Letter: Rangely wrestlers don’t get any respect

Wrestling, still no respect?
I am a senior at Rangely High School this year. I have been wrestling for 11 years, and it is a sport that my family and I have come to love and respect.
Over the summer, our school had some nice renovations done, and I think the school really looks good. The sports area was where I was left truly upset. With a new sound system in the main gym, a new track, and the football field looking almost brand new, you could imagine how shocked another teammate and I were when we walked into our wrestling room and saw it treated almost like a storage room. Now, I didn’t expect anything to really be done to the room, because it’s where we practice. However, I was absolutely shocked when we found a huge projector screen just sitting on one of our mats. This screen left four big dents in the mat, maybe an inch to two inches deep each. I find this very disrespectful, and I think I speak not only for myself, but other team members as well when I say that. It was also pretty clear that the room had barely even been cleaned through the summer.
I am extremely proud to a part of the wrestling team that I have been a member of these past three years. We have been a good group of kids who work extremely hard, and have put on, what I feel, three very impressive seasons. I am very proud to be a Rangely Panther, and I love my school and the people in it. I just feel like our program, and just the overall sport of wrestling, has earned a lot more respect then we are being shown.
JC Chumacero
Rangely