Terry Steiner: The Art of the Leg Lace - "Going Beyond the Technique"

Many wrestlers struggle with the par terre aspect of freestyle wrestling, as it's dramatically different from the typical mat work in scholastic and collegiate wrestling. Frequently, wrestlers will score the takedown, cover the upper body, and then get stood back up without scoring additional points. Athletes spend 80% of their time attacking legs on their feet, so it makes sense to continue attacking them once they're on the mat.

US National Women's Coach Terry Steiner shows a system of turns for freestyle that can be easily added into any wrestler's arsenal. He also covers how to counter several common defenses to the lace and completes the training with other attacks based from the leg attack. Steiner has spent most of his coaching career developing this system, which has led to several world titles on the women's team.

Laces Off Leg Attacks

The best way to score points on the mat in freestyle is by transitioning immediately into a turn off of a successful takedown. Since most wrestlers are most comfortable with leg attacks, the natural transition is into the leg lace. Coach Steiner demonstrates transitions into the leg lace from single legs, double legs and high crotches. Additionally, he shows a variety of ways to transition directly into the lace from your opponent's takedown defense.

A Pathway to Attack the Body

Coach Steiner believes in attacking the straight leg at all times. This gives your athletes a blueprint to attack on the mat. He demonstrates several options right off the leg attack that lead to big time scoring. These options can be, but aren't limited to, cross to a lace, bent knee to a leg in, bottom leg turk, crotch lift, and gut wrench. All of the turns are dynamic, right off the score.

Leg Lace System

If a wrestler is able to lock up the lace immediately from a takedown, there's always the potential to score big points off of consecutive turns. Many savvy opponents will have a solid initial defense to prevent the leg lace from getting locked up immediately. However, many wrestlers don't recognize that they're still in a strong position, and fail to score additional points.

Steiner demonstrates a complete system to transition into a number of different leg lace variations off the most common and effective defenses. He shows:

• How to get an opponent back to the mat when they come to their base.
• How to split the ankles when the opponent is sitting on their hips.
• How to change off to a cross knee turn when you cannot break through the opponent's lace defense.

These follow-up attacks open up a whole new world for many athletes that feel stymied from a basic lace getting shut down.

Women's Wrestling

As the USA Wrestling Women's National Coach since 2002, Coach Steiner has been a passionate advocate for women's wrestling. In a lecture format, he discusses the benefit of incorporating women into your program and the broader wrestling community. He talks about his methodology for creating opportunities for women in the sport, and how he feels it will benefit the sport as a whole.

Coach Steiner gives a complete system for attacking on the ground in freestyle, allowing your wrestlers to score big points that are often left behind. This video is appropriate for coaches and athletes of all levels.

"This video was incredible! After watching for 20 minutes I already had more answers than you normally get from most videos. He shows so much technique and talks about how to develop a system of lower body turns. This is by far the best video I have ever seen on Par Terre." - Customer Review

Produced at the 2016 USA Wrestling Silver Coaches Clinic in Iowa City (IA).

63 minutes. 2016.