Why Choose Purler Wrestling?

An overview

If you are serious about your wrestling, then we believe you should be very particular about where you spend your time training.  We are well aware that you have many choices out there to choose from and many coaches willing to offer you coaching advice and training.  For most of us, this coaching and training environment will suffice. However, if you are serious about wrestling, then you need more than these programs can off and Purler Wrestling just may be the answer!

While I cannot say that Purler Wrestling will measure up to everyone’s demands, I can only say that we have much to offer you in terms of wrestling and coaching experience.  Most importantly to you, we have a history of winning and getting results in both areas of the sport…competing and coaching.  We encourage you to visit our personal wrestling profiles on this site and at  www.tonypurler.com to see a list of our personal achievements as competitors in the sport of wrestling.  Furthermore, we ask that you browse the ‘Medal Count’ section and see the long list of achievements that our students at Purler Wrestling Academy have racked up over the years since PWA opened back in November of 1999. 

As for our personal training and influence, we have seen it all.  Both Tony and I have been members of losing teams and winning teams.  We have been involved with teams that were all but winless and terrific teams that include a nationally ranked high school program as well as 3 NCAA Championship teams while at Oklahoma State University (’89, ’90, ’94).  The coaching we have received over the years also runs the gammit as well.  We have been trained by dedicated coaches that knew very little (but did the best they could!) and have received 12+ years of training and coaching from the World’s best coaches who know it all!  This training at Oklahoma State University and US World Team-member training includes over a decade of mentoring and coaching from experts which includes Olympic Champions (John Smith, Kenny Monday) and Olympic coaches (Bruce Burnett, Joey Seay & Kevin Jackson).

Simply put, there is very little (if anything) that you can ever experience in the sport of wrestling that we cannot help you with— and we are eager to do so.

A different kind of sport

Wrestling is a very high skill-level sport— one that takes constant, technical evaluation in order to consistently compete at the highest level. Throughout the World, wrestling is considered an art-form complete with a healthy mix of strategy, skill, positioning and technique while sadly, here in the US, many of our coaches mistakenly teach wrestling as a brawl or a fight. The truth is, in order to consistently win at the highest level, you must approach your training from a skill-level standpoint, or you will not win. Wrestling, unlike the popular running / jumping / throwing / kicking sports we have here in America, is just plain different! In running, you can purchase a marathon training kit from any bookstore, follow this training plan / running schedule, and be well prepared for race day. I wish you could do that for wrestling. You can’t.

You will not be able to learn this highly-skilled sport from a novice coach no more than you could learn gymnastics, diving, figure skating, judo, fencing, karate, etc from a novice coach.  

Furthermore, we all know that wrestling is indeed a very emotionally-draining sport that takes someone who has been through it in order to understand it, and understand it in order to teach it.  We have experienced more highs and lows than any man should have to endure and helping athletes with the mental side of the game is something that Purler Wrestling is known throughout the US as being the very best at.  We encourage you to watch the way our students carry themselves at wrestling meets before a match and during competition. Our athletes are ready because they have been trained to be ready.  Our wrestlers are taught to focus on HOW they win and lose, not IF they win and lose. 

If you dream of greatness…we can help.

More about the Purler Bros

When you look at the “About Nick Purler” portion of our site, you will see that Nick has not only won high school state and national titles, but has also earned All-American honors at Oklahoma State University while Tony Purler (PWA West), has an NCAA title to his credit as well as US Open National titles. In fact, Tony has won a National title on EVERY level that there is in the sport of wrestling! Furthermore, he has competed in the World Championships TWICE.

Simply stated, you cannot compete all over the world and have been a member if 3 NCAA Division I Championship teams, had the successes, victories, titles, and also the failures, hard-ships, and disappointments that the Purler Bros. have had and NOT be able to meet the emotional and technical training needs of all wrestlers.  Throw that in with a love of kids and an eagerness to help today’s youth, and you have the formula for success that is Purler Wrestling.

Side note~ Of course being a wrestler does not mean you can teach wrestling!  There are many experts in many fields that lack the ability or patience to teach what they know…and wrestling is no different.  This is why we have seen many wrestling programs and camps (some instructed by Olympic medalists) that have failed within their first year of operation.  With Purler Wrestling Academy, you will find that Nick and Tony have a knack for working with kids of all ages as well as a passion for the job!  They have also developed a ‘system’ for teaching techniques, managing the workout rooms and kids behavior, operating the drill sessions, putting the workers to work, developing excitement and intensity and igniting fire in an otherwise ‘dead’ workout room, and just plain getting their student’s to the next level quickly. 

Do your research

As more and more wrestling schools and academies pop up and the wrestling camp market becomes extremely competitive, you must be that much more discerning in your decision of where to send your son for training.  We ask you to weigh out all options before getting involved in a wrestling academy or summer camp and that you do some research before spending your wrestling time and wrestling dollars. We are constantly amazed at the wrestling club flyers and camp brochures that we see set out at tournaments where coaches / camp directors will twist the truth or flat out lie about their wrestling backgrounds.  It is an unethical business practice and something that Purler Wrestling will have no part in! If the instructor claims to have competed for some major University, then check out his claims. Do a search on the internet and find out for yourself.  Furthermore, find out whether or not he actually completed during his stay at this University, or did he simply walk on to the team for a month and quit as so often is the case.  Keep in mind that anyone can walk on to any wrestling college and become a member of the team, practice one day and quit, and then claim to be a college wrestler.   While doing your ‘research’, we encourage you to do some on the Purler Bros. as well.  The truth is, there are many quality camps, etc to attend and many wonderful opportunities for today’s wrestler…Purler wrestling being one of them.  However, the disappointing truth is that there are also many that are not and some will type anything on a flyer or website to get you onto their wrestling mats.

We now see claim after claim about ‘Training for the Olympics’. Be aware that anyone can be training for the Olympics.   I have 7 year old wrestlers who swear up and down that they are ‘Training for the Olympics!’ Also, be very wary of individuals that claim to have ‘trained at the Olympic Training Center’. I have several 14 year old Purler Wrestling Students that have trained at the Olympic Training Center and one youth wrestler as well.

The same goes for the Olympic Trials.  My wife can enter the ‘Olympic Trials’ if she wanted to and so can you.  The bottom line is that attaching the word “Olympic” to your name is a fast and convenient way to instant wrestler credibility and one that is used a lot nowadays by those needing a quick fix to their resume’ in order to enter the camp industry. It is a word and anyone can use it. 

All-American / National Champion ~ I remember working a camp for a coach years ago who had every clinician slated as All-American or National Champion. When I confronted him, he stated that ‘no one’s gonna know the difference anyway’!  Needless to say I quickly severed ties with this individual.  

Side note

Before making the US National Men’s team, Tony Purler spent two years as an Oklahoma ranch hand and another 2 years running a weed-eater eight hours a day at the Columbia, MO cemetery in order to support himself.  Precious training time was scheduled before or after these long hours at work but it paid off when he was finally able to crack the lineup and become a member of the US Men’s World Team.  Needless to say, both of us endured countless hours (sometimes painful ones at that!) to make the team at Oklahoma State four years straight and to earn All-American honors / NCAA titles during that time. It is for this reason that I will not lie to you when I say that it angers us greatly when we see these lies and ‘claims of greatness’ by competitors in the camp / wrestling academy industry.  This is the only reason why I took the time to ask you to ‘do your research!”

ps…Don’t forget to research us as well.  We have nothing to hide and are more than will willing to earn your trust the old fashioned way...the respectable way. 

PWA Students’ Success:

It is unrealistic to think that your son or daughter can be involved in competitive athletics and it not cost you anything.  With kids of our own that are involved in many activities, believe me…we understand!  We also understand that it is very difficult to watch your dedicated son come up short time after time, especially after investing plenty of your own time and hard-earned money into his athletics.  At some point in time, you just want to win and who can blame you! Bridging the gap between hard work and success is what Purler Wrestling is all about.

Purler Wrestling students are getting results!

As mentioned, our credibility is vital to our success and ‘truth in advertising’ is part of the deal when it comes to Purler Wrestling.   When you visit the ‘Medal Count’ portion of our site, understand that we do engage in truthful advertising…even though our student’s very impressive results do not seem real for a program that has ONLY been in existence a short number of years.  Read on!

It is easy to look at the large number of state and national medalists that PWA has helped produce and wonder if those numbers are real.  For the skeptics, I will offer you this:

When you look at the number of All-Americans that Purler Wrestling Academy has helped to produce, keep in mind that we have a demanding set of criteria for All-American honors. Sure, there are 100’s of tournaments nowadays that call themselves ‘nationals’ and this is another attempt to get you to go to their tournaments…fine! However, we all know that most of these events are very low- caliber events and that the titles of National Champion and All-American can nowadays be purchased…with a lofty entry fee of course!

By scrolling down our results page, you will see that Purler Wrestling only counts a handful of Purler-tested, Purler-approved wrestling tournaments that qualify for national All-American honors.  The number of national place-winners our students have won would no doubt quadruple (not exaggerating) if we counted every tournament out there that has the word ‘national’ in it.  Rest assured that this causes heated debate between our wrestlers, parents, and coaches in that many of our hard-working, dedicated students may very well enter a so-called ‘nationals’ event and whip some of the nation’s top kids only to come home and find out that this meet does not count for All-American honors for Purler Wrestling…and that means no All-American t-shirt!  Speaking of All-American t-shirts, you may see black t-shirts with ALL-AMERICAN in red across the chest at various wrestling meets throughout the US. These are high school and youth PWA students who have won a medal at one of our approved national meets. We do not lower our standards so that we can pad our results in order to earn your business. As previously stated, we plan on doing that the old-fashioned way. Therefore, you can rest absolutely assured that when you check out our results and see the large number of state and national medalists that PWA has helped to produce, NO fuzzy math was involved!

As for our state results, we have 20-30 high school and youth wrestlers each year who have spent several years training with Purler Wrestling only to step away from our training sessions for some reason or another. Those athletes that go on to place or win state titles after a 1 year absence from Purler Wrestling Academy are NOT counted in the PWA state medal results…even though they probably should be.  Interestingly enough, over 20 high school wrestlers did just that last season and were not counted!  Again, we clarify this so that you, the discerning wrestling parent, can make the best choice as to where to send your son for his wrestling training and to realize that the impressive results of our students are impressive indeed!

*The 100’s of freestyle and Greco-Roman state medalists we’ve had over the years are also not counted in the state results…those are folkstyle only.  

PS – We proudly give our All-American and National Champion students t-shirts and singlets when they reach the pinnacle of national-caliber wrestling by placing top 8 at a Purler-approved event.  So, whenever you see a mean-looking wrestler with a Purler ALL-AMERICAN t-shirt on, or worse yet— a custom-made, black / high-cut singlet with metallic gold NATIONAL CHAMPION stitching on the leg and PWA printed on the back— stay away!  This kid is dangerous.