Editor's Note: The following was taken from an email by Jens Valasquez (Aaron's father) on Aaron's experience at the Blair camp.

"I went to Blair last night with Ann to see how Aaron is doing in practice and to talk with team leader "Gimp" Gary Brownell (Gimp also does Lehigh U Wrestling radio broadcasts)...

Blair is a beautiful campus with rolling hills in a country setting. The dorm buildings are also really nice. I can see how a "recruit" can be swept off his feet after a visit.

Freestyle training runs from Sunday through Wednesday (7/12) morning. Since Aaron is a "double styler" -that is, he is going to Fargo to compete in both Greco & Freestyle - he is at Blair for the full 5 days through Thursday (7/13) evening. Exactly one week later Double & Free stylers will be leaving for Fargo (7/20).

These practices are long and hard - three 2 hour sessions a day. Most of the guys are pretty beat by the end of the 3rd session. He is rooming with David Standridge of Randolph (Ron of the Standridge Academy is his dad), who is also a "double styler" and just completed 8th grade like Aaron. They are both holding there own but are also getting "schooled" by some of the 10th, 11th & 12th graders on the squad.

Out of the 90 plus NJ wrestlers on the Cadet & Junior teams there are about 10 that just finished the 8th grade. About half the NJ wrestlers will be competing in both Greco & Freestyle and the other half only Freestyle or only Greco.

Some of the best wrestlers in NJ were on the mat training for Fargo last night. Mike Grey, Jimmy Conroy, Scott Winston, Alex Caruso and Zach Rey (all of them NJ state HS Champs) were there, along with all the National prep champs from Blair and tons of NJ HS state place winners, district and region champs.

Some of the guys Aaron has been working out with: Sean Collins from Randolph who is going to be a JR & won the NJ Freestyle title at 145 lbs; graduate Paul Galipeau from Parsippany Hills a NJ state place winner and the "most pins/least amount of time" award winner for Greco last year in Fargo; JR and 2X District champ Joshua Burman from St. Joes in Hammonton; Soph and District champ Dan Seidenberg from Raritan; and of course Eclipse & former Parsippany Hills coach Matt Ciampa. All the wrestlers train with new partners every day.

Some of the other NJ team coaches besides Blair's Jeff Buxton & Ciampa: John Hangey - Asst. at Rider; Pete DiBiase of the Seagull Wrestling Club; and Dave Bell - Head Coach at Bergen Cath; there are plenty more.