Merrillville junior Martin Cruz knows he hasn’t been doing this alone.
“I really have to thank my family and my coaches,” he said. “Everyone around me is always there to tell me that I can do something. They’re always supportive.”
And one of the biggest ways his support group has helped Cruz, who’s 25-1 at 106 pounds this season, has been with one of wrestling’s biggest challenges: weight management.
Cruz, who wrestled at 106 last season, first weighed in at 111 at the start of this season.
“That was because of what I ate all summer,” he said. “It was more fat.”
And that’s why Merrillville coach David Maldonado believes the term “cutting weight” is often misinterpreted by those outside the sport.
“It’s not really ‘cutting weight’ as much as it’s about getting lean,” he said. “And the most important thing is conditioning. You can’t get your weight down if you don’t get in shape. You still have to be able to wrestle.”
Once that excess summer weight is gone, though, it’s a season-long battle to stay under the limit for each weight class. And that’s where Cruz’s parents have helped.
“It’s about making him eat right,” Sue Cruz said. “One of the coaches gave us the lowdown on what to do, and we’ve had two other boys do it before, so we were a little familiar with this.”
And there are times when Martin Cruz Jr. — Martin’s father— practices the same restraint as his son.
“You’ll want a steak and some potatoes for dinner, but you can’t tease them with that,” Cruz Jr. said. “We pretty much eat what they do.”
Last Friday, the Cruz family was planning on eating burritos for dinner, a main course typically not on the menu during the wrestling season.
But when Cruz weighed in one pound over the limit for Saturday’s Lake County Tournament, that dinner plan was scrapped.
“And they’re still in the refrigerator,” Cruz Jr. said with a hint of disappointment in his words.
Those burritos were likely eaten in celebration Saturday night, though, after Cruz took the title at 106, his second straight first-place finish after he won the Al Smith Invitational in Mishawaka on the final weekend of 2017.
Cruz was a regional champion as a sophomore, but lost in the ticket round at semistate, finishing with a 28-8 record. After Saturday’s final, when he handed Wheeler’s Giovanni Diaz his first loss of the season, Cruz is now ranked No. 3 at 106 by IndianaMat.
“All I’ve focused on is going out there and doing the best I can,” Cruz said. “It’s not about wins and losses, it’s about showing that I can keep up with those good guys. Now they’re putting me up in those rankings, I need to maintain.”
Dave Melton is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
Top 5
With last week’s rankings in parentheses
1. Portage (1)
2. Chesterton (2)
3. Crown Point (3)
4. Merrillville (5)
5. Hobart (4)
Wrestler of the Week: Wheeler senior Trey Buehler pinned all four of his opponents Saturday, winning the Lake County title at 170 pounds to move his season record to 26-1.
