Wrestling comes to Webutuck Central School District

Wrestling comes to Webutuck Central School District

Webutuck high schoolers Michael Johnson, left, and Lucas Vallely, right, watched their classmate Degan Bracey grapple with coach Thomas Monteverde at a recent practice session of the school’s new wrestling club.

Judith O'Hara Balfe

AMENIA — On a recent Monday at 2:15 p.m., three high school students and a high school science teacher met in the middle school cafeteria of the Webutuck Central School District for wrestling practice.

The school established the wrestling club earlier this year in response to a proposal from Coach Thomas Monteverde and the interest of several students; the first meeting took place in late November.

Monteverde, who has been teaching high school science at Webutuck for six years, now runs and coaches the club.

Lucas Vallely, 15, Michael Johnson, 16 and Degan Bracey, 16, are just three of the 14 boys who have already joined the team (the boys rotate through sessions on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays so that everyone gets a chance to practice).

Johnson said he’d been doing some wrestling before the club started. He rounded up a few fellow students to join, he said.

Vallely said that he decided to check it out because he’s watched wrestling on television.

“It’s more fun than it looks,” Vallely observed.’

The boys look forward to these sessions, where they learn moves and get to try them out on each other and the coach.

Wrestling is a very precise and deliberate sport, Monteverde explained. At first, he said, the boys were surprised that wrestling wasn’t just getting down and dirty and rolling around in weird positions.

The moves you see, the ones that look swift and deadly and bring an opponent to the ground, he explained, don’t come through luck or from strength, but through smart technical, almost scientific, motions.

“It’s really an individual sport rather than a team sport,” Monteverde said.

Monteverde, who had been a wrestler when he was in high school, loves the sport, and loves teaching it.

“It’s a really great sport for small school districts because it works with small numbers of students,” said Monteverde. “And it’s not expensive. It doesn’t cost much to start out, just the shoes, the mouth guard and the head guard.”

The school district paid for the mats, the headgear and some of the other materials; the boys supplied their own shoes and mouth pieces.

He also noted that wrestling teaches transferable skills, citing law enforcement, military training and other careers.

“It requires effort but not great physical strength, as matches are based on weight classes. It does take great skill to be successful, however,” said Monteverde. “It’s fun for an individual with a competitive spirit.”

Bracey grinned and quipped, “I just wanted to throw people.”

Latest News

Where the mat meets the market

Where the mat meets the market
Kathy Reisfeld
Elena Spellman

In a barn on Maple Avenue in Great Barrington, Kathy Reisfeld merges two unlikely worlds: wealth management and yoga, teaching clients and students alike how stability — financial and emotional — comes from practice.

Her life sits at an intersection many assume can’t exist: high finance and yoga. One world is often reduced to greed, the other to “woo-woo” stretching. Yet in conversation, she makes both feel grounded, less like opposites and more like two languages describing the same human need for stability.

Keep ReadingShow less
google preferred source

Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.

To mow or not to mow?

To mow or not to mow?

A partially mowed meadow in early spring provides habitat for wildlife while helping to keep invasive plants in check.

Dee Salomon

Love it or hate it, there is no denying the several blankets of snow this winter were beautiful, especially as they visually muffled some of the damage they caused in the first place.There appears to be tree damage — some minor and some major — in many places, and now that we can move around, the pre-spring cleanup begins. Here, a heavy snow buildup on our sun porch roof crashed onto the shrubs below, snapping off branches and cleaving a boxwood in half, flattening it.

The other area that has been flattened by the snow is the meadow, now heading into its fourth year of post-lawn alterations. A short recap on its genesis: I simply stopped mowing a half-acre of lawn, planted some flowering plants, spread little bluestem seeds and, far less simply, obsessively pluck out invasive plants such as sheep sorrel and stilt grass. And while it’s not exactly enchanting, it is flourishing, so much so that I cannot bring myself to mow.

Keep ReadingShow less
Capitol hosts first-ever staging of Civil War love story

Playwright Cinzi Lavin, left, poses with Kathleen Kelly, director of ‘A Goodnight Kiss.’

Jack Sheedy

Litchfield County playwright Cinzi Lavin’s “A Goodnight Kiss,” based on letters exchanged between a Civil War soldier and the woman who became his wife, premiered in 2025 to sold-out audiences in Goshen, where the couple once lived. Now the original cast, directed by Goshen resident Kathleen Kelly, will present the play beneath the gold dome of Connecticut’s Capitol in Hartford as part of the state’s America250 commemoration — marking what organizers believe may be the first such performance at the Capitol.

“I don’t believe any live performances of an actual play (at the Capitol) have happened,” said Elizabeth Conroy, administrative assistant at the Office of Legislative Management, who coordinates Capitol events.

Keep ReadingShow less
Hunt Library launches VideoWall for filmmakers

Yonah Sadeh, Falls Village filmmaker and curator of David M. Hunt Library’s new VideoWall.

Robin Roraback

The David M. Hunt Library in Falls Village, known for promoting local artists with its ArtWall, is debuting a new feature showcasing filmmakers. The VideoWall will premiere Saturday, March 28, at 6 p.m. with a screening of two short films by Brooklyn-based documentary filmmaker and animator Imogen Pranger.

The VideoWall is the idea of Falls Village filmmaker Yonah Sadeh, who also serves as curator. “I would love the VideoWall to become a place that showcases the work of local filmmakers, and I hope that other creatives in the area will submit their work to be shown,” he said.

Keep ReadingShow less
google preferred source

Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.

google preferred source

Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.