Tournament improvements

[grappler-of-old 44]

Since I brought this up in another thread.  I thought I might give it it's own thread.

Wrestling Tournaments last to long.  This is one of the negatives of wrestling.  We loose many potential wrestlers because of this.

When tourneys get over at 10-12 at night wrestlers don't get home until the wee hours of the morning.

Spectators also don't like sitting that long in a gym. 

From my experience however this is mostly a problem in KY.  From my experience tourneys in Ohio get finished at the latest 8 P.M.  Usually the finals will start between 4 and 5 pm. 

My question is why can't Ky accomplish the same thing in their tourneys.  It is one of the reason Nky teams cross the state line into Ohio to participate.

This may have been a topic we covered in the past, but with the new members maybe we can come up with new and improved ideas.

[plee 0]

i'm definitely no expert on this topic....but i'm very interested in hearing some of the ideas.  not to sound defensive of ky wrestling, but if you're comparing tournaments whether it's from ohio or ky, the 2 obvious factors are 1) number of matches 2) number of mats.  Also breaks will kill a tournament.  you made a comment about the WCI going til 1am each night...well that's a 24 team tournament.  with that many teams, unless they have a gym that can hold like 10+ mats, that is going to go late.  you can't compare that to a smaller ohio tournament that has 10 teams or less.  unless you just feel like no one should have tournaments that big.  it's a trade off....i'm sure the WCI has some outstanding competition....the catch is it will run real late. 

as far as suggestions for improvements.....the key is to reduce the amount of time that a mat sits empty.  have your next match(es) waiting on each mat.  each mat should have bout sheets queued up, and the wrestlers should be paired up with anklets ready to go as soon as a mat becomes available.  i've seen some tournaments where they use a bullpen area or call matches out on a PA.  this will work ok too...as long as you queue the wrestlers in that bullpen area...BUT have 1-2 matches paired up and standing by at the table of each mat.  if you have wrestlers in a bullpen, and it takes 30-60 seconds to get them from 1 side of the gym to their mat....then another 15-20 seconds to get the anklets ready to go.....multiply that by 300+ matches and that time will kill you. 

i totally agree with you that the long days sitting in a gym is a major drawback to this sport.  i coached a very good m.s. kid that did not want to wrestle this year because he couldn't stand sitting around all day. 

[TeamJesus316 0]

Coming from California, Tournaments there routinely get over between 9 and 11 pm, especially if the tournament wants to give the finalists their proper resepct (1 mat finals for 1st/2nd and spotlight if it is available).

[plee 0]

Coming from California, Tournaments there routinely get over between 9 and 11 pm, especially if the tournament wants to give the finalists their proper resepct (1 mat finals for 1st/2nd and spotlight if it is available).

how many teams would that be for a typical tournament and on how many mats?

[grappler-of-old 44]

What I am getting to is that a team will travel 2+ hours to a tourney.  Stay in the gym all day.  Leave the tourney at about 12 and still have a 2+ hour trip home.  

    Parents of Freshman and some Sophomore parents complain that 2am is way to late for their child to get home, especially when they left the home at 6am.

    Many teams complain that the boarder schools do not spend enough time wrestling in KY, but this is the reason they don't.  

    Here are my top reasons that I believe the tourneys don't get finished until late.  

1.  Overbooking teams.

2.  Seeding meetings lasting to long

3.  Person running the computer program is not familiar with it.

4.  To many and to long breaks.

5.  Setting a specific time for finals even if they could finish earlier.

[Ranger123 43]

As long as the state tournament is set up as it is (long, late nights), then I think the kids need a tournament or two that are similar.  WCI is not quite that late.  It is a long two days, which makes it tough on anyone traveling unless you stay in a hotel.

I personally love the big tournaments.  I think the bigger tournaments are run pretty well in KY.  But as plee mentioned with so many teams there is no way around those late nights.  The real pains are the next level tournaments that are poorly run and the kids and fans sit around all day for much less competition and less wrestling.  And often it is not the coach running the show, but his help (or lack of) that really causes the issue.

grappler:  #1 is not as big a deal IMO.  #2 is huge.  This is often unorganized and very inefficient.  I understand some discussion when we get to regions, but during the season there is no need for such long meetings.  Much of this can be handles on Friday night.  #3 Coaches need good help.  #4 This can be a problem.  #5 I hate this one.  The coaches association or the state should ban this practice.

[grappler-of-old 44]

I did not put these in any specific order.

#1 Becomes a problem when there is a need for rattails,pigtails, whatever people want to call them.

#2 Is ridiculous.  The tournament director should set up a simple criteria and go with it.  (Friday nights are great, but many teams can't attend).  If teams send in a potential roster on Thur. or Fri. less changes need to be made on Sat. 

#3 This should never be a problem.  A person should run a simulated program the night before with the rosters that were given.

#4 Unless you need time for the 45 minute rule. No breaks should happen.  Hire an one extra official so they can have breaks.

#5  Wrestle the finals when you get there.  I like the one mat finals.  Take 15-20 to set up the mat and go. 

One that I left out.  I like giving the medals between final matches.  It reduces the confussion at the end of the Hwt. match.  It also allows the scorers to focus all attention on team scores and special awards (MOW, Quick pin ect.) I also think this reduces time.

[grappler-of-old 44]

as far as suggestions for improvements.....the key is to reduce the amount of time that a mat sits empty.  have your next match(es) waiting on each mat.  each mat should have bout sheets queued up, and the wrestlers should be paired up with anklets ready to go as soon as a mat becomes available.  I've seen some tournaments where they use a bullpen area or call matches out on a PA.  this will work OK too...as long as you queue the wrestlers in that bullpen area...BUT have 1-2 matches paired up and standing by at the table of each mat.  if you have wrestlers in a bullpen, and it takes 30-60 seconds to get them from 1 side of the gym to their mat....then another 15-20 seconds to get the anklets ready to go.....multiply that by 300+ matches and that time will kill you.

I think this is where many of the Ohio tourneys I have experiences made up the time.  In several of the tourneys they had a tote board of some kind.

The board had each mat labeled.  Under each mat had the bout number of the match going on, the on deck bout number and the, bullpen bout number.  That way the wrestlers were near the mat they were competing on when it was time.  I believe this is the way their state tourney is run.

[ccbcdeke 43]

Fern Creek's middle school tourney uses a bout board. Each weight class was assigned to a particular mat and all the matches for that weight are wrestled on the same mat.  Matches still can run long, but every one knows what mat they are wrestling on and when their match is coming up.

[TeamJesus316 0]

For the california tournaments, my high school used to run a 24 team tournament and it would get done between 9 and 10 at night, but they would break for like an hour or hour and a half between the last round of consolation and the first round of finals.  There were pigtails, and if you lost in the pigtails, you went into a seperate consolation bracket and wrestled for 7th and 8th.  They used between 5 and 7 mats in two gyms depending on how many mats they could get from surrounding schools.  Finals were three mats, 1st/2nd on one, 3rd/4th on another, 5th/6th on the other.  The finals would not move on in weight until all the matches for that weight were finished.  Usually the tournaments that had problems with taking too long was because of:

A. Booking problems.  Inviting too many teams and assuming some of them would not have full teams.  If they did have mostly full teams, the tournament would take forever.

B. Seeding problems.  Problems with not all teams sending in their rosters and seeding information and having to adjust the brackets after weighins, causing a late start.

My high school one year tried doing the seeding meeting over the forum during the week prior to the tournament.  It actually worked out great and got some great publicity for the tournament.  Wrestlers knew who were seeded and then the final seeding meeting after weighins was just to verify that everyone made weight.  Fans knew the matches to watch for.  Just a suggestion.  Having all the coaches post their wrestlers records and placings and common opponents on the forum.

[Ranger123 43]

For the california tournaments, my high school used to run a 24 team tournament and it would get done between 9 and 10 at night, but they would break for like an hour or hour and a half between the last round of consolation and the first round of finals.  There were pigtails, and if you lost in the pigtails, you went into a seperate consolation bracket and wrestled for 7th and 8th.  They used between 5 and 7 mats in two gyms depending on how many mats they could get from surrounding schools.  Finals were three mats, 1st/2nd on one, 3rd/4th on another, 5th/6th on the other.  The finals would not move on in weight until all the matches for that weight were finished.  Usually the tournaments that had problems with taking too long was because of:

A. Booking problems.  Inviting too many teams and assuming some of them would not have full teams.  If they did have mostly full teams, the tournament would take forever.

B. Seeding problems.  Problems with not all teams sending in their rosters and seeding information and having to adjust the brackets after weighins, causing a late start.

My high school one year tried doing the seeding meeting over the forum during the week prior to the tournament.  It actually worked out great and got some great publicity for the tournament.  Wrestlers knew who were seeded and then the final seeding meeting after weighins was just to verify that everyone made weight.  Fans knew the matches to watch for.  Just a suggestion.  Having all the coaches post their wrestlers records and placings and common opponents on the forum.

You will never see 5-7 mats in KY.  3 maybe 4 is the max.  That is a huge difference.

Using the forum is a fantastic idea.  Hey Mathound, what do you think of coaches signing onto the forum to host a preliminary seeding meeting on a Thursday or Friday night?  Just my opinion, but if coaches know they need to send in info ahead of time and don't then I say too bad, your kids are just drawn into the bracket.

[plee 0]

Larue County also uses the bout board system, and we used the same system for the m.s. state tournament.  It works fantastic, and parents & wrestlers love it because they can easily tell when they'll be up and on what mat.  These bout boards are also popular in Ohio, I've seen them used at the Milford tournament last year.  However, if you're not careful they can slow you down a bit.  At the m.s. state tournament last year, we were using this system and waiting until the match was actually up on a mat until we sent the bout sheet to that table.  This was causing a 30-60 second delay between each mat.  Again, this may not seem like a lot....but 30-60 seconds per match will KILL a tournament.  Mark Hitchings suggested that we go ahead and send 2 bout sheets to each mat....after we did that, there was very little empty mat time from that point forward.

I can also speak from experience that the software everyone uses (tournament manager) is not as intuitive as people think....it's not too difficult to really mess a tournament up by clicking the wrong button.  At the m.s. regionals last year, when you start a tournament, there's an option to queue the matches by bout number or by round.  This is not a big deal if every bracket is the same size....but if you have a 32 man bracket in 1 weight class, and an 8 man bracket in another....you have to queue by round...if you queue by bout #, you'll be in the finals of the smaller bracket and in the 2nd round of the 32 man bracket.  I made this mistake by clicking 1 button wrong.....do not try this at home kids, it will screw your tournament up big time!!!  Thank GOD for Pam & Keith Ruschell!!!!

[ontherise 0]

I agree with the bout board system completely.  it def helps us to be more aware of how long we have till our match and gives us  a heads up.  and personally i hate having the long breaks in between rounds or before the finals, because then you have to just sit there in the bleachers and personally i usually either get tired or my muscles tighten up. i think that 30-45 minutes is more than enough time for a break because everyone has enough time to recover and do what they need to do.

[Mathound 4]

Hey Mathound, what do you think of coaches signing onto the forum to host a preliminary seeding meeting on a Thursday or Friday night?

Coaches have right to use the private coaches forum for any reason. It's there to make contacting each other easier. Whatever helps them out! Now if only we could get them to use it...

[grappler-of-old 44]

  Just my opinion, but if coaches know they need to send in info ahead of time and don't then I say too bad, your kids are just drawn into the bracket.

Devils advocate here Ranger. 

1.  Not having kids seeded many times hurts the seeded kids more than the one not seeded.  Especially if you have a kid who is top 2 and not seeded.

2.  Many old coaches either do not have e-mail or internet capabilities, or do not know how to use them efficiantly. 

Try to get hold of Baddida at Conner by e-mail or now Coach Simmons at Dixie.  Good luck  :-D :evil:  Even though I know their assistant coaches are capable.  :wink:

[Ranger123 43]

Devils advocate here Ranger. 

1.  Not having kids seeded many times hurts the seeded kids more than the one not seeded.  Especially if you have a kid who is top 2 and not seeded.

2.  Many old coaches either do not have e-mail or internet capabilities, or do not know how to use them efficiantly. 

Try to get hold of Baddida at Conner by e-mail or now Coach Simmons at Dixie.  Good luck  :-D :evil:  Even though I know their assistant coaches are capable.  :wink:

I know what you mean as I was bit by #1 before in a round about way.  I was #1 and another kid (whose coach thought he could get 2nd) threw him into the draw rather than take the #4 seed.  He drew me first round and I didn't show up and he kicked my butt.  But that's the way it goes.  Yes, things won't always work out nice and neat, but just wrestle the guy who lines up against you.

On #2, too bad.  If that's all it takes to speed up tournaments, then I say too bad.  If Coach Badida, Simmons, and Reigel want to get kids seeded, then get access to email or have your assistants do it.

[refdad 3]

There are many factors to tournaments here (KY) lasting TOO long. Most of which have been mentioned allready. I really believe that the bout board system along with having one more ref than mats would go along way to solving most of the problem. You would only need a quick break, maybe ten minutes after every two or three rounds for the table workers to use the bathroom and get a drink..Go ahead a wrestle all bouts except the finals. If you want to set up one mat in the center to wrestle the finals matches, this should only take 15 minutes or so...

[eville dad 17]

I agree refdad, lots of good ideas on how to keep a tourney moving along, I think the extra ref is essential to avoiding breaks and plenty of workers assures breaks as needed for table workers.

I personally like the bout board system either on the mats or a master board with mat #'s and the match on hand, on deck and in the whole.

I have also recently seen a tournament ran manually as efficiently as any software program. It was really fun to watch the bouts being recorded the team points applied and the bout cards created manually and very systematically. The whole event ran without a snag.

The biggest problem I have w/KY tourneys is the undefined break that is announced as a 15-30 minute break and turns into a 1hr - 3hr break. This creates alot of frustration with the parents and wrestlers. It also makes it hard for wrestlers to manage their time in between matches. When its not clear how long a break is going to be its hard to know when to eat, rest or prepare for the next match, not to mention how long the whole day and night becomes because of the long break.

[wrestling4life 0]

As an offical myself an extra reff would be great at these tournments....BUT there is not enought of us as it is.  That is where you coaches and parents come in, we need you all to get the kids into officating.  And the coaches need to know the new ones and work with them and not be so hard on all them and let them make thier mistakes.  That is how I made it into officating and gotten better over the years 

[bulldog-leader 56]

I know what you mean as I was bit by #1 before in a round about way.  I was #1 and another kid (whose coach thought he could get 2nd) threw him into the draw rather than take the #4 seed.  He drew me first round and I didn't show up and he kicked my butt.  But that's the way it goes.  Yes, things won't always work out nice and neat, but just wrestle the guy who lines up against you.

I have done this on occation (not seeded any of my wrestlers).  Mostly because they had seeding meetings on Thur. or Fri. and I had to travel to Lou. or Lex. and couldn't make the trip.  Each time I did this the other teams reemed me.  They told me I messed the whole tourney up.  What is the use of seeding then.  Heck I almost got hung when I did it at the NKAC one year.

[Ranger123 43]

I have done this on occation (not seeded any of my wrestlers).  Mostly because they had seeding meetings on Thur. or Fri. and I had to travel to Lou. or Lex. and couldn't make the trip.  Each time I did this the other teams reemed me.  They told me I messed the whole tourney up.  What is the use of seeding then.  Heck I almost got hung when I did it at the NKAC one year.

I'm not advocating doing that, but just saying that we shouldn't let coaches who refuse to participate (or can't for some reason) in Thursday or Friday seeding meetings slow the process down.  I think everyone can email a roster with records at a minimum.  Plus, if we could get more coaches participating on this site and turning in results, then we have another tool to aid in the seeding process if needed.

[5291234 0]

Tournaments directors-Run your tournaments straight thru.  Maybe one 15min break one.

Coaches- email or fax your records.  IF they don't.  DO not invite them back. 

If you seed a kid and he does not wrestle (injury)you can sub him with a non seeded wrestler.  And every wrestler under the seeded kid bumps up one.

No body wants to sit there any longer than they have to.

[grappler-of-old 44]

Tournaments directors-Run your tournaments straight thru.  Maybe one 15min break one.

I agree with this.  Get the tourney over and get home.

Coaches- email or fax your records.  IF they don't.  DO not invite them back. 

 

Not sure how I feel about this.  Why punish the wrestlers for coachs that are not tecnologically efficient.

If you seed a kid and he does not wrestle (injury)you can sub him with a non seeded wrestler.  And every wrestler under the seeded kid bumps up one.

I think this is common sense. However you run into situations where a true stud does not make wt. and bumps up a wt. class(because the team has an opening) and he messes up that bracket.  I like the tourneys where they ask for 2 or 3 kids that need to be split and go, no true seeding. Actually I would not mind if they blind drew all the tourneys except the region, since it is the one that really counts.

No body wants to sit there any longer than they have to.

Which is why I made this thread.

[Ranger123 43]

It doesn't have to take much effort or technology to communicate records.  If we concede that a couple of these guys are so technologically handicapped that they can't even have an assistant or athletic director send in a roster with records, then pick up a phone.  If that is too hard, then yes, I say don't invite them back.

[TeamJesus316 0]

If you seed a kid and he does not wrestle (injury)you can sub him with a non seeded wrestler.  And every wrestler under the seeded kid bumps up one.

I think this is common sense. However you run into situations where a true stud does not make wt. and bumps up a wt. class(because the team has an opening) and he messes up that bracket.  I like the tourneys where they ask for 2 or 3 kids that need to be split and go, no true seeding. Actually I would not mind if they blind drew all the tourneys except the region, since it is the one that really counts.

If you dont make weight you should not be able to wrestle.  Why are we allowing kids to not keep commitments, but still be allowed to compete.  Coaches need to send in the roster, and if there is a scratch that is one thing, but if your kid doesnt make weight because he wasnt disciplined enough to do it, he should be dropped out of the tournament.

About the online seeding, each team should either send their info in on the forum or email or fax the info to the tournament director.  The director should then add it to the forum.  That way everyone knows why wrestler A is seeded above wrestler B.  If a kid gets hurt or scratched, there should be a twenty minute or so meeting at the conclusion of weighins to verify the seeds.  This is what my school did and it worked out great.  Dont allow the coaches to argue over seeds at that 20 minute meeting.  Seed 1 alternate and bump him in and everyone else up one spot to fill it.