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- Hi, my name's Adeline Gray.
I'm a five-time world champion
for Team USA for women's freestyle wrestling.
I competed in the 2016 Rio Olympic Games.
Let's head to the mat.
(swoosh) (rhythmic, electronic music)
Today we're gonna talk about stance in motion.
We're gonna go over a couple drills,
such as getting into our stance,
changing elevations, circling,
downblocking, sprawling and shadow wrestling.
Mastering these simple techniques
allows you to advance forward
to be offensive as well as understanding
your defensive level of wrestling.
It creates angles and forces your opponent
to open up their wrestling so you can open up yours
to score points.
(electronic music)
So, whatever hand you would throw a ball with
or kick a ball, we're gonna take that
and put it on that leg.
That leg's gonna move forward and then
this back foot is gonna go into a sprinter's stance.
So if you were gonna run away and push off the blocks,
that's that what we'd wanna come up onto a toe.
From there, we wanna transfer most of our weight
into our front leg, change elevations
so our hips come down but our head stays up,
hand comes in front, butt stays low,
back straight, elbows in, hands down to protect the legs.
This is a basic wrestling stance.
So the main thing that we need to remember is this triangle.
Our head is the top, our hips are the bottom.
So the base of the triangle, the tip of the triangle,
we have to keep that integrity the entire time.
So when we talk about getting into our stance,
anytime you're in bad wrestling position,
it's usually when that triangle's flipped upside down.
So if our head is low and our butt is high,
we're probably in trouble.
And if we can fix that and put our head high
and our hips low, then we're gonna be in better position.
It's so important to have a great stance.
It's really hard to do anything in wrestling
if you don't have this fundamental down
of being able to be low and advancing forward
in your wrestling stance.
(blast) (music with heavy bass)
From here we're gonna change elevations.
All that means is we're taking our hips lower
and our head's gonna stay up
and we're gonna touch the mat,
protecting this front leg.
We can have this leg being able to bounce off
to pressure forward.
Most of our weight is in this front leg.
We can come back up, we must protect the legs,
and never coming higher than the belly button.
If you're standing up straight,
you're probably gonna be more defensive.
If you're gonna be low and in your stance
advancing forward, you're gonna be more offensive.
More willing to be on the attack, scoring points
and just overall better at wrestling.
(swoosh)
The next basic wrestling position
we're gonna work on is circling,
being able to be agile in your stance,
moving and not having too much weight
on one foot versus the other and transferring
that weight without forcing our feet together.
We wanna make sure we get into our stance,
we have good distance between our legs
and when we're moving we keep that distance.
So we're never crossing our legs
or putting our feet close together,
'cuz we'll be susceptible to be taken down.
So we keep our feet apart and we're circling.
Change direction.
(shoes shuffling against mat)
This right hand stays in front to protect my right leg.
This hand's stayin' open to be able to attack.
We're circling.
(swoosh)
Next position is downblocking.
So we're gonna get into our wrestling stance.
If someone starts attacking us
and trying to get to our legs,
we're gonna put our hands down,
block with our head and take our leg away.
So what that looks like is this position right here.
We wanna keep our eyes up, we wanna lower our head,
take our leg backward so they can't attack it
and our hands down and bring them right back up
to advance into our opponent.
You can tell I'm staying low in my stance at all times.
I am dipping my head below my hips,
but I'm bringing it back up into position right away.
(swoosh) (energetic electronic music)
The next move we're gonna do is a sprawl.
You're getting into wrestling position,
this is a defensive move where we're going to take
our hands to the mat and our foot's gonna shoot back.
Our hip is gonna try to shoot into the mat,
our shoelaces go to the top of the wrestling mat.
(shoes and body thudding against mat)
Some common mistakes with sprawling
are that people go do far onto their hip.
So when they sprawl they land down on this side.
That creates too much of an angle
and if your opponent doesn't go underneath you,
then you could be susceptible to being taken down.
So when we sprawl we wanna make sure
that hip goes flat into the mat
and this foot is straight back
so we can extend backwards and our chest
stays high enough to be able to circle around
and keep our opponent in front of us.
(swoosh)
So similar to how you always see boxers
walking around punching mirrors or punching a shadow,
we're gonna do that but in deep wrestling stance.
So we're getting into our wrestling stance,
we're picturing an opponent in front of us
and from here we're pretending like we're wrestling.
So we're envisioning them taking a shot and downblocking.
We're envisioning them circling
and trying to get to our leg and forcing us
to changing elevations, circling to open up and attack
or a sprawl when they're attacking us.
Downblock, sprawl, moving and seeing the opponent
in front of you.
This can be a great cardio workout.
Being able to visualize your opponent in front of you,
changing elevations and putting together
all of your different moves that you know
and be able to be offensive and defensive in your stance
is vital to having success on the live wrestling mat.
Now that we're all wrapped up,
remember: do your stance in motion, but keep the triangle.
Your head above your hips.
The stance in motion can really help
with just the basic fundamentals of wrestling.
Don't forget to practice this every single day
and put on a YouTube wrestling match
and follow along as you do your stance in motion.
(swoosh)
And don't forget: stay hydrated.
(swoosh)
Thanks so much for watching.
Try out these tips and let us know how they go
in the comments below.
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- Marker. (clapperboard claps)
(beep)
Marker. (clapperboard claps)
(beep)
- There is something else that I wanna say about that.
But I need to catch my breath!