Athlete of the Week: Jonas Corl '05

Jonas Corl’s coaches told him he shouldn’t wrestle his third and final match of the weekend last Saturday.

The Harvard coaching staff worried that the sophomore heavyweight might aggrevate a rib injury in a meet the Crimson was confident it could win anyway.

But as he so often does, Corl chose to compete rather than give in to the pain.

“It’s not one of those injuries where, if you take a week off, it's just going to go away,” said Harvard coach Jay Weiss.  “It’s incredibly painful. He’s just trying to block it out.”

Corl didn’t have to block out the pain for long against Sacred Heart’s John Miller. He ended the contest in the first period with a technical fall, propelling his teammates to a 26-17 rout.

The victory capped a flawless weekend for Corl. The Troutville, Va., native had already won his previous matches against Cornell’s Buck McLamb and Columbia’s Bart Seemen.

The McLamb bout Friday night snapped Corl’s three-match losing streak and provided a huge momentum boost that he rode the entire weekend.

Though Corl let his Big Red opponent come back and even the match in the third period, he was first to light up the scoreboard in overtime, winning the contest 5-4.

The Crimson still lost the meet 21-13, but Corl started Harvard on a winning note against the Lions when he won the first bout of the day, 4-2, despite Seemen’s huge size advantage.

“You’ve got to realize, Jonas only weighs 220 [lbs.] and some of the guys he wrestles are close to 280,” said junior co-captain Jesse Jantzen.

In any given match, Corl’s sizable weight disadvantage could prove disastrous for him—if he does not shoot his move quickly and deeply enough, his opponent is able to lean his weight on him and wear Corl out.

“Every time he wrestles he gives up a considerable amount of weight,” Weiss said. “But he’s sort of getting used to that and he’s really using it to his advantage.”

One of Corl’s great assets as a lighter heavyweight is his mobility. Since he is not bogged down by an extra 20 or 40 pounds, the agile Corl moves faster than his lumbering counterparts.

Despite his quickness, Corl struggled early in the season. His only victories in Harvard’s two tournaments came in the consolation rounds and he went 2-7 in dual competition before Friday.

But he began showing signs of improvement in the Crimson’s meet against Lehigh in January, when he faced No. 14 Joe Sahl for the second time of the season.

In his first match against Sahl during the consolation round of the the Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational, Sahl dominated, pinning Corl after going up by 12 points. But in the second meeting, Sahl only won by three points in a tightly contested match.

“You can see in his last couple of matches that he’s growing a lot more confident,” Weiss said.

Part of Corl’s early struggles may have been due to the huge jump he had to make to the heavyweight class after competing at the 197-lb. position last year.

The loss of All-American heavyweight Dawid Rechul ’02 to graduation left a huge gap in the Harvard lineup. After watching Corl wrestle at heavyweight in a tournament last year, Weiss felt that the sophomore was suited to fill Rechul’s shoes.

“His style is better for the heavyweights,” Weiss said. “When he goes back down to 197, his quickness doesn’t help him as much. He wrestles much better against the bigger guys.”

Corl’s lack of size isn’t without precedent. The legendary Rechul weighed only slightly more than Corl and won the conference title twice and placed seventh in the national tournament.

That gives Weiss all the more reason to be satisfied with his less-than-heavy heavyweight.

“He’s doing incredibly well,” Weiss said.