Check out these 20 MUST-HAVE training tips and techniques for improved wrestling. Follow the tips in this post and you’ll transform yourself into a ‘force to be reckoned with.’

1. Rest Pause - Rest Pause is a strength conditioning technique that works to stimulate more muscle fibers during a strength training set. In return, you will be rewarded with improved strength gains at a faster rate. It is an especially good technique for wrestlers because it simulates similiar conditions to a wrestling match, and therefore contributes to your anaerobic conditioning.

To perform a rest-pause set you choose a weight that you can lift for anywhere between 6-10 repetitions. Perform your set to momentary muscular failure. When failure is reached, rest for 15 breaths, then repeat. The second set will only allow you to get a few repetitions. This second set is again taken to failure. Rest 15 more breaths. Finish by lifting the weight for a couple last repetitions.

I like rest pause style training because you go all-out for up to a minute, take short rest, then repeat… just as in an actual match.

2. Static Repetitions – Static repetitions are performed during your strength training workouts. You perform them on exercises such as leg extensions, leg curls, lateral raises, barbell curls, pullups, machine exercises etc. that force you to contract the muscle in the middle position. In other words, the exercise is at its hardest when you lift the weight.

You do static reps at the end of a regular set by first taking the exercise to momentary muscular failure. At this point, you have someone help you lift the weight to the top position and you hold it as long as you can. This forces you to tire out a muscle when it’s fully-contracted. This technique goes well with the needs of a wrestling match where you frequently force the muscles to statically contract against the force of your opponent.

3. Uphill Running – If you need to get into wrestling condition fast you might want to add hill sprints to your training regimen. Hill sprints will get you into wrestling condition faster than anything. They require you to run up a hill, then walk down. You repeat this for a number of sprints. You progress by doing more hill sprints in the same amount of time, while cutting down the rest. You can also sprint up the hill faster than before for a progressive workout.

Another great benefit of hill sprints is that they will help strip off body fat like nothing else. There is a complete metabolic stimulation that is achieved when you start doing hill sprints. This increased metabolic activity serves to use more body fat as fuel… especially when you sprint immediately following strength training.

4. Sled Pulls – I like sled pulls for wrestlers because they help get you into great anaerobic condition. Sled pulls are also great for developing core and leg strength. When you pull a sled in a forward motion you get a fantastic quadriceps workout (the 4 muscles of the front thigh – rectus femoris, vastus medialis, vastus lateralis, vastus intermedius). When you pull a sled while walking backwards you get a fantastic hamstrings workout. The core muscles serve as stabilizers the whole time.

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Sidebar

Here’s a great tip for sled pulls. Sled Pulls don’t traditionally give you a great hip workout. I’d recommend that you do them in combination with a leg press, deadlift or squat. For an even better overall hip and thigh workout, do them immediately following the leg press, deadlift or squat.

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5. Use MCT’s When Cutting Weight – Wrestlers traditionally cut weight by restricting food intake. Anyone who’s read my stuff knows that I’m completely opposed to barbaric methods of cutting weight that only serve to make you weaker and inefficient as an athlete on the wrestling mat.

This is why I think it’s a good idea to increase your fats when cutting weight. But not just any fats. You don’t want to increase your saturated fats. These are the bad fats. Saturated fats are solid at room temperature, and you find them in fatty meats, as well as dairy products (that aren’t skim) and fried foods.

There is a fat that you can consume that will give you more energy while cutting weight. The fat is a medium-chain-triglyceride type. The MCT’s are a unique chain of fats. They can be easily broken down and used for energy.

A great way to add some MCT’s to your meal plan is to use skim milk with a protein powder as if you’re making a protein shake, but add about 1/4 cup of coconut oil. This is a good source of MCT’s and will be healthy when you’re cutting weight and dropping carbs. It is a good idea to include a good amount of healthy fats in your diet all of the time as an athlete. It will keep you leaner, stronger and more energetic.

6. Start With Pre-Testing – Before you begin a strength and conditioning program to improve your wrestling performance, you should do pre-testing.

This means you will want to know you current strength levels on basic exercises. I like to use a compound/multi-joint movement such as the bench press for the upper body, and deadlift for lower body. Find out what your best set of 5 is and use that as your base.

—————————- Great Tip ——————————-

It’s not always practical or safe to ‘max-out’ on strength exercises due to the possibility of injury. That’s why I advise finding out your 5 rep max for each exercise. After that you can use the following formula to determine what your 1 repetition maximum would be based on the 5 rep set (or any number of repetitions for that matter):

- Take your weight lifted and multiply by .03335 (Ex. 315 x .03335)

- Take the product found above and multiply by the number of repetitions you performed. (Ex. 10.50 x 5 = 52.52)

- Add the original weight to the product above. (Ex. 315 + 52.52)

- This sum gives you the approximate 1-repetition max on this exercise (Ex. 367)

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You will also want to do pre-testing on your cardio level with timed runs, and your stretching.

7. Work on Your Weaknesses – After you’ve done pre-testing, you’ll want to work on your weaknesses to bring them up, while continuing to enhance your strengths. In the case of wrestling strength and conditioning, you can accomplish this through unilateral training. Unilateral training is when you work one side of the body at a time.

The first phase of your strength training program might consist of exercises such as one-leg squats, one-arm rows, one-arm incline dumbbell press etc. The idea is to work one side of the body so that more muscle fibers can be stimulated during the set. This will help you bring up those weaknesses. Your first phase will therefore necessitate a lot of dumbbell work.

8. Include an Anterior Reach – Wrestlers need great hamstring strength in order to excel on the mat. The hamstrings are kind of like the rear wheel drive of a muscle-car.

Most guys get on a leg curl machine in order to work the hamstrings. However, if you ONLY use a hamstring curl machine you are limiting the strength development in the hamstrings. This is because the hamstrings must be stretched while supporting your body weight in order to fire off more muscle fibers.

Doing exercises that involve an anterior reach will get your hamstrings much stronger, especially when combined with a leg curl. You can do a Romanian Deadlift or a one-leg Romanian Deadlift to accomplish this.

9. Include a Strength/Hypertrophy Phase – After you’ve evened out your strengths and weaknesses with unilateral training, you’ll want to build a base level of strength and muscular size.

This is when we start to include compound exercises that work a lot of muscle at one time. You’ve also heard these exercises referred to as full-body exercises. Basically, you are training each muscle group while forcing it to move the most amount of weight through its range of motion. For instance, if you’ve ever performed a triceps pushdown with a rope you know that you can get quite a burn in the triceps muscle. But if this were the only exercise you did for triceps they wouldn’t develop a whole lot of strength. Now, if you replace them (or add to) with Weighted Dips, then you’re working your triceps with considerably more resistance throughout their full range of motion. This in turn will make the triceps considerably stronger while strengthening the muscles of the chest, shoulders, back and core as well.

Good exercises for this phase might be:

barbell squats
front squats
trap bar deadlifts
barbell deadlifts
barbell bent rows
t-bar rows
dips
medium grip bench press
close grip incline press
standing military press
These are just a few that I thought of off the top of my head. There are many more…

10. Include a Power/Speed Phase - Once you’ve built a base of strength and size with the previous phase, you’ll want to make your newly-acquired muscular size and strength faster. This is done with both Plyometric exercises as well as Olympic-style lifts.

Plyometrics are good to use after you’ve built strength… at the beginning of a workout. This helps ‘wake your muscles up.’ Box Jumps, Plyometric Pushups, and Bounding are 3 examples of plyometric exercises that can really help increase your reaction time ability and speed on the mat. Let me forewarn you… plyometrics are useless if used when you haven’t built a solid strength foundation. They are also ineffective if used too often. You want to use them in shorter bursts especially as the season gets closer.

Olympic-style lifts are strength exercises that require you to move the bar fast. Some of these exercises are:

Hang Cleans
Power Cleans
High Pulls
Snatch
Hang Snatch
Clean and Press
I’ve found these to work best in conjunction with plyometrics (done first) and for limited periods of time.

11. Train Your Internal Obliques – When you train the core for improved wrestling, you need to include an exercise of two that will require you to twist while performing them. This will incorporate the internal oblique muscles that are so important to your ability to move quickly on the mat. The internal obliques are located in your waist. I like twisting crunches, one-arm medicine ball crunches, or woodchoppers to train this area.

Be sure to train any twisting core exercises prior to traditional abdominal training where you are doing a full-abdominal exercise such as crunches.

12. Build an Aerobic Base – There are 2 things I always notice that wrestling teams do that are limiting their conditioning programs.

The first thing is that the wrestlers do too much jogging in an effort to get into shape for the mat. Wrestling is an anaerobic sport, meaning that the energy requirement does not require oxygen. Guys do countless hours of jogging. This might be good to break a sweat, and feel well-trained, but the carry-over to the demands of an actual match are poor.

The second thing I see wrestlers do with conditioning that is incorrect is doing tons of sprinting but NO jogging. Yes, I said that wrestling is anaerobic. But jogging does serve a purpose in a wrestling conditioning program.

Although jogging is aerobic and doesn’t serve the direct needs of a wrestling match, it is good to jog only one time per week when conditioning for wrestling. This will help you keep an aerobic base. The reason this is important is because you will build superior anaerobic condition by starting off with an aerobic base, and keeping it up throughout your season.

The trick is not to overdo it. If I were to have my wrestlers do 3 running/conditioning workouts weekly, only 1 of these workouts would involve low-intensity jogging.

13. Get the Anaerobic Edge – I just mentioned the need for an aerobic base when training. Most of your conditioning should be of the anaerobic type however. This is accomplished through faster, more-intense running.

Two of the best anaerobic conditioning methods are sprints and intervals.

Sprints are simply short distance, all-out runs for speed. You perform a sprint, rest, and then repeat. Various distances for sprinting are recommended. You can use variety. I like to use sprints from 10 meters up to 100 meters for athletes.

Intervals are when you run for a relatively short distance with all-out speed, and then slow it down for the same distance you just sprinted… allowing your heart rate to slow down. This is repeated for the required number of times.

Each of these methods work great. They need to be progressive and require more volume (number of sprints) or decreased rest in between sprints.

14. Use the Farmer’s Walk – This exercise is a total-body exercise. It requires you to hold two heavier dumbbells and walk until you can no longer hold them. This is great for that wrestling grip that you need. You can do them with a partner by doing them as long as possible, then putting them down. Your partner then continues until he is fully-fatigued. You then relieve your partner by taking the dumbbells and continuing.

This is a fantastic grip builder… a fantastic full-body exercise… a fantastic conditioning exercise.

Do these at the end of your strength training workout… or else you’ll be useless on the rest of your exercises.

15. Use Minicycles – Here’s a technique I learned from former NFL football player, Jim Bert. I was just a kid when he taught me this, and I believe it contributed greatly to the powerlifting success I achieved. I’ve had athletes do this ever since, and it’s been amazing. It’s called minicycles. Minicycles are basically 4 week long miniprograms. The key however, is to work as hard as you can for 3 weeks, and then back-off on the 4th week of the minicycle.

Unless you are taking anabolic steroids (please DON’T) you are limited by your body’s recuperative ability. Your body goes through rythmns. It can be strong for a short period of time, and then needs to be undertrained for a short period of time to allow your nervous system to recuperate.

When Jim Bert told me to do this, he recommended that I train like a mad-man for 3 weeks and then take 1 week off from training. I don’t mind taking off from training every 12 weeks or so, but I couldn’t stand the thought of doing it every 4th week. So I modified it by simply decreasing my training volume by one-half, and/or decreasing my weights by 20% every 4th week of training.

The result? More consistent strength gains will minimal chances of hitting a training plateau.

In my new Workouts for Warriors program, I have the guys do the very same thing with their training. Every 4th workout is watered-down a bit. It is already proving to be successful with those that have been keeping my abreast of their progress.

16. Use a Trap Bar – By using a Trap Bar when you do deadlifts, you maximize the use of your hips and glutes. This is crucial to overall wrestling-specific training. I’m not saying that you can’t benefit from good ‘ole barbell deadlifts, but the Trap Bar can’t be beaten for training your wrestling muscles.

The Trap Bar allows you to pull the weight off the floor through the midline of your body. A regular barbell deadlift is pulled from in front of the body. This involves a lot of lower back. The Trap Bar trains the lower back too, but is superior for wrestling training.

17. Standing Shoulder Press – The standing front shoulder press can be done with a regular barbell or even better, with a thick bar.

This exercise is a mainstay in the programs of my athletes…

It gives a tremendous amount of work to not only the shoulders, but the core, hips, lower and mid-back, and almost all of your muscles which must act as stabilizers. You will benefit on the mat by doing these in your workouts.

18. Use Close, Underhand Grip Chinups – In wrestling, you must have strong lat muscles, forearms, biceps and grip. Any takedown you ever make is made possible by this combination.

This is why wrestlers always benefit by doing pullups…

The problem I see is that most guys want to take an overhand, wide-grip on the chinning bar. This is limiting and is why I get guys to change to an underhand, close-grip on the bar. When you take an underhand, close-grip on the chinning bar, you force the latissimus dorsi muscle to stretch and contract through a full range of motion. This will have a direct carry-over to your mat performance. A front grip, wide pullup motion only forces the lats to work through about 2/3 of their range of motion. The lats are worked fully when the elbows are pulled down and back during the exercise. Try out these 2 variations and see if you don’t agree that the close, underhand grip chinup is much more effective.

19. Keep it Brief - Contrary to what a lot of coaches preach, shorter workouts are much more effective for wrestling conditioning.

Workouts should be kept under 35 minutes total work time.

When you do shorter, more intense workouts you will stimulate the production of testosterone and growth hormone. These hormones are what allow you to get bigger and stronger.

Many guys are confused (probably because they read those crappy bodybuilding magazines that are nothing but fancy sales letters for their products) and think that more is better. This couldn’t be further from the truth. If you have to take more than 35 minutes to complete your strength training workout for wrestling, you’re either not working hard enough or you are doing too much volume.

20. Morning Strength Training for Ultimate Progress - I realize that strength training first thing in the morning for many guys is impracticle due to school, jobs, and other obligations. However, if you can do it, DO IT!

It’s been shown in numerous studies that when you strength train shortly after waking, you can elicit more of a hormone response.

This hormonal response can transfer into more significant strength development over the course of a full training program (ie. summer training)

You also have a better chance of burning more fat by strength training first thing in the morning. Your metabolism will speed up for the day, and therefore your food that you consume will be used to help repair the body. This will lead to less food stored as fat.

Hope these help you reach success this season!

Steve

PS.  Many of these tips, strategies are found in my Ultimate Wrestling Strength program.  You can get it FREE this week with a one-year membership to my Wrestling Performance site!  Click here to join Wrestling Performance and get your FREE Ultimate Wrestling Strength + Ultimate Wrestling Nutrition ebooks!