Young Wrestlers Fast, Sweat to Make Weight

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Young Wrestlers Fast, Sweat to Make Weight

Weight Loss Their Greatest Opponent

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Before high school and college wrestlers can face their
opponents in the ring, they must first vanquish one in the
locker room, the scales that determine whether they’re eligible
to compete in a given weight class. In order to make the weight
they want, many of these young athletes are using fasting,
dehydration, diet pills, and laxatives as ways to lose weight
quickly.

How widespread is this potentially deadly practice? A recent
study of wrestlers in Michigan high schools found 7 out of 10
used at least one possibly harmful weight loss method each week
of the wrestling session — and just over half of them used at
least two methods each week. About a quarter of the young
wrestlers lost 10 pounds or more during the season, and 11%
fasted longer than 24 hours before a match.

The study was published in the May issue of Medicine and Science
in Sports and Exercise.

“This study reinforces what we’ve known for years,” lead author
Robert Kiningham, MD, tells WebMD. “While previous studies have
looked at elite, highly committed wrestlers, we looked at
everyone. Disturbingly, we found the same percentage of harmful
behaviors as previous studies of elite wrestlers, suggesting
these behaviors are widespread.”

Kiningham is an assistant clinical professor and director of the
sports medicine fellowship program at the University of Michigan
School of Medicine in Ann Arbor.

Many wrestlers try to compete in an unrealistically low weight
class because they believe this gives them a competitive
advantage, says Doug Andersen, DC, nutrition consultant for West
Coast Sports Performance and Sports Medicine Consultants in
Manhattan Beach, Calif., and a nutritionist for the Los Angeles
Kings hockey team.

“First, wrestlers should qualify for a sensible weight class,”
he says. “If you skip one meal the day beforehand in order to
drop two or three pounds, that’s one thing. But when someone
tries to drop tremendous amounts of weight, 10 pounds or more,
we’re concerned. While they may not have an eating disorder in
the strict sense, they certainly have disordered eating.”

“In 1997 three healthy college-age men all died because they
were trying to make weight for the wrestling team, using similar
rapid-weight-loss regimens based on dehydration. Wrestlers put
on nonpermeable clothing and exercise hard, and then don’t
rehydrate themselves. This is dangerous,” says Samantha Heller,
MS, RD, a senior clinical nutritionist at New York University
Medical Center and an exercise physiologist.

Short-term studies have found rapid weight loss can lead to a
decline in the ability to think clearly, loss of athletic
strength and power, and mood changes, Heller says. No one knows
if there are long-term effects, because long-term studies
haven’t been done.

The authors of the Michigan study conclude by saying, “Altering
these entrenched behaviors will require a unified effort by
coaches, administrators, parents, and wrestlers throughout the
sport.”

However, some coaches don’t see any need for change.

“Wrestlers have a short-term goal, to make their weight,” says
Dick Bellock. “They may not eat for a day but we all skip meals
once in awhile. Teenage kids get hungry. They make weight, they
eat right afterward; that isn’t necessarily binge eating.”

Bellock wrestled in high school and college and is now the
athletic director of McKay High School in Salem, Ore.

Bob Ferraro agrees.

“We already have safety measures in place,” says Ferraro,
executive director of the National High School Coaches
Association, based in Easton, Pa. “Every wrestler must be
examined by a physician, and the physician determines the weight
class that wrestler will compete at. These issues have already
been addressed.”

Andersen, however, believes changes are needed.

“Today, wrestlers weigh-in hours before or the day before the
match. They should have to weigh-in just beforehand. If someone
had to wrestle in a dehydrated state, weak as a kitten, they
wouldn’t like it.”

Since the data was collected for the Michigan study, the state
has instituted a new program using mandatory weight standards
based on a measured percentage of body fat. Kiningham hopes the
new program will be effective in limiting pressures on young
wrestlers to engage in unhealthy weight-loss behaviors in order
to compete.

Source: WebMD

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