The Easiest Ways to Lose Weight for Wrestling

Collegiate, high school and even middle school wrestlers have all been exposed to the desire to lose weight. Wrestling works on a weight class system and the myth is that if you drop weight (also known as cutting weight) before a wrestling meet, you will be stronger than the opponent who did not cut the weight. The issue is that almost every wrestler is cutting weight and many of them in very unhealthy ways. If you must lose weight there are some healthier ways to do it, but you must always listen to your own body and avoid anything dangerous.

  1. Consequences of Losing Weight Quickly

    • In the late 1990s, there were many collegiate wrestling reforms after three college wrestlers died attempting to lose weight. Billy Saylor, 19 years old, of Campbell University in North Carolina, was riding a stationary bike in the early morning when he suffered a heart attack. Joseph LaRossa was 22 years old and was wearing a rubber suit and riding a stationary bike as well when he collapsed and died. Jeff Reese of the University of Michigan, aged 21, died of rhabdomyolysis, a breakdown of skeletal muscle at the cellular level from excessive exercise. His rubber suit and dehydration also led to heart malfunction and kidney failure.

      Some other effects of quickly losing weight for wrestling are reduced endurance capacity, reduced muscle strength, depleted important electrolytes, decreased anaerobic capacity, lower plasma and blood volume, decreased cardiac stroke volume, lower oxygen consumption, impaired heat regulation, decreased renal blood flow and kidney filtration of the blood, depleted muscle and liver glycogen stores, and possible cardiac arrhythmia. Consider this your advisory for not losing weight rapidly under any circumstances.

    How to Lose Weight

    • You must plan ahead if you wish you lose weight for wrestling. The weight loss that you take part in must be done gradually over the course of four to six months. If you wish to truly be in an unnatural weight class for you, you must strive to make it natural. That means improving your diet to the point of perfection: chock full of fruits and vegetables, lean sources of protein, nuts and other healthy sources of monounsaturated fats, and vacant of extra sugar, processed food, alcohol and drugs.

      One way to increase your metabolism is to eat five or six small meals a day instead of the typical three. This will make you very hungry when combined with one or two workouts a day, and you will slowly but surely lose fat. Train hard and safely. Let your wrestling coaches and your parents know what your plan is so that they can help you reach your goal safely. If someone wants you to stop your plan and lose weight the normal way, cite to him the statistics from the first section of this article and tell him you do not wish to end up with any of those problems.

      If you use all of your discipline before a wrestling season even begins to set in place the habits of proper eating and exercise, you will be able to lose the weight you need.

    The Healthiest Way to Wrestle

    • If you are unwilling to perform a four- to six-month training program to get down to the weight you want, then perhaps it isn't worth losing the weight at all. You need to be responsible for your own body and losing all the weight in one quick shot is neither healthy nor responsible. Either lose the weight over the course of a long training period or wrestle at your natural weight. There is a chance that the other wrestler will be so tired from losing weight that you'll have an extreme advantage anyway.