AZ Tournaments?

cdhrk3

Member
I have a couple questions somebody on here might be able to answer. I have been to a lot of tournaments here in Phoenix, not all, but a lot. I've noticed a couple of things. First, why does nobody run an efficient tournament? What I mean is, why does every tournament I've been to not run trackwrestling properly and instead run bout cards like it's the 80's? Why do tournaments make teams wait 3-5 hours for medal matches on Saturday, it doesn't take that long to set up. Last, why don't tournaments run jv/freshman tournaments on track?


Can anybody provide an answer?
 

Coach Pat

Well-Known Member
Freshmen and JV tournaments, for the most part, arent run on Track because for the end of the seeding, we are not allowed to use JV/Frosh track records and track supposedly does not delineate between varsity and Jv matches when it comes to seeding criteria.

In regards to efficiency, I think it depends. As many tournaments are going to the dual format, running a dual tournament through track can be very difficult (I did it when I ran the William Bell in Tucson) and there really isnt a whole lot of advantages to doing so. And if you have a mini tournament, where you cross bracket, track wrestling still charges you something like $250 for that small tournament, and if its an add on to the dual tournament, they up charge you.

Depending on when a tournament ends regular wrestling, if the paper says a tournament final will start at 6pm, it should start at 6pm, regardless of wait time. We already have a hard time getting spectators. When a director has told a local paper or website a certain start time and then they move it up, it screws with both fans and parents, especially if those parents have rearranged things in regards to a certain medal round start time.
 

cdhrk3

Member
Well that doesn't make sense because track can delineate varsity, jv, and freshmen. And if it is entered correctly it wont interfere with seeding. Track up charges you because you are running two different tournaments a dual tournament and an individual.

Why are tournament directors giving an actual time for the finals? Why cant they just say that finals will start 1 hour after semis and consolation?

Why still bout cards? Especially at state?
 

Coach Pat

Well-Known Member
So, if you want more community members to attend your events, you would have to give them a time, I would think. Football games start at 7pm. Basketball games start at 6pm. etc. The dual tournament format with track (at least several years ago) was difficult to manage and not very helpful. Not sure if its changed. I know at state they use bout cards to back up what they are doing track. They do everything on track and they have computers at each table. But just in case the internet goes down, they have bout cards. Makes sense to me.

Sounds like you should get a hold of Bryan Smith over at Moon Valley. Hes the state seeding guy. You probably have some insight that might be helpful.
 

BKramer

Well-Known Member
The answers are as varied as the tournaments themselves. We (Tucson State) just recently switched to electronic bout cards and while we love it now, it wasn't an easy transition. You need computers and, more importantly, a solid WiFi system with redundancy (unless you run ethernet, which also presents challenges). We had triple redundancy last year in Prescott and still had issues because the ISP provider's system went offline temporarily and simultaneously, the AT&T hotspots we had, slowed to a crawl due to the increased traffic. But...with the presence of Chromebooks these days...it only makes sense to go paperless and I would encourage any tournament to do so - it is worth it!

We always liked the paper backup but to be honest, I am not sure it truly gets you anything the e-boutcard doesn't. In almost every disputed case, the wrong winner was circled and I have never had an opposing coach try to steal a win because the boutcard was wrong - ever. If its scoring, you can just as easily compare the boutcard to the two books and sort it through.

It takes a heck of an effort (and dedication) to run a tournament, especially a large one, and it generally isn't the only thing on their plate. So...once you get a system down (like printed boutcards) it is comfortable and easy to stay with. The old "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" mentality argues in your head against adopting and risking change because if it doesn't work, you fear that you could "break it" and make it worse! Does that make sense? Not the most satisfying answer, I know, but probably closer to the truth than just about any other explanation, given my experience.

Finally, I think if you offered to help at a tournament to improve it, someone would take you up on it, especially one ran more locally and without the infrastructure that the larger tourneys enjoy. You could be part of the solution that we definitely need in the state in terms of our wrestling tourneys. But who knows...I offered an easy script that uploads updated documents (think brackets) to a website to Peoria a few years ago so that people could stay updated on their results...and never heard a thing. That offer still stands...as well as anything else I could do to help any tourney.
 

cdhrk3

Member
We ran a JV/Frosh tournament on track last year and with 5 total teams showing up. We didn't just use trackwrestling. We set it up to project mat assignments with wrestlers names, schools, and weight classes and that was being projected in the gym. We didn't call out what pool was on which mat, we simply said that here are the upcoming matches pay attention for your name. The kids got it and it was much easier than saying 106 pool a is on mat 1 and pool b is on mat 3 or whatever. All you need to do is project the mat assignments. I can understand being comfortable with what you are doing and using paper bout cards but that is just making the tournament run longer. And if you cant learn something that was common place almost 10 years ago then you shouldn't be running tournaments anymore.

Things just don't get deleted from trackwrestling. I've been to some tournaments that said "track deleted everything" and that doesn't happen. That was when it went down last season and they had to find all of their bout cards again. They blamed it on track going down but everything was deleted before it went down.
 

BKramer

Well-Known Member
I totally agree about using next available mat and not assigning weight classes to mats. And it sounds like you have been in the trenches with at least one tournament, but probably more than that, so kudos to you for being part of the solution.

I get you on the "adapt and change or get out of the way" thing and totally agree. There are days I get frustrated with certain tourneys because finding information, let alone results or history, is so difficult. I try not to judge though, because people who run these mean well and we don't run a perfect tourney either.

All I can write is that answers to your questions will remain elusive and I hope you have a better experience this year.

All we can do is offer our services and experience to make things better.
 

cdhrk3

Member
Just got back from a JV/frosh tournament. 2 mats for JV and 2 for frosh. About 26 teams total. They made around 25-30 8 man brackets for JV to wrestle on 2 mats. The first round took around 3 hours. To make the math nice, if there were 25 brackets and the average match time was 2 minutes that's 200 minutes per round. That's over 13 hours for 4 rounds.

Simple solution. Realize that you have a lot of teams coming then use your other gym for two more mats. Move the hospitality room from the wrestling room to another room. Put a mat down in there. Use track wrestling to project who is currently wrestling, who is on deck and who is in the hole. Have each table use track to keep score. There, I have single handedly saved probably an hour. You no longer have to print bout cards or brackets, you don't have to sit there yelling for kids names, and you can keep the floors clear of wrestlers.

If you want to see how a tournament is run go to Horizon next year. That was the best run tournament I've been to in my 5 years here. And that includes brad Jones, sectional, state, McClintock, Dysart and many more.
 

npwc-az

Member
Just got back from a JV/frosh tournament. 2 mats for JV and 2 for frosh. About 26 teams total. They made around 25-30 8 man brackets for JV to wrestle on 2 mats. The first round took around 3 hours. To make the math nice, if there were 25 brackets and the average match time was 2 minutes that's 200 minutes per round. That's over 13 hours for 4 rounds.

Simple solution. Realize that you have a lot of teams coming then use your other gym for two more mats. Move the hospitality room from the wrestling room to another room. Put a mat down in there. Use track wrestling to project who is currently wrestling, who is on deck and who is in the hole. Have each table use track to keep score. There, I have single handedly saved probably an hour. You no longer have to print bout cards or brackets, you don't have to sit there yelling for kids names, and you can keep the floors clear of wrestlers.

If you want to see how a tournament is run go to Horizon next year. That was the best run tournament I've been to in my 5 years here. And that includes brad Jones, sectional, state, McClintock, Dysart and many more.

Only tournament that I've ever been to where the wrestling started on-time both days...and they actually started 5-10 mins early each day: )
 

Coachdoerr

Well-Known Member
I have a couple questions somebody on here might be able to answer. I have been to a lot of tournaments here in Phoenix, not all, but a lot. I've noticed a couple of things. First, why does nobody run an efficient tournament? What I mean is, why does every tournament I've been to not run trackwrestling properly and instead run bout cards like it's the 80's? Why do tournaments make teams wait 3-5 hours for medal matches on Saturday, it doesn't take that long to set up. Last, why don't tournaments run jv/freshman tournaments on track?


Can anybody provide an answer?
I for one am not a true fan of track something always goes wrong internet goes down or the wrong person advances things like that with paper bout sheets at least you can look back at the matches and fix them Little things like that make a tournament go bad real fast
 

Coachdoerr

Well-Known Member
Well that doesn't make sense because track can delineate varsity, jv, and freshmen. And if it is entered correctly it wont interfere with seeding. Track up charges you because you are running two different tournaments a dual tournament and an individual.

Why are tournament directors giving an actual time for the finals? Why cant they just say that finals will start 1 hour after semis and consolation?

Why still bout cards? Especially at state?
The state tournament is ran on track wrestling
 

cdhrk3

Member
I for one am not a true fan of track something always goes wrong internet goes down or the wrong person advances things like that with paper bout sheets at least you can look back at the matches and fix them Little things like that make a tournament go bad real fast

Those are not track wrestling problems. That's bad table workers and bad wifi. Simple fix on the wrong kid advancing is tell your kid, if he won, to check with the table after the match. And state is not run properly on track. If it was they wouldn't be running bout cards like it's the early 2000's still.

The whole state tournament is run poorly. And things aren't going to change unless more coaches speak up.
 
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