The Sage Informer

As the late fall turns to winter, the football pads get hung up and the wrestling mats get rolled out. The Sages wrestling team, coming off of an exciting 2023-24 season placing 4th in the Illinois Prairie Conference tournament returns some familiar faces this winter, and they are more than excited to get the season underway. Seniors Hunter Romano and Russ Brown are very familiar with the scene of cutting weight, and the discomfort that comes with it.

When asked about how cutting weight helps them with their matchups on the mats the athletes shared similar thoughts. Brown said, “It helps me stay in shape and helps with my endurance throughout the season.” Romano shared similar thoughts on the topic saying, “It gives you a more realistic matchup in terms of strength.”

While cutting weight does help the wrestlers, it 24/7 commitment while in season. When asked about how cutting weight affects their life outside of wrestling the two seniors responded with a corresponding line of thinking. Romano stated, “It makes us have a stricter diet, and add more running outside of practices.” Brown responded with “Cutting weight can be good and bad. Usually it makes me feel pretty good because of all the healthy food I am putting into my body during that time.”

Along with having to eat healthy, comes the temptations they crave while they are not cutting weight. After being questioned, the seniors saw eye-to-eye on this topic. Brown expressed, “Sometimes I get jealous when I see people going out to restaurants and other places, but it helps stay focused on the end goal.” Romano then shared, “I don’t eat as much, and I have to cut out all the extra stuff like candy, and other snacks.”

Both seniors face this challenge, and are more than ready for the up and coming 2024-25 season. You can catch the sages in action at the home meets on December 5th, December 17th, and 19th. The events start at 6:00 p.m. and the home season closes on February 8th (2025), starting at 9:00 a.m.

Andrew Neef, Staff Writer

neean25@sages.us