On Tuesday, December 13th the Punahou Intermediate wrestling team held a joint practice with the Washington Intermediate Eagle Wrestling club. Coached by Brett Kumabe c/o ’95 the Washington Eagles and Punahou Buff n Blue have collaborated on a number of successful projects in the past, and continued that success with a spirited and eventful afternoon.

Getting to Know Each Other

The day started off with warm-ups, stretching and getting to know each other. We learned all sorts of information about each other like where we are from and our favorite ice cream flavors, school subjects, and video games. We practiced our neutral position and spin drills with the help of varsity wrestlers Nicole Taniguchi c/o ’12, Brian Peralta c/o ’12, and L.J. Remillard c/o ’13. We had fun learning different moves and seeing different styles of wrestling.

Working on Basing Up

After a short water break and reviewing how to base up from the bottom position we moved on to every wrestlers favorite part of practice…..WRESTLING! We broke up into groups of three and banged heads (both figuratively and literally). This was the most enjoyable part of practice and the wrestlers got a lot out of it. We ended the day learning to walk like an elephant, crawl like a bear, and learning to play chess… Like a Wrestler!

Much Aloha to Coach Brett, Joey, Andrew and the entire Washington Intermediate Eagles Wrestling club for visiting Punahou and providing us a tremendous opportunity to share and advance the sport we love. We look forward to continuing our relationship with Washington Intermediate and wish everyone a happy holiday season!

Coach Mike

Under Overs

Double Leg Takedown!

Showing the boys how its done!

Battling for Position!

Collar Tie!

Lower your stances!

Wrestling is hard but fun. =)

Putting away mats at the end of the day

The JV team had an even more frustrating performance, wrestling below their abilities on too many occasions.  They finished in 2nd, behind a very tough and loaded Kamehameha JV team.  We have a good  group of wrestlers who are willing to do the work, so we’re gonna have to continue pushing forward and hopefully get many of them to attend the off season training and continue to improve on their abilities.  We know we can be better in the future.

The boys and girls varsity continued to strive for their ultimate goals, and put themselves in position to finish strong.  Both qualified all possible weight classes (14 for the boys, and 10 for girls (we don’t have a 220 girl wrestler)) for the states this weekend.  Both teams were able to pull away from the rest of the teams over the course of the tournament and win the ILH Team Championships.  Though we know we still didn’t wrestle our best, which frankly excites us as we don’t need to truly peak until this weekend at states, we did have several key wrestlers work through their injuries and survive the weekend qualifying for states and with the potential to improve their health even slightly more through the week.  We expect to continue working hard this week and polishing up and improving our technique in certain positions, and know that there will be several teams pushing hard to finish on top this weekend, including us.

If at all possible, we’d love to see you either Friday and/or Saturday at the Blaisdell for the excitement of this tournament.
Thank you for all the continued support.

Saturday once again found us hosting the Intermediate and JV round robin tournament, the last of the season.  Our boys and girls varsity teams did an excellent job of setting up the brackets and running the tables, and our younger wrestlers continued to show their development.  We can definitely see the progress of the 7th and 8th graders, and also of several of the JV’s as well.

This week Friday and Saturday the JV, Vars, and Girls will be competing in the ILH Dual Meet Tournament at Maryknoll.  Next weekend, yes Distraction Weekend, will be the ILH Championships (for all levels) at Kamehameha.  As always, we’d love to see you at any/all of these if you can make it.

Friday night the boys team started slowly against Kamehameha, the weight class draw took us right to the heart of their lineup, but we were able to rebound well and string together 5 consecutive pins, from 152-215, which swung the momentum right back in our favor. We finsihed the meet pretty strong, and won decisively against them, knowing they are still missing a few key weight classes due to injury. We expect to see their lineup complete by the end of the season, so we know it’s gonna be a dogfight til the end. Kamehameha is a very tough team again this year.

On Saturday the varsity boys battled St. Louis, and were able to handle them as well, getting a few of our non-starting seniors some very well deserved matches. It was fun to see them battle at that level. On Saturday we also had the inter/jv round robin tournament at St. Louis, and our younger wrestlers showed improvements of their own, and are seemingly getting more comfortable with the battle.

With only a few weeks left of the season, it is definitely time for everyone to step up and prepare their best to finish the season strong. This weekend we’ll have boys and girls varsity dual meets at Punahou Friday night, and Saturday we’ll be hosting another inter/jv round robin tournament. We’d love to see anyone on the island there to cheer us on.

This past weekend our intermediate wrestling team had two great opportunities to advance their knowledge in the sport of wrestling. Our first year wrestlers competed in their first tournament at Washington Intermediate School, and our veterans got to watch some of the best wrestling in the state at the first Pa’ani Challenge Girls Wrestling Tournament.

It was a great day for our first years who competed for the first time in a scrimmage with the Washington Intermediate Eagle Wrestling Program. Coach Brett Kumabe c/o ’95 set this up and we are grateful to have had this preseason opportunity. There was some awesome wrestling on both sides and we continued to cultivate our relationship with our brother/sister school down the road.

Our veterans and some zealous first years who couldn’t get enough helped run the first Pa’ani Challenge at Punahou. They saw some of the best girls from around the state go head to head for the first time this year. The field included national champions, state champions, and multiple state placers. We appreciate the intermediates help and the opportunity to learn and grow.

We’ve had a great first month of wrestling and hope to see you all at the ILH intermediate tournament at the St. Louis Field House. Approximate start time of 9:30am-10:00am.

Aloha,

Coach Mike

Punahou is getting a special line on ascis split second wrestling shoes this year.  They are $55 including shipping and handling.  These shoes usually run $60 not including the $10-$15 for shipping.  This is a good deal.  If any of you would like to order a pair, please email me back the size shoe you wear and your full name asap.  We would like to get the order out asap. 
 
Coach mike
 
ps cant wait for the season.  see you on november 1st

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This past Thursday, May 20^th Punahou wrestlers practiced and competed with the Washington Intermediate Eagle Wrestling Club for the last time this year.  This event capped off a successful month of joint practices and getting to know each other.

The day started off with warm-ups and team building.  Then our own Evan Johnson (2x state placer) started off a clinic with arm drag setups to a single leg.  Next Mckinley’s Bradley Suda (2x state placer and runner-up this year at 108lbs) demonstrated one of his favorite single leg finishes (An inside trip).  After learning these moves and drilling, the wrestling started.  It was an action packed meet with a lot of scoring and good, hard wrestling.  In the most anticipated matchup of the night Brett Kumabe c/o ’95 matched up with Brett Will c/’11 for an exciting match won by Brett Will.

Once the mats were put away we enjoyed a night of food and fellowship with the Eagles Wrestling Club and staff from the Boys and Girls Club.  We had a great time and would like to thank Coach Brett Kumabe for setting this up and providing us with such great opportunities.  What a coach!

We had a great time and look forward to working with them next year!

Coach Nelson coaches team "Brett Will and Friends"

Mckinley's Marilyn, Bradley Suda and Punahou's Bryan Peralta and Evan Johnson keep score

Alex and Hanale

The Bow n Arrow

Puma Michael Saito in his first wrestling match

Coach Brett Kumabe and Brett Will

This past weekend Punahou wrestlers from all levels competed in the annual AAU Maui State Wrestling Championships.  It was a great opportunity for our varsity wrestlers to get their feet wet in their first freestyle competition of the season, and for our younger wrestlers to compete against new opponents from different islands.

This year’s tournament of 552 participants was contested on 8 mats, Saturday May 15^th at the Lahaina Civic Center.  It was a great day of wrestling for all, and Punahou ended the day with three individual champions:  Josh Crimmins, Makana Valdez, and Nicole Taniguchi.

During down time the kids engaged in a variety of activities.  Among the highlights were dinner at Ka’ahumanu Mall, jumping whales on the drive to Lahaina, donkey and sheep petting, endless shenanigans at the Puma Inn, cooking breakfast together, eating 15 lbs of bacon and Portuguese sausage, Krispy Kreme, and learning that Tasaka’s Guri Guri shop is closed on Sundays =(.

Once again we were fortunate to stay at the Puma Inn in Makawao.  The kids had a lot of fun and spent time getting to know wrestlers from other grade levels.  Much gratitude goes out to the outstanding upperclassmen leadership on the trip, and to the young ones for bringing an endless amount of energy and enthusiasm.

Despite missing our initial flight, we were able to get all students and coaches back to Oahu by late Sunday evening.  We had a great time and look forward to next years trip!

Coach Mike

-If your kids have nothing to do and want to be back on the mat, we have practices in the varsity wrestling room on tuesdays and thursdays from 3:00-5:00.  These will go until the last week of the year. 

-Every year Maui hosts the largest wrestling tournament in the state.  The very best youth wrestling programs in the state will be there, so in a sense… This is the unofficial K-8 wrestling state tournament.  As coaches we really feel like we had a great year on so many levels, and we would love to offer this one last wrestling opportunity before school is up.  This is a fun trip that we do every year, and the wrestlers get to experience a tournament with over 500 competitors and fans spilling out of the stands on to the mat.  We will be staying in Makawao at an alumni’s house and competing in Lahaina, Maui at the Civic Center.  The dates are May 14-16. 

If you are interested read the attached document, book your flight and pay coach Nelson by May 10th.  This information will be handed out at practice (Tues/Thurs 3:00-5:00) and posted on the website. 
Coach Mike