KNIGHTDALE — Members of the Knightdale High School wrestling team spent quality time together from July 9-14 during their trip to the Appalachian State University wrestling camp.

The group drove to New River State Park on Thursday, July 9, and embarked on a 10-mile canoe trip through Ashe County.

“It was an excellent team building activity,” coach Alex Von Hoene said. “We were able to remove most of the wrestlers from their comfort zones and put them in a situation where they had to depend on a teammate to be successful.”

The coach said few canoes managed to stay completely above the water line over the course of the journey, but aside from a few plunges he felt his team learned more valuable lessons than how to tame the river.

“On the wrestling mat, a wrestler is only able to become as good as his drilling partner makes him, or her, become. Canoeing was a great parallel for developing as a wrestling team,” Von Hoene said.

The group spent the night camping in the park, and the park tested wrestlers — several of whom had little to no camping experience. It rained.

“We had a great time getting a fire started, staying, or getting, dry, and eating,” Von Hoene said. With the outdoors in the past, the squad packed up and headed to Boone for the other camp-site experience — that which took place on the mats for the next five days.

The Knightdale grapplers went head-to-head with teams from all over North Carolina and the southeastern United States. Von Hoene said the group worked hard through the 10 instructional sessions and picked up on techniques from prominent college and high school coaches.

The Knights finished with a dual meet record of 8-3, individually stacking a record of 84-56.  Notable records from the camp included senior Parker Baucom, 14-1 at 130 lbs.; senior Zack Russell, 10-2 at 171 lbs.; senior Nick McClelland, 13-1 at 171 and 189 lbs.; senior Drew Lopez, 8-5 record at 119 lbs.; junior Tim Coston, 5-4 record at 215 lbs.

“I am certain that this experience will help us as we work toward our goals for next wrestling season,” Von Hoene said. “I greatly appreciate the efforts of each wrestler who attended, their parents, and our assistant wrestling coaches. (They) all have been committed to building the Knightdale High School wrestling program into a competitive, respectable, quality organization that is devoted to developing quality citizens of our community.”