The Athlete of the Week for Jan. 9 is Senior Wrestler Derek Deichert.
Deichert has dominated so far this season with a 16-3 record, dominating match after match. He has been the star player on this team helping the team to try and push to get their first win and even being ranked #18 in the state for his weight class.
Having lots of pressure on you comes with being ranked that highly and when it comes to being ranked that high Deichert said, “It’s definitely a blessing and a curse, the blessing comes because it gets my name out there for other schools and college coaches, but the curse is the amount of pressure to win every match because if you don’t you will drop in the rankings”.
Deichert has started off the season extremely strong with a 16-3 record. He’s very proud of how he’s performed, going on to say, “I feel pretty good so far, I’ve lost some toss up matches but other than that I am very proud of how I’ve performed”.
Being such a skilled wrestler comes with putting in lots of hard work, which Deichert has done consistently. He practices every day of the week and sometimes even multiple times a day. Deichert stated, “I have club practice twice a week after my school practice”.
Even though he practices all the time for wrestling he often does other things to stay active. He said, “ I also go to the rec during my lunch break to bike and get some weight off if I need to”.
Speaking of losing weight, it’s one of the most difficult parts of wrestling. Often wrestlers have to lose several pounds over the course of a few days. Deicherts says, “It can be very difficult, especially having multiple practices a day, but you get used to it eventually”. He also went on to say that, “Chewing gum helps a lot with the cravings”.
Deichert is a star on and off the field being one of the top students in his class. So he has a great desire to go to college, but he’d also love to continue being able to wrestle. He stated, “Wrestling in college is definitely the goal”.
Deichert would like to go to a division two or division three college and often those schools prefer academics to sports. He said, “I need to keep my academics at a high because in lower divisions, D3 and D2, academics are placed in such a spotlight that saying I have a high gpa to a college coach is going to make them want me a lot more”.
Thank you to everyone who voted for Athlete of the Week and congratulations to Deichert, good luck with the rest of your season and school year.
