The Greyhound wrestlers won’t just be wrestling outside again this year in the midst of the Main Street Gray Hometown Christmas Market.
They’ll be doing so out in the middle of the street.
For the second year in a row, the Main Street Dual will bring wrestling, usually a winter indoor sport, outside. This year the Greyhounds will host Dublin with a start time set for 2 p.m. Saturday with the mats placed in the middle the streets of downtown Gray.
So much like the Bruce Springsteen song lyric, the directive for Saturday is to see wrestling “out in the street.”
“It’s really good; it’s fun and something different. Our kids know lots of kids from Dublin, so it’ll be fun. It’s fun to be able to do something like that together,” Greyhounds head coach Adam Gillhouse said. “We’ll be wrestling in the middle of the day. It should be a great atmosphere and be fun not just for our kids but for our community as well.”
One big change from last year’s outdoor match is the timing. Last year’s bout against Mary Persons was held at night. This year’s event has been moved earlier in the day to prevent last year’s occurrence of the mats becoming slick due to evening dewpoint levels.
“Last year we went later, and the atmosphere was great until the dewpoint set in and made the mats really slick,” Gillhouse said.
In the midst of how different and unique Saturday will be, the goal of winning does not change once wrestling begins.
“Any time we walk on the mat, the expectation is to win,” Gillhouse said. “You enjoy the atmosphere, but once you start wrestling, it’s all about competing.”
That also plays into the development of the Greyhounds schedule as it builds toward January’s region and state duals followed by individual matches.
“The goal is to put guys in as many different environments as possible. That’s something that we preach, that ‘wrestling is wrestling,’ “ Gillhouse said. “They’ve wrestled in big and small venues, but once you are on the mat, it’s wrestling live like we do every day in practice.”
