Adrian De Leon is a junior on the Boys Varsity Wrestling Team. He shares his experiences through the years and how he continues to improve throughout his career.
By: Mariah Villarreal and Libertad Lopez
Adrian De Leon has been wrestling since seventh grade, making this his fifth year doing the sport.
De Leon, ’25, says, “I feel like I’ve grown a lot and have gotten stronger mentally, as well as growing a lot physically too, but mentally I feel like it’s made me grow as a person and on the mat.” De Leon shares about his growth.
Teammate Izaiah Balderas, ’25, expresses his feelings for Adrian throughout the season. He says, “Adrian has improved overall when it comes to wrestling, he always puts it first, and that shows who he is as a person in the sport.”
Head Coach Watts says, “Adrian is one of the hardest workers in the wrestling room on a daily basis, and comes to every practice with a smile on his face …he is the one of the most committed guys in the room, anytime he has an opportunity to go other places for practice he’s there, he works hard every day and he does the little things that make a champion.”
One piece of advice that stuck with De Leon over the years was, “Coach wright is always telling us that there’s not really a try, you do it or you don’t, he’s basically telling us that If we don’t do it it’s basically not trying.“
When asked what advice he could give to incoming wrestlers, he says, “You have to be committed, and you have to stay committed the whole time. It is a tough sport, so you’re not gonna get anywhere if you just quit in the first week.”
For the week of January 14th-20th Adrian De Leon was titled Wrestler of the week for the Redwood Boys Wrestling team.
“Wrestler of the Week” is when a wrestler does outstanding things in a match, at a tournament, or at practice, that makes the coaches notice. These outstanding things can be hitting moves right, showing improvement, or anything else involving the category.
“Wrestler of the week makes me feel like all my hard work is paying off and that all the work I put in every day feels like it’s eventually turning out to be something…” Adrian says about being wrestler of the week.
Watts finishes by saying, “Adrian got this award because he went to one of the toughest tournaments in the state (5 Counties) and made it to the semi-finals, he was the only one on our team that made it that far, which at the end of the day he took home 6th place.”
Mariah Villarreal
Mariah Villarreal, is a first year journalist and a senior here at Redwood High School, class of 2024.You can find her taking photos for yearbook around campus, or this year write stories for the Redwood Gigantea.
Libertad Lopez
Tags: #redwood, #rhs, #sports, #wrestling