For the past several summers, the Jones County High wrestling team has made a pilgrimage to Virginia to attend a summer camp hosted by the famed Granby School of Wrestling that boasts producing 60 state champion teams in the past 10 years.

For a couple of reasons, coach Daniel Lewis and the Greyhounds found themselves far from Virginia in a cramped field house by the high school track last week.

“With gas prices the way they are and considering that the price of Granby camp has gone up as well, we decided to run our own Granby camp here,” Lewis said.

The “mini” Granby camp was held from 9-11 a.m. each day last week for Jones County High wrestlers only.

Lewis said attendance on average represented 10 of the team’s 14 weight classes.

The track field house served as a suitable venue for this turnout with renovations taking place to the school’s gymnasium.

“It’s a little bit smaller, but with the numbers we’ve had it’s been the perfect size,” Lewis said. “If we had any more, we wouldn’t be able to fit them in here.”

With half of a wrestling mat down on the concrete floor and the tin roof and walls radiating heat around the room, the wrestlers were in for an intense two hours each day.

“We have to take a lot of breaks, because it starts getting hot in here and kids are sweating really bad,” Lewis said. “But they don’t seem to mind. When it comes to wrestling, it’s sort of a roll-your-sleeves-up-and-go kind of sport, or a blue-collar sport, or whatever you want to call it.

“Things like condition or temperature of the wrestling room don’t matter. We’re going to go gung-ho regardless of where we are. Having a nice place might actually have a bad effect, because they might not be as focused on what they’re doing.”

The wrestlers spent the first hour of each day reviewing the previous day’s techniques and the second hour going over new techniques for the next day.

“Granby camp teaches a whole system of how to wrestle on bottom, top, and neutral,” Lewis said. “Since we’ve gone up there over the years, I’ve managed to pick up on all the moves and what they teach. I consider myself lucky enough to be exposed to that, and I feel like I can teach that same system.”

The coach said that by hosting his own camp, he could pick and choose what techniques he believes will benefit his wrestlers most.

“There are times at Granby camp where I think sometimes they introduce too much. A kid may walk away knowing 500 moves but only being able to be good at one of them,” he said. “At something like this, they may only learn 15 moves, but I feel like they can do all 15 in a match.”

In order to instill those select few moves, Lewis instituted the use of line drills where the wrestlers are placed into groups and are called upon in rapid succession to hit moves that they have already practiced to the point where they should be able to do them quickly.

“It’s real fast-paced and intense, and you can get in quite a lot of repetition in a very short amount of time,” Lewis said.

The coach said that he feels like the most important part of the week was his wrestler’s improvement working from the bottom position.

“There are two things you have to be able to do in a wrestling match if you want to win – take your opponent down and get away if you are on bottom,” Lewis said.

“If you can work well on top, that’s just an extra bonus. You can always just let the guy up and keep wrestling on your feet. But bottom is one of those important areas because you have to be able to get out from underneath a guy.”

Lewis said the only downside to holding his own camp was the loss of the team-building experience that takes place during the trip to Virginia.

“You spend so much time together during the week with the trip up and trip back and going to breakfast, lunch, and dinner everyday that there’s a lot of camaraderie and team concept involved there,” he said.

The trade-off that took place was ultimately worth it, however, he said.

“We lose that bonding experience that you get going off to camp for the week together, but, at the same time, I feel like we get as much accomplished in a shorter amount of time,” Lewis said. “All things considered, this was definitely the way to go this summer.”

Lewis said he is excited about the upcoming year when he will return a crop of wrestlers who were mostly sophomores and juniors on this past season’s squad.

“We lost a few seniors, but I really feel like the core of our team is coming back,” he said. “I think as a team we can be better this year than we have the last couple of years because everybody is an upperclassman at this point.”

The losses of successful seniors Clyde Haynes and Doug Stephens will have to be compensated for by the improvement of the returning wrestlers.

“For these kids that are going to be juniors and seniors this year, it’s their turn to step up and score the points and start placing higher at tournaments,” Lewis said.

“There are enough kids with enough experience here that I don’t see why we can’t be competitive week in and week out, especially in the dual meet format.”