with Troy Nickerson,
Northern Colorado University Head Coach;
former Iowa State University Assistant Coach;
NCAA D1 National Champion and 4x All-American at Cornell University;
the first 5x state champion in New York
Does your team need to be better on their feet? If you need more takedowns, this video has what you need! You will learn a drill series to get your wrestlers better on their feet from four-time All-American Troy Nickerson, who teaches ways to score from shots as well as defensive scoring to make your wrestlers complete threats on the mat.
Coach Nickerson brings his coaching techniques into your room, beginning with the basics of stance and motion and progressively moving to his finishing drills. Learn how and when to use each of these drills to improve wrestler performance. Nickerson has designed these progressions to grow athletes from a very raw and basic level, to the highest level of competitors.
Footwork Drills: Speed, Balance, and Flexibility
Any wrestler that is great on their feet uses stance and motion to improve their skills. Coach Nickerson demonstrates drills to get hands and feet moving together to improve attack and defense speeds. These drills cover:
- Stance and Motion - Learn how to move hands and feet together, plus how to develop solid level changes, down blocks, cross blocks, head blocks and knee drops.
Foot Speed - Develop the speed needed to get to the leg and defend. Master the over and back, side to side, and leg switches.
Flexibility and Balance - Increase hip and leg flexibility by mastering single leg finish stretches and back step drills.
Learn How To Drill Control Ties
Nickerson covers a few different drills on positioning that allow wrestlers to have a higher success rate on their shots. He demonstrates drills for gaining and getting out of underhooks, collar ties, and 2-on-1 ties. Using the climbing drill, wrestlers will learn how to work up to a proper tie without providing a chance for their opponent to score.
This video allows you to build wrestlers from beginners to beast with simple drills that everyone can do. If you want to get better on your feet, Coach Nickerson can help get you there!
57 minutes. 2018.
WRD-05335B:
with Troy Nickerson,
Northern Colorado University Head Coach;
former Iowa State University Assistant Coach;
NCAA D1 National Champion and 4x All-American at Cornell University;
the first 5x state champion in New York
Mat wrestling is a forgotten art. Most kids want to work on takedowns, but wrestling consists of three areas in total that need to be worked on.
In this video, four-time All-American Troy Nickerson shows you how to incorporate a series of drills that will improve wrestlers in the top and bottom positions at the same time. He starts with some foundational drills that are later integrated into other drills.
Coach Nickerson teaches you drills that you can put your own moves into and have success. Bottom wrestlers will learn how to maintain a solid base and how to get their hips away for an escape or reversal. Top wrestlers will learn to maintain forward pressure and hip control. These drills will build good instincts and will give wrestlers the confidence to hit their moves in competition.
Bottom Position Wrestling Drills
Nickerson builds wrestlers by getting them to embrace the basics. He starts with a drill that helps the bottom wrestler learn to maintain a good base position while creating space on bottom with a knee slide or changeover. It's important that a wrestler has great hips, which helps them to move on bottom. He covers three different drills to help improve hip heist for all wrestlers. He then uses several drills that cover stand ups, sit-outs, and Granby rolls.
All the moves are combined, and the scenarios are endless. There are also drills for clearing legs, working reversals, and re-attacking from a stand up. This series isn't just focused on technique, it also incorporates whistle start drills and drills from bottom with mat returns. These drills can advance athletes to a high level in a short amount of time.
Top Position Wrestling Drills
The second half of this video starts with teaching the top wrestler how to break down an opponent's solid base by keeping active forward pressure. Drills are added that emphasize riding under the arms and hip control while staying off the knees. Key concepts cover countering all offensive scoring attempts from the bottom wrestler.
Coach Nickerson's drills also touch on maintaining control when the bottom man rolls, sits out, or stands up.
You'll get a drill that Nickerson uses with his wrestlers to improve returning wrestlers to the mat. It covers how to land and how to use multiple returns. There are also drills for using tilts and pinning combinations. These drills are then combined to encourage chain wrestling on the mat.
Coach Nickerson does a great job of setting athletes up for success. This is a fantastic video for athletes and coaches that want to improve rapidly!
54 minutes. 2018.
WRD-05335C:
with Troy Nickerson,
Northern Colorado University Head Coach;
former Iowa State University Assistant Coach;
NCAA D1 National Champion and 4x All-American at Cornell University;
the first 5x state champion in New York
One of the easiest ways to control the bottom man is to be good at using the legs. Leg riders can control a match and score a lot of points before the bottom man has realized what's happened. This video is great for teaching leg riding.
Troy Nickerson demonstrates over 15 drills and moves that show how to get into legs and how to crush opponents from the top position. What makes his legs rides so tough to defend is that they transfer from legs to other turns and rides with ease.
Getting the Leg In
Most wrestlers only have one way to get legs in, which makes them predictable. Nickerson covers two standard breakdowns that he uses to make the transition to legs simple. He begins with a tight waist chop that sets up legs with a tilt. When he comes out of the tilt, the leg easily goes in.
His next setup is a spiral ride that gets the bottom wrestler extended and allows the leg to easily flow inside. These two rides help wrestlers get to the legs, regardless of their positioning, and help eliminate the riskiness of riding legs.
Turns and Pins
Coach Nickerson covers six turns that are based around his breakdowns. These range from a simple face-lift to a power half, to a tilt series, and cross-body ride series. The great part about several of his turns is that they easily transfer to an arm bar series or a ball and chain series of turns and back to the legs. Because of this flexibility in the top position, the top wrestler can become almost unstoppable and can make it hard for the bottom man to figure out any way to escape.
This video from Coach Nickerson will allow an average rider to become a devastating force and make others want to avoid going underneath at all costs!
47 minutes. 2018.