'Tough Time' Drills: Mat Work

with Troy Nickerson,
Northern Colorado University Head Coach;
former Iowa State University Assistant Coach;
NCAA D1 National Champion and 4x All-American at Cornell University;
the first 5x state champion in New York

Mat wrestling is a forgotten art. Most kids want to work on takedowns, but wrestling consists of three areas in total that need to be worked on.

In this video, four-time All-American Troy Nickerson shows you how to incorporate a series of drills that will improve wrestlers in the top and bottom positions at the same time. He starts with some foundational drills that are later integrated into other drills.

Coach Nickerson teaches you drills that you can put your own moves into and have success. Bottom wrestlers will learn how to maintain a solid base and how to get their hips away for an escape or reversal. Top wrestlers will learn to maintain forward pressure and hip control. These drills will build good instincts and will give wrestlers the confidence to hit their moves in competition.

Bottom Position Wrestling Drills

Nickerson builds wrestlers by getting them to embrace the basics. He starts with a drill that helps the bottom wrestler learn to maintain a good base position while creating space on bottom with a knee slide or changeover. It's important that a wrestler has great hips, which helps them to move on bottom. He covers three different drills to help improve hip heist for all wrestlers. He then uses several drills that cover stand ups, sit-outs, and Granby rolls.

All the moves are combined, and the scenarios are endless. There are also drills for clearing legs, working reversals, and re-attacking from a stand up. This series isn't just focused on technique, it also incorporates whistle start drills and drills from bottom with mat returns. These drills can advance athletes to a high level in a short amount of time.

Top Position Wrestling Drills

The second half of this video starts with teaching the top wrestler how to break down an opponent's solid base by keeping active forward pressure. Drills are added that emphasize riding under the arms and hip control while staying off the knees. Key concepts cover countering all offensive scoring attempts from the bottom wrestler.

Coach Nickerson's drills also touch on maintaining control when the bottom man rolls, sits out, or stands up.

You'll get a drill that Nickerson uses with his wrestlers to improve returning wrestlers to the mat. It covers how to land and how to use multiple returns. There are also drills for using tilts and pinning combinations. These drills are then combined to encourage chain wrestling on the mat.

Coach Nickerson does a great job of setting athletes up for success. This is a fantastic video for athletes and coaches that want to improve rapidly!

54 minutes. 2018.