About Our Club

Our Mission is to maximize student-athlete potential in the DC region on and off the mat through professional coaching, mentoring, and providing a positive community around the sport of wrestling. Our aim is to build well-rounded, driven, successful human beings with integrity. We serve children and their families in the DC region who have or can develop a passion for wrestling. 

Legend Wrestling Club

•       A nonprofit 501(c)3 Corporation

•       A year-round wrestling center in Vienna, Virginia

•       Serving families in the greater DC area that covers as far as MD to Shenandoah

•       Full time, professional head coach & certified staff

•       Board of Directors with high-level business experience & a passion for wrestling

•       Community focused: kids, families, and partnership

Philosophy

Mental Health for our youth: Most of our team have dealt with this issue with their children or their children’s friends.  Brian Monday’s son Eric was a HS star wrestler for Madison HS yet, he committed suicide in college.  The VMC will embrace the Eric Monday Foundation and require its coaches as part of our the VMC certification to take an online awareness course of this real current issue our youth are facing today.

Women’s Wrestling: This is the fastest-growing youth sport in America today.  We will accept and train girls and we will give them the same life tools we will for boys.  We have a girls Coach, Jessie Burkett-Erice who is an experienced college wrestler and coach. Our goal is to always have a woman as a member of our board of directors.

Health and Nutrition: We work with our wrestlers on strength and agility, healthy habits, and weight management.  We are planning to implement classes for this and have a good trainer who is a coach.

Academics: We realize that the chance of making a career out of wrestling is a low probability for most kids.  We actively communicate on a regular basis that academics are a priority and will be needed for the rest of your life.   Many lessons from wrestling will be a huge benefit after the last match is over but academic learning is the most important thing.

Being part of the Legend Wrestling Club at any level is being part of a club that values integrity, hard work on and off the mat, academic success, and a lifestyle conducive with excellence.

All members of our club at every age level will be expected to conduct themselves with the utmost respect for others including opponents, officials, coaches, peers, etc.

All parents are expected to do the same, any signs of unsportsmanlike conduct by a wrestler or a parent will be addressed. If the issue continues, the potential for revoking your membership will be considered. We require that everyone involved with this program including the coaches, parents, athletes, fans, etc. show class, respect, and sportsmanship.

Expectations

Why Wrestle?

A great description of the benefits of having your child wrestle is provided by one of the sport's all-time greats, Cael Sanderson.

The following is excerpted from his article "Why My Kids Will Wrestle".

Foundation Sport

Wrestling is the perfect foundation for all other sports. Wrestling is balance, agility, hand-eye coordination, flexibility, positioning, strength, speed, explosiveness, footwork, hustle, mental focus, mental toughness, core strength, concentration, competition, and endurance. Wrestling will make our youth better at all other sports.

Fun 

Wrestling is a game. It is the most basic and instinctual game. Toddlers wrestle. The sport of wrestling is the ultimate competition where two individual take their individual strengths and match them up against each other. Wrestling is a battle of wits, technique, speed, agility, flexibility, and toughness. No two wrestlers are alike.

Exercise 

Wrestling is one of the world’s most premier physical fitness sports. Wrestling develops strength and endurance. Poor health is a major issue in our society today and wrestling will help develop a love of exercise and physical fitness in our youth.

Self-Confidence 

Very little is accomplished without self-confidence. Wrestling teaches self-confidence like nothing else I know outside of religion and knowing that you are a child of God. Insecure people have the most difficult time learning from others and make progress even more difficult than it already is. Wrestling teaches hard work, self-improvement, sense of accomplishment, camaraderie of a team, 1 on 1 aspect, and self-defense to name a few. These promote self-worth, respect, and confidence.

Self-Defense

Although wrestling is not commonly considered a “martial art,” it is the #1 base discipline in the world of MMA. Wrestlers know how to defend themselves and neutralize threats quickly. Wrestling is controlling an opponent. If you want your kids to know how to defend themselves, put them in wrestling.

Humility

Nothing teaches humility better than a 1-on-1 sport. Winning and losing in a 1-on-1 setting brings humility. There is nowhere to hide and no one to blame but yourself. All wrestlers will lose at some point and doing so in these conditions teaches humility. Hard work and discipline are two keys to success in wrestling and both teach humility.

Respect

The challenges of being a wrestler teach you to respect yourself. After you learn to respect yourself you will learn to respect others. You learn to respect your teammates as well as your opponents. You learn to listen to and respect your coach. After you learn to respect others you are able to learn from them, a life lesson.

Self-discipline 

Wrestling is discipline. Repetition of drills, hard work, weight management, and continually doing the best thing instead of the easiest thing is discipline. Wrestling requires postponing instant “wants” to gain something more valuable long term. It takes discipline and focus to reach goals.

Roadmap to Success

Wrestling is the perfect example of what it takes to be successful in life. Goal setting, hard work, determination, focus, love of challenges, love of competition, confidence, being coachable, mental toughness, discipline, creativity, teamwork and accountability.

Toughness

Wrestling is a physical, contact sport. You learn that sometimes you just get poked in the eye. Physical and mental toughness go hand in hand. You learn that a little pain or struggle is part of the process of doing great things.
Some personal information included in this category may overlap with other categories.

“After you’ve wrestled, everything else in life is easy.”

— Dan Gable, Olympic Gold Medalist and Coach

Meet Our Coaches

  • Head Coach and General Manager

    Coach Ian is the founder and head coach of the Legend Wrestling Club. He brings a wealth of experience and accomplishments to the club.

  • 5 club members combined to make 8 World teams and earn 5 World level medals

    5 individual Flo National Champions, including 8 finalists

    7 Journeymen Classic champions, most hammer award winners

    4 Club members ranked #1 in the country at their weight

    Named one of the top clubs in the Nation by USA wrestling 4 consecutive years

    NHSCA top 5 Team at the High school, Middle school, Elementary school levels

    3 Consecutive Waterway duals team champions

    Tyrant Duals Champions Elementary school/Middle school

    Dozens of Fargo Champions/All Americans

    Dozens of PA State Champions/Place winners

    Director of wrestling operations/RTC Coach NC State University

    4X reigning ACC Champions

    Top 5 national ranking

  • Girl's Head Coach

    Coach Jess is a graduate of Lyon College in Batesville, AR where she studied Psychology and Business Administration. She participated on the Women's wrestling team, Student Activities Council, and sister of Phi Mu Fraternity. She is proud of her long wrestling pedigree. Both her parents, Matt Burkett-Erice and Aubrey Burkett-Erice are accomplished wrestlers and coaches and have built thriving wrestling programs in Northern Virginia. Working alongside her parents, Coach Jess has experience in running practices, individual sessions, implementing strength training programs, coordinating schedules, recruitment and the organization of tournaments.

  • Potomac Falls High School Wrestling Alum ('18)

    2x VAWA Freestyle State Champion

    2x VAWA Team member

    VAWA Team Coach

    2x SAC Women’s Wrestling Medalist

    Marymount University Women's Wrestling Assistant Coach

  • Coach and Founder of Legend Wrestling Club

    David is a serial entrepreneur experienced in starting, financing, and growing several companies over a 28 year period. Including Hamanasi Adventure Resort in Belize, Blu Venture Investors and DPI, the exclusive representative of Apple Computer for Russia. MBA, Northwestern Kellogg School of Management.

    David has coached youth wrestling for over 10 years including 2 years as an Assistant Coach for Langley HS and the last 8 years for VYI firebirds in Vienna, VA. David wrestled in HS and decided his first year, he was going to win the 4A (large school) state tournament in Missouri. From 3-18 at JV 105lbs to 35-5 at 138lbs. David lost 1-0 in the semifinals at the state tournament.

    At Legend Wrestling Club, David has been able to combine his love for wrestling with his business experience and passion for creating entities of lasting value. David lives in Vienna, VA, has three boys and his wife, Dana, that put up with his love of wrestling. David’s mother Joan was a devout feminist and taught him a woman can do anything a man can do.

  • Head Beginners Coach

  • Assistant Coach

    Coach Chris’s wrestling philosophy is to not only help athletes master wrestling fundamentals, new techniques, and systems; but also to be leaders in their respective communities. He is passionate about applying strength and conditioning elements to wrestling programs to make wrestlers more dynamic competitors.

  • Coach Chris Knight has been involved in the sport of wrestling for over 34 years. Coach Chris competed locally at Yorktown High School for Head Coach Scott Brooks; and, at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (UTC) for Head Coach Ralph Manning. He has over 20 years of experience coaching wrestling at the high school and youth levels in Tennessee, Virginia, and Washington D.C.. Before joining Legends Wrestling Club, he was a member of the coaching staffs at Yorktown High School (Arlington, VA), Hyde Leadership Public Charter School (Washington, D.C.), and Oakton High School (Vienna, VA). Chris has coached multiple regional and state qualifiers and/or placer winners; as well as wrestlers that went on to compete at the collegiate level.

Our Facility

Legend Wrestling is centrally located in Vienna, VA, and features one of the largest, most comprehensive year-round wrestling-specific facilities in the country. With 6,000 square feet of climate-controlled mat space, we can safely and effectively manage both large and small groups of wrestlers, and our mats and wall padding are new for maximum comfort and safety. Strength training and physical conditioning are other aspects of wrestling where our wrestlers receive expert instruction with supervised access to a wide range of training equipment.

Parents are welcome to stay for practice in our parent lounge featuring WiFi and TVs streaming the practice sessions. 

FAQs

  • Camp fees are typically non-refundable however the fees can be used at a later date for future camps or club practices.  A written notice of cancellation with explanation of medical or emergency circumstances must be provided for a refund for credit request to be considered. Refunds in full will be offered for campers or household member who have COVID-19 symptoms, exposure, or a positive test within two weeks of the start of camp session.  If a program is canceled a full refund will be issued. No refunds or credit will be given for campers arriving late, leaving early, dismissed from camp, or unable to attend all or part of a session. All requests for refunds must be in writing and emailed to info@legendwrestling.org

  • Monthly memberships will begin and automatically renew on the day of the month you make your initial membership purchase. Club memberships can be canceled or paused starting on the renewal date.

  • Generally, we say no one below kindergarten, but this really depends on the maturity of each individual child. As long as they are able to follow directions and can safely participate, they are welcome to join us at practice.

  • Yes, Girls wrestling is the fastest growing sport in the country right now and we love that girls can now benefit from all that our great sport has to offer. Each year we have more and more girls joining and are expecting quite a few again this year. We have a girls coach and our female wrestlers have already been very successful in competition.

  • Yes, you can. We understand that this sport isn’t for everyone and we offer a 2 day trial as well as a variety of registration options.

  • For practice we suggest a t-shirt, athletic shorts/sweats, and a pair of wrestling shoes (We do not allow street shoes or bare feet on the mat for sanitary reasons) and a water bottle. For competition they will be required to wear a singlet, wrestling shoes, and possibly head gear depending on the event. We recommend that every athlete brings a water bottle to practice.

  • No, we require wrestling shoes and have loaners you can use.

  • We do not require athletes to wear headgear at practice. But depending on the tournament or event we compete at head gear may be required. Our suggestion is to own a pair of head gear that has been properly fitted for the athlete, so if the need arises it’s ready for competition.

  • Unfortunately, a stigma still lingers around the sport from how weight management was handled in the past. Rest assured, the days of running in plastic suits and dehydrating yourself is a thing of the past. Not only do we not encourage weight cutting we actively encourage our wrestlers to get bigger, stronger and healthier.

  • While coaching duties are a major role that we are always looking to fill, there is a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes to ensure our club runs well.
    Anyone interested in helping out in any capacity whatsoever, can always volunteer.

  • Several studies have been conducted in recent years that show wrestling to be safer than many more common sports including football, ice hockey and gymnastics. Most noteable in these reports is wrestling's low percentage of serious, permanent and life-threatening injury in relation to other sports. A quote from USA Wrestling Club has the following to say about the risk of injury in wrestling:


    "Wrestling is a contact sport and injuries will occur. As would be expected, wrestling has more injuries than tennis and swimming, but most injuries are minor, consisting of sprains and strains. Wrestling has fewer serious injuries than football, basketball or ice hockey. There is a lesser chance of getting seriously hurt when wrestling than when riding in a car, skateboarding or riding a dirt bike."

  • No. We do have a comfortable parent lounge where they can watch practice if they choose to do so.

  • It’s important for wrestlers to maintain good skin health. Wrestlers should shower with soap and water soon after practice. Not only is it good hygiene, it also helps keep the wrestler’s skin healthy. Only wear clean workout clothes to practice. Contact-sports can increase conditions to pick up a contagious skin disease such as Ringworm, Impetigo, Staph, etc. Most are usually treated with a topical medicine and go away within a few days. If your wrestler develops an itchy spot, sore, rash, or patch or zits all close together, you should have it checked as soon as possible.

Wrestling is one of the few sports that requires almost no equipment to participate in practices, and very little equipment for tournaments.