"Viking Voyage: U.P. Grappler's Trip Journal (Eighth Entry)" by Frank Sports Talk (F.W. Manning II)

Viking Voyage: U.P. Grappler's Trip Journal (Eighth Entry)

July 14, 2011

The Pilot Sports Team has enlisted the help of Union Pines' senior wrestler Mike Brennan, to keep a trip journal so fans and readers can stay updated on how the boys' excursion is progressing.

In his junior year Mike wrestled at 160-pounds for U.P. winning the Cape Fear Valley Conference Championship and placing third in the state at the NCHSAA 3A state wrestling tournament.

Read his Initial Entry

What follows is the eighth entry in an on-going online journal Mike is keeping and will add to throughout UPHS Wrestling's 2011 summer camp trip:

Day 11, July 14, 2:02 p.m.

We left Bucknell this morning for our cabin in West Virginia.The last two days have been really busy, so I haven't had time to keep up with the blog. Almost every day we wake up at 6 and usually don't get back to the dorms until about 11 p.m. That leaves very little time for relaxing and doing laundry. I was up until midnight last night doing my two weeks worth of laundry.

We ended up taking 2nd in the dual tournament to Vorhees, a top-8 team in New Jersey. It was a hard fought match; the difference was our underclassmen. They are still learning the importance of not giving up pins in a close dual. The final score of the dual was 26-33. The coaching staff and myself aren't worried about this happening anymore. The preseason workouts and the extensive training during the actual season will toughen them up.

Shortly after our finals match, the first two rounds of the tournament started. I was done pretty early. I won two matches that with less than a 10-minute break in between. We would have had the final round of the tournament this morning, but the coaches decided we were all pretty beat up. I've been wrestling on a sprained ankle since Ohio and Sam Bartram has a strained bicep. We should be at our cabin in about an hour, and we go white water rafting tomorrow morning.

-- Mike