Jack is the wrestler with the red ankle band and red headgear.

Two funny things about this video — First, the start. You can see the ref question Jack about his name and then send him back to the head table to confirm that he was supposed to wrestle the guy. Jack said that because the other kid looked soooo much bigger the ref thought the coaches had made a mistake in the matchup.

The other funny thing is that Jack is wrestling in mismatched shoes, neither of which is his own.

He got wonderful new (expensive) wrestling shoes at the beginning of the year. He promptly lost one of them. (One of them, how does someone lose ONE shoe). I refused to get him ANOTHER pair of shoes, so he went foraging in the lost and found and got a pair of used, size 11 shoes (he’s a size 9.5). He wrestled in those in the couple of matches that he had in December.

BUT, Jack managed to lose ONE of the lost and found shoes (again??). So, “luckily” one of his teammates had lost a shoe as well (what the hell is going on at GA with the wrestling shoes?). So, Jack used the one shoe from the lost and found and the other shoe from his teammate.

He said that he heard some comments from the Malvern wrestlers about his shoes during warm-ups. So, I’m sure that BEFORE the match, the Malvern wrestler thought this match was going to be a piece of cake — not only was Jack MUCH smaller, but he was the kid with the mismatched shoes.

As you’ll see, I’m thinking the Malvern wrestler had a different opinion of Jack AFTER the mater.

Below is the match (If you can ‘t see the video below, reload the page. I’m still working out some kinks in the code.)

The next video is from last week’s match against Chestnut Hill. Jack has the red headgear and the red/royal singlet on.

If you’re following the shoe saga, you will notice that Jack has on yet another pair of shoes. This week he is wearing Kevin’s old wrestling shoes….bet you can’t wait to see what he wears next week!!!

(NOTE: I messed up when I uploaded this video and uploaded the whole thing, not just Jack’s match. Jack’s match starts at about 1:15 and runs through about 4:39, so you can just fast forward to his match.)

Jack’s middle school football team won their first game of the year! The GA Middle School varsity beat Malvern Prep 13-0. Jack started at fullback and middle linebacker.

The team seemed a bit rusty in the first half, but played much, much better in the late part of the game. Jack had a couple blitzes through the line to nail players in the backfield, and he scored an extra point on a great short run.

Jack’s highlight of the game was on the last play when he had a long carry that almost scored. He had to bust a couple of tackles to gain ground and looked strong running. If you go through the photos to the end, there are some pictures of his long run.

(Jack is #39 — I know, it’s weird not to see him wearing #24. He has royal blue and black shoes.)

For photos of the game, CLICK HERE  Sorry about the quality of the photos; it got dark early and was rainy.

(If you don’ t have flash, you can see the photos here — as well as download them.)

We survived Top Gun camp. Or, Kevin and I just survived — Jack excelled. This was his second year to earn an invitation to Football University‘s Top Gun camp. Technically, you’re supposed to have completed sixth grade, but he was selected last year as a fifth grader. CLICK HERE for the report on last year’s camp.

During the Spring/Early Summer, Jack attended three of FBU’s weekend camps in Downingtown, New Jersey, and on Long Island. After each camp, he was selected as one of the top players and invited to the summer Top Gun camp (as a defensive back from the Downingtown camp, as a linebacker from the other two camps. He did linebacker at Top Gun.)

Top Gun camp is held at wonderful facility in Williamsburg, VA, but like last year, it was the middle of a heat wave. At one point, the turf temperature was about 140 degrees; they said the heat index was about 120. I got in the car and the thermometer read 115 … after driving around, a few minutes later, it read 119. They did a great job of keeping the kids healthy and safe — water breaks at least every 15 minutes and non-stop Gatorade before and after.

The competition was as hot as the tempteratures. Jack’s group — the purple jerseys mean “6th grade defensive player” — had a range of skills. I’m probably biased, but I think Jack had the best skills, although a couple of the other boys had genetics (i.e., SIZE) on their side. Rumor had it that although one of the larger players just completed sixth grade, he was 14 years old.

Kevin and I both thought the general talent of the linebacker group was superior to the linebackers at last year’s camp, but we didn’t think the quarterbacks, running backs and receivers were as good.

The structure of all the FBU camps is pretty much the same: skills drills according to position, offense/defense one-on-one drills, offense/defense seven-on-seven drills and a classroom session. That pattern repeats in the afternoon.

Below is a video of one of the skills drills (If you can ‘t see the video below, reload the page. I’m still working out some kinks in the code.) Jack is #40 in the purple shirt.

I think Jack looks faster and smoother than some of the other linebackers and he got a lot of praise for his form and speed.

Below is a video of some of the one-on-one drills:

We got a new video camera, because Jack is going to need a lot of highlight reels in the next couple of years. I spent a lot of time at Top Gun practicing with the camera. (I know, I need a lot more work.) I’ve spent EVEN MORE time since we’ve been home trying to figure out editing and uploading. Because of all that, I didn’t take as many still photos as I usually do, but CLICK HERE for the photos I took of Jack at Top Gun. (If you don’t have Flash installed, CLICK HERE for non-Flash gallery.)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Jack (#22) scored a touchdown.

The day before the game, most of the players traveled to Syracuse to watch The Orange play Louisville (Syracuse lost) in the Carrier Dome.

But a real highlight was returning to the Carrier Dome on Saturday evening to do their pre-game walk through on the field in the Carrier Dome.

Photos from the Carrier Dome workout are here.

Photos from the first quarter are here.

Photos from the second quarter are here.

Photos from the third quarter are here.

Photos from the fourth quarter are here.

• He got picked to go to FBU football camp.
• He was  selected as one of the roughly 80 6th graders in the U.S. to go to Top Gun camp (and he was really only a 5th grader).
• He won the “Top Linebacker” award for the 3rd year in a row at Sports International camp.

… and now he’s been named a “Bux-Mont Scholar Athlete” by his Pop Warner league.

From the letter he received:

Congratulations, based upon the school grades you received during the 2009 -10 school year, you have been selected to be a member of the 2010 ALL BUX-MONT LEAGUE SCHOLAR-ATHLETE TEAM….The 68 Bux-Mont League 12- to 14-year-olds selected have shown the ability to excel.

He gets to go to a banquet in January. I’ll bet he hopes he can make a speech.

Jack had a touchdown, an interception, a couple long, long runs and about a zillion tackles for loss.

Although they have only played a couple of games and haven’t been able to have too many practices, the team has really improved since the beginning of the season.

More photos from the Malvern game are here.

Photos from the game are here.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Go Lions! Game is 12:00 tomorrow at Laurel Field.

See photos from the game here.