By Ed Piper
Tanner Shimp, a sophomore wrestling at 162 pounds, placed second at the City Conference Championships Sat., Feb. 2. Yet the six-footer just took up the sport for the first time last year after he entered the ninth grade.
How did Shimp, though a good athlete, gain the skill to compete at and above the league level in a sport that University City coach Eddie Hernandez says has "a high learning curve" that causes many first-timers who try to the sport to drop out a short time later--and in the short span of 15 or so months?
La Jolla's program presently features a small stable of young wrestlers who are proficient and competitive: among them, sophomores Keegan Leonard (134 pounds), Jack Evans (138), and Chase Maisel (140), besides Shimp; and freshmen Zeke Pearl (122) and Buzzy Bomberger (115). Juniors and seniors further along the path include Joshua Jasso (197), Isaiah Torres (222), and Faress Zwain (154) (the latter two 12th-graders).
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