By Alex Doan
With preseason on its way, the wrestling team has been preparing in hopes of bring home another Sunset League Championship and hopeful CIF Championship.
With the upcoming season, many wrestlers have returned to the mat for another year of intense practice. Head coach Brad Woodbury expects that the team will be able to get another 10 wrestlers, if not more, to place in league finals to compete in CIF. “We have an experienced team…we just got to stay healthy and not get hurt,” said Woodbury.
Currently, FVHS wrestling is ranked eighth in all of Orange County. FVHS wrestling has recently competed in the Westminster Crossarek Classic on Nov. 6 through Nov. 7 and was able to place fourth overall with many wrestlers placing. Medalist include Quintin Gomez (’14), Alex Damscen (’15), David Galdamez (’15) for 8th place; Carson Aires (’17) for sixth place; Amador Rodriguez (’15) for fifth place; Blake Vasquez (’16) for fourth place and Stone Escobedo (’15) for second place. Andrew Morgan (’15) and Bryant Vasquez (’14) placed first in their respected weight and are ranked in their divisions and CIF including several other wrestlers.
Wrestling has been practicing more intensively with practices being shorter but also being more focused then before. The team has been spending a lot of time focusing on technique, speed and agility, weightlifting, endurance, and much more.
“The team is pretty young [and] we have a lot of sophomores and juniors in the lineup [with a] couple of freshman stepping up too,” said Gomez. “We do have work on some things, but we have a solid lineup and I’m expecting another [Sunset League Championship] this year.”
FVHS wrestling will continue their preseason throughout December with several tournaments such as Temescal Canyon, The Holiday Classic Vegas, and Godinez Tournament. Their first season duel will be at home against Huntington Beach on Jan. 2.
Photos by Ashley Le
