time state champions hosted a grueling 2-day battle. In the end, 5 of our men brought home medals. This level of competition is where we need to be in order to reach our long-range program goals!

Feb. 3, 2018: Valley District Champions! Congratulations are in order as this truly was a total team effort. Each and every guy stepped up and contributed to our victory. The finals were awesome as two guys beat opponents that they had previously lost to (Youngblood and Hinty). Rockbridge’s 6 champs doubled the number of second place Turner Ashby’s champions (3).

Feb.9, 2018: Region 3A West Runner-up. Once again, the Wildcats did not disappoint (ok, just a little since coach Bruce was college teammates with the Brookville head coach (Brookville has been placed on notice- look out…haha ). Seriously though, what a great showing at the region. The fellas all wrestled hard and although there were a few disappointments, by in large we Rocked IT! (Pun intended).

Feb. 16-17: 3A State Tournament. Ok...yes, we’d wished we had done better. 7 State Qualifiers, 5 guys won a match, 2 State placers. 19th place out of approx. (60) Group 3 schools. BTW: We might have gotten whipped on the wrestling mat but we had 3 champion Buffalo Wild Wing Eaters!

Here is a summary of the level of competition we saw at various tournaments during our regular schedule season:

(25) Teams that placed in the top-10 of their respective State tournament

(13) of those 25 teams placed in the top-5

(8) of those 25 teams placed in the top-3

(4) of the teams we faced ended up being State Champions.

 

Hold your heads high Wildcats, you had the courage to square off against some of the best the states of Virginia, Tennessee, and West Virginia have to offer.

-Shoemaker Classic Champions

-Big Orange Runner-up

-Ed Cressel 3rd Place

-Valley District Champions

-Region 3A West Runner-up

-State Championships 19th place

Dual Record 8-2

Thanks Rockbridge Wrestling Family! This was a year to remember…wait ‘till next year, you aint seen nothin yet.

  

/
By Aaron Bruce 30 Sep, 2017
~Team Hammer is planning to kick off the 2017-18 season by traveling to Christiansburg for the Fall Brawl on Saturday, October 14.   Contact Coach Bruce for more information. 

~Practice will resume at the shop on Tuesday and Thursdays from 6:00-7:00.  Also, please don't forget Team Hammer booster meeting Monday, October 2 6:00 pm at the MRMS Cafeteria.  Dr. Sedovy will be performing sport's physicals.  Also, we are going to have Amanda Kaster, a nutritionist at Stonewall Jackson Hospital speak to the team about proper nutrition for an athlete.  As we all know, the fuel we put in our body has a direct correlation to our performance.  

~We are excited to announce an anonymous donor paid for a sweet sound system for the wrestling room!  Nothing like rockin out while training hard!  

See you all tomorrow night

By Aaron Bruce 16 Sep, 2017
Rockbridge Wrestling is looking forward to the beginning of the 2017-18 year!  We have had a busy spring/summer with offseason workouts, a camping/kayak trip, and the VMI camp.  We are  excited to announce that we will begin training with Mat Pack wrestling club beginning Tuesday, September 19th.  Fall practices will be on Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 6:30-8:15 located in the Washington and Lee wrestling room.  Check out Mat Pack  Facebook page at  https://www.facebook.com/matpackwrestling/   All participants will be required to have parents sign a release and also purchase a USA Wrestling card.  Follow this link for directions on obtaining the required card    https://www.usawmembership.com/login
By Aaron Bruce 15 Apr, 2017
Rockbridge Wrestling has a brand new website
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