After 23 years, a girls wrestling team has officially been established at school. Sophomores Isabella Simon, Olivia Hyde, and Freyja Dodson, and freshman Emily Eskins, the inaugural members of the team, believe this is only the beginning of changing women’s sports.
“As someone who plays women’s contact sports, in general, they are extremely underrepresented,” Dodson said. “It was interesting to see the parallels and how it happens across so many sports, especially in places where women aren’t necessarily seen.”
A challenge prevalent within the girls wrestling community is pressure and false perceptions the sport receives.
“In female sports in general, whenever women are doing well in a certain area, there is always that pressure when the whole world is watching her,” Dodson said. “‘Are they going to do well? [or] ‘Is it going to be as good as the men’s?’ But I think the rise of women’s sports is always incredible to see.”
As a result of being acknowledged as an official team, they feel they can be seen as an option for girls to join the program.
“There’s plenty of girls who would love to play rugby, do wrestling, and do more of these involved sports, and I think the thing that really holds people back is that we don’t get enough publicity,” Dodson said.
Joe Bull, the head coach of the girls wrestling program, established a mindset for the team where “sometimes you’re the hammer, and sometimes you’re the nail.” The team has used this as motivation to not be afraid of failure or losing a match to strengthen in-match mentality and surpass pressure.
“You’ll forgive yourself for losing, but you won’t forgive yourself if you don’t try,” Dodson said.
Using a reflective mindset, according to Dodson, allows them to put less criticism on their performance and instead to “leave it all out there.”
“If I lose, I lose, but I can learn something from it,” Hyde said. “If I win, I win, and that’s great.”
Although the team is passionate about improvement, they believe you don’t have to sacrifice who you are when competing in the sport.
“I feel like a lot of times when you do sports, ‘you have to give up being girly’ and that people are going to think you’re going to be a tomboy, but you don’t have to give any of that up at all,” Dodson said. “You can take people out on the rugby field or on the wrestling mat and still manage to be yourself.”
After competing against Henrico High School in their season opener on Dec.2, the team claimed four victories, two from Simon and one each from Dodson and Eskins.
