Fargo and National Event Prep: The 8-Week Plan

Solo and parent-assisted. Every throw, every turn, every live go belongs in the club room with a coach. What this builds is a stance that survives a five-match day, hands that win ties when tired, and a par terre defense that keeps a bad position from becoming eight points.

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Three-minute rounds, one minute rest, four rounds, with a level change every ten seconds and a fake shot every thirty. Record the last round and watch it with the sound off. Count how many times your hands drop below your chest and how many times your head gets ahead of your hips. Those two numbers are your baseline for the eight weeks.

Inside step, level change, lead knee softly across the tape, trail foot through, up and moving. Ten right, ten left, four sets. Sets three and four: fake first, then the real step. Slow enough to be silent.

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Hips through the floor, chest heavy, up in one motion, two circling steps, reset. Fifteen reps, four sets. In freestyle a stalled sprawl is a scramble and a scramble is exposure; the circle is how you leave it.

Twenty squats, fifteen push-ups, twelve burpees with full sprawls, ten stand-ups against the wall, thirty seconds of shadow pummel, thirty seconds rest. Six rounds, timed.

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Duration: 12 min · Equipment: A towel over a bar or doorknob, or a parent holding two forearms up and still

Inside control, wrist to wrist, swim to a collar tie, snap and circle, swim off to an underhook, clear back to inside control. One-minute rounds, thirty seconds rest, eight rounds. Elbows tight, feet moving. The parent holds; the parent never pushes. Resistance is the room’s job and the coach’s call.

Swim right to an underhook, swim left, hips forward, chest up, short steps. Two-minute rounds, three rounds. If Greco is on the trip, this is most of the match.

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Belly down, feet toward the wall, hips pressed into the floor, elbows tight, hands in front of your face, chin up. Hold forty-five seconds, then walk the hips sideways and back while pressed down. Ten reps. Then the same position with your hands walking forward and back an inch at a time, hips never lifting. This is the gut wrench and leg lace defense; heavy hips and tight elbows are all of it.

Stand-ups: inside foot up, hips forward, elbows tight, stand and turn to face the wall, fifteen reps, three sets, timed. Hip heists, ten each side, two sets. In the folkstyle events this is a point every time; in freestyle it ends the danger.

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Forty-five seconds hard, thirty easy, six rounds, then five minutes of easy walking, then six more rounds. That is two matches with a bracket break between them. In two weeks it becomes three.

Motion, fake, level change, penetration, up, circle, sprawl, get up, hand fight, pummel, motion. One minute on, one off, six rounds. No standing tall between pieces.

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Duration: 15 min · Equipment: Pull-up bar, towel, a backpack loaded with books, a rope if you have one

Towel pull-ups or hangs, four sets to failure. Rope climbs if there is a rope, legs allowed. Farmer carries with the loaded backpack, four lengths. Push-ups with your feet on a step, three sets.

Hand on forehead, press for ten seconds with no movement, then the back of the head, then each side, three rounds. That is the entire neck program, at every level, including this one. No weight on the neck, no bridging with weight, no partner on the head, no harness. The national mats are full of wrestlers with strong necks, and every one of them got there by wrestling with a coach in the room, not by loading the neck in a garage.

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Six rounds of forty-five on and thirty off, five minutes easy, six rounds, five minutes easy, six rounds. On the third set, shadow wrestle the easy thirty seconds instead of walking. This is the closest thing to the back side of a national bracket that you can build alone.

Thirty-second rounds of the chain at full speed, thirty seconds rest, ten rounds. Clean, or slow down until it is.

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Record one three-minute stance and motion round and count the same two things as week one: hands dropping, head ahead of hips. The numbers should be lower than they were. Then stop for the day.

Lay it out: two singlets if the event requires red and blue, shoes, headgear, warm-ups, three towels, the membership card, the state team itinerary with weigh-in times, snacks that travel, two water bottles, and a plastic bag for wet gear. Pack it three days before the trip. Read the day-of schedule out loud with your parent so the bout call is not a surprise.

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Run it, then after the qualifier tell us how the second match felt compared to the first and which tie the coach wanted more of. That is where the trip plan starts.