Practice Planning and Program Building for Wrestling

with Rob Koll,
North Carolina Head Coach;
Stanford Head Wrestling Coach from 2021 to 2023;
Cornell University Head Coach from 1993 to 2021;
2017 EIWA Coach of the Year;
20x Ivy League Champions;
2x NCAA Championship Team Runner-Up;
2011 NWCA National Duals Champions;
2005 NWCA Division I Coach of the Year;
wrestled for North Carolina;
1988 NCAA Champion;
4x All-American;
2x World Cup Champion

Rob Koll built Cornell into a national power on the wrestling mat from 1993 to 2021- including runner-up in 2010 and 2011, as well as winning 20 league championships.

Now, you can get the same drills and techniques that Coach Koll uses in his room everyday.

Koll begins with a typical warm-up session that contains more than 15 exercises. His warm-up session takes 15 minutes and features a lot of gymnastics techniques to maximize your wrestlers' athleticism. The exercises start basic and move to advanced drills - all relating to wrestling in some way.

In addition, Koll includes more than 10 conditioning drills with a sport specific twist. These drills all feature full body motion and concentrate on quick starts and explosiveness.

To compliment the warm-up, you will see over 25 wrestling drills that Koll focuses on for 30 minutes to an hour every day in practice. These short offense and defense drills focus on technique, work on set-ups and foot motion, while developing conditioning, hip power and athleticism - all in a match-like setting. Among the techniques you'll see are shrugs, knee taps, high and low singles, bar arms, foot fighting and more.

Moving off the mat, Koll gives you his philosophy behind how he built his program to the level it is today. He touches on a number of topics, including:

• Sleep deprivation - More sleep allows your athletes to convert short term memory to long term and build up muscle
• Micro practices - get same amount of work from the team, but not in a team setting. Allows you to individualize technique and gives you increased contact with wrestlers - which in turn gets them to feel more connected to the program and coaches);
• Practice phases - See different practice routines from October to December, January to February and for the last month of the year.
• Strength Training - See the key to Cornell's success - volume and intensity. Koll discusses three different phases of strength training, which has resulted in his wrestlers have maintained or gained strength throughout the season.

41 minutes. 2010.