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Authors: Glenn Stout
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undefeated season.
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Typically, a wrestling match begins with a series of skirmishes, starting from the neutral position. Grapplers paw and push, cuff and tug one another until one senses he has unbalanced his opponent enough to create an opening, and then lunges at one or both of his legs. The lunged-at wrestler tries to sprawl his legs away or, if he cannot, gives them up and counterattacks with his upper body. This begins the âscrambleââa battle of vectors, inertia, and angular acceleration, alternating between strained counterpoise and flashes of explosive motion, as each wrestler tries for a takedown.
The critical thing about the scramble is that, at the college level and beyond, it is almost entirely reflexive, moving far too fast to be thought through. Scrambling wrestlers rely on muscle memory, developed through extensive repetition and retained for years. (Hence the theatrics in the audience at many wrestling meets, where former competitors jerk their legs, claw the air, and otherwise try to gesticulate their way free of the fracas before them.) Occasionally, a wrestler exerts some conscious control as he scrambles, deliberately trying something new and counter-instinctual. This is usually the point at which he loses the scramble.
Wrestlers scrambling against Robles regularly reached for the leg that wasnât there, the way people who learned to drive on a manual transmission car sometimes grab for a phantom gear stick in an automatic. This was especially true when opponents tried to âturn the cornerâ clockwise, or slip past Roblesâs right side to complete a takedown. With no right ankle to catch hold of, they lacked the anchor they needed to finish their attack. A number of other moves were also literally out of reach, including the navy ride, the western ride, and some cradles. One of the most popular and effective maneuvers for the man on top, known simply as âlegs,â involves lacing one leg through the bottom manâs same-side leg and turning it outward at the hip. Needless to say, there is no âlegsâ without legs.
Whenever an opponent attempted to gain purchase on a part of Robles that does not exist, muscle memory failed him. It was a bewildering and anxiety-provoking moment. âA lot of the stuff youâre used to doing on a more able-bodied wrestler, you canât do,â Matthew Snyder, Roblesâs first-round victim at the 2011 championships, told me. âYouâre looking for the leg and itâs just not there.â When this happened repeatedly, as it did for anyone who hadnât trained with a one-legged wrestler before facing Robles, frustration, confusion, and ultimately demoralization set in. This was a fatal combination. No wrestler can win with despondency in his heart, at least not against a foe as formidable as Robles.
What was an opponent to do? Roblesâs anatomy suggested at least two possibilities. One was to attack his leg relentlessly. Every time Robles scooted across the mat or attempted a takedown, he drove off the same leg. Every time a competitor yanked his ankle outward, the same knee got wrenched against the joint. As a result, the muscles, tendons, and ligaments of Roblesâs leg endured terrific strain, and thus were more prone to fatigue and injury than those of a wrestler who can distribute the same stresses over two legs. By his senior year of high school, his knee was so stiff after practices that he could barely move it. If an opponent could have somehow consistently circumvented Roblesâs hulking upper body, he might have eventually been able to take out his relatively vulnerable leg.
A second, and perhaps underutilized, strategy for scoring against Robles can be found 5,000 miles east of Arizona, in the Tuileries gardens of Paris. Among dozens of giant statues dotting the Tuileries is one of the Greek mythical hero Theseus, in close combat with the Minotaur, the bovine-headed,
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Typically, a wrestling match begins with a series of skirmishes, starting from the neutral position. Grapplers paw and push, cuff and tug one another until one senses he has unbalanced his opponent enough to create an opening, and then lunges at one or both of his legs. The lunged-at wrestler tries to sprawl his legs away or, if he cannot, gives them up and counterattacks with his upper body. This begins the âscrambleââa battle of vectors, inertia, and angular acceleration, alternating between strained counterpoise and flashes of explosive motion, as each wrestler tries for a takedown.
The critical thing about the scramble is that, at the college level and beyond, it is almost entirely reflexive, moving far too fast to be thought through. Scrambling wrestlers rely on muscle memory, developed through extensive repetition and retained for years. (Hence the theatrics in the audience at many wrestling meets, where former competitors jerk their legs, claw the air, and otherwise try to gesticulate their way free of the fracas before them.) Occasionally, a wrestler exerts some conscious control as he scrambles, deliberately trying something new and counter-instinctual. This is usually the point at which he loses the scramble.
Wrestlers scrambling against Robles regularly reached for the leg that wasnât there, the way people who learned to drive on a manual transmission car sometimes grab for a phantom gear stick in an automatic. This was especially true when opponents tried to âturn the cornerâ clockwise, or slip past Roblesâs right side to complete a takedown. With no right ankle to catch hold of, they lacked the anchor they needed to finish their attack. A number of other moves were also literally out of reach, including the navy ride, the western ride, and some cradles. One of the most popular and effective maneuvers for the man on top, known simply as âlegs,â involves lacing one leg through the bottom manâs same-side leg and turning it outward at the hip. Needless to say, there is no âlegsâ without legs.
Whenever an opponent attempted to gain purchase on a part of Robles that does not exist, muscle memory failed him. It was a bewildering and anxiety-provoking moment. âA lot of the stuff youâre used to doing on a more able-bodied wrestler, you canât do,â Matthew Snyder, Roblesâs first-round victim at the 2011 championships, told me. âYouâre looking for the leg and itâs just not there.â When this happened repeatedly, as it did for anyone who hadnât trained with a one-legged wrestler before facing Robles, frustration, confusion, and ultimately demoralization set in. This was a fatal combination. No wrestler can win with despondency in his heart, at least not against a foe as formidable as Robles.
What was an opponent to do? Roblesâs anatomy suggested at least two possibilities. One was to attack his leg relentlessly. Every time Robles scooted across the mat or attempted a takedown, he drove off the same leg. Every time a competitor yanked his ankle outward, the same knee got wrenched against the joint. As a result, the muscles, tendons, and ligaments of Roblesâs leg endured terrific strain, and thus were more prone to fatigue and injury than those of a wrestler who can distribute the same stresses over two legs. By his senior year of high school, his knee was so stiff after practices that he could barely move it. If an opponent could have somehow consistently circumvented Roblesâs hulking upper body, he might have eventually been able to take out his relatively vulnerable leg.
A second, and perhaps underutilized, strategy for scoring against Robles can be found 5,000 miles east of Arizona, in the Tuileries gardens of Paris. Among dozens of giant statues dotting the Tuileries is one of the Greek mythical hero Theseus, in close combat with the Minotaur, the bovine-headed,
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