Stanford wrestling vs. UT-Chattanooga, won 20-17
Friday night I shot Stanford’s wrestling team for the first time.
Lucas Espericueta of the Stanford Cardinal wrestling team during his decision over Brandon Wright of UT-Chattanooga at Burnham Pavilion. Stanford won 20-17.
Jayne and I were juggling time with the car and I definitely needed a ride since I’d be shooting with the 400mm so it worked out that I showed up to Burnham Pavilion really early. We had originally planned to light the meet with some strobes but that didn’t work out. I wasn’t too worried until I showed up and saw the gym was considerably darker than Maples Pavilion. I was getting around 1/250 at f2.8 and ISO5000. So since I had plenty of time, I actually wandered around to see if I could stumble on some strobes, but how often does one run into a couple studio strobes and Pocket Wizards?
Ryan Mango of the Stanford Cardinal wrestling team during the team's dual against UT-Chattanooga at Burnham Pavilion.
So I went back to the Pavilion ready to shoot available light. I think because I had a fairly disappointing available light outing at basketball last time, I had myself all prepared to be disappointed this time around. But I embraced the grain and just pushed things as much as I could. Plus without having to wait for a strobe to refresh, good or bad, I was able to take a lot more shots. Of course, that left a ton more images to flip through to find good ones but with a slow refresh I probably would have ended up with a lot of well-lit butts and very few faces. And even though wrestling is a very active sport, most of it has the wrestlers pushing against each other so they are technically pretty stationary, allowing me to slow the shutter speed down a little.
Nick Amuchastegui of the Stanford Cardinal wrestling team during his pin against Levi Clemons of UT-Chattanooga.
I used to wrestle in 8th grade. I was terrible but I was light so I was probably the top points earner on my team due to teams forfeiting the 80 pound weight class. Yes, 80 pounds. So being back in the gym and seeing the bleached mat and mat burns and hungry faces caused the memories to flood back. All the chicken wings, wall sits, crossfaces and Rice Chex diets. I saw some wrestlers come in and they just looked like they would kill for a hamburger.
Justin Paulsen of the Stanford Cardinal wrestling team during the team's dual against UT-Chattanooga.
They were all very polite dudes and after they beat UT-Chattanooga 20-17, they held an autograph signing for the fans. After staying late for the autograph signing and talking to fans, they all came together and cleaned up the gym, chairs, bleachers and mats. Seems simple, but I wonder how many varsity sports do that. The coach also came over afterward and introduced himself to me. He said he appreciated having media here. Classy dudes.
The Stanford Cardinal wrestling team sign autographs for fans after the team's dual against UT-Chattanooga.
And there was some good wrestling too. One guy, fourth-ranked Nick Amuchastegui, pinned a dude halfway through the first period. I think that was the only Stanford pin. There was another ranked wrestler, #10 Ryan Mango, who was very dominant. I could hear the fans behind me saying things like “Oh man, you’re done now” and “He’s just playing with you.” For all my submitted images, go to StanfordPhoto.com.
[...] be a sport I knew very little about, especially in person. I’ve shot Burnham once before for wrestling. I showed up not expecting great results with the crappy light and I feel like I did fairly well. [...]