Original Article posted in the Mercury News

By Tiffany Carney

tcarney@community-newspapers.com

Posted: 03/16/2010 06:00:22 PM PDT
Updated: 03/16/2010 06:00:49 PM PDT

Bobby Soto still remembers his father’s wrestling trophy from Sunnyvale High School. It sat on his grandmother’s mantel and caught his eye each time he passed. It was that admiration that inspired Soto to follow in his father’s footsteps.

Soto, 37, began wrestling at Sunnyvale Middle School in seventh grade. He continued to perfect his wrestling technique until graduating from Fremont High School in 1990—but his interest in wrestling did not stop there. Soto returned to his alma mater as a teacher and coach in 1999.

Soto was honored in January for his coaching efforts with the Central Coast Section’s Honor Coach of the Year Award.

“Going to the state tournament and CCS, I’m going to have that momentum,” he said before the tournaments. He says he was taught to take a humble approach, but was on a high after he was recognized for his efforts.

And that high continued when the Fremont wrestling team finished eighth in the February CCS tournament. It was the first time the team broke into the top 10 since 2006. Individual wrestler Joe Johnson, a Fremont student, won the CCS championship and qualified for the state tournament, held March 5 and March 6. Johnson was defeated in the end.

For Soto, the gratification is not in the number of awards or first place trophies, but in the motivation in his wrestlers. “That’s what I’m the most proud of, getting those students to the next level who still want to wrestle [in college], and if they don’t want to wrestle, going to the next level in academics,” he says. Soto, who also teaches literature and writing, adds that his hope is to send the students to college.

Just like most of his students, for Soto, wrestling is a year-round commitment with 2 1/2-hour practices, twice a week at times. After the wrestling season, he also coaches a team that includes students from the entire county. During tournaments, weigh-ins begin at 6 a.m. and Soto doesn’t get home until 10 p.m. “You really have to enjoy it to be a coach,” he says.

During practices, Soto can also be seen on the mat. He often goes head to head with his students to show them a move or give them the experience of a match with a more advanced wrestler. “A heavy part of coaching is to get in there and wrestle with the guys that are developing,” he says.

Soto co-coaches the team with Erik Duus and says they are visual opposites as Duus stands at 6 feet and Soto is just shy of 5-feet, 5-inches tall. Soto calls the duo yin and yang.

The two also take the team to competitions in Fresno to train, where Soto says many of the best students wrestle. “They have to be exposed to that level of competition to be prepared,” he says.

With a 9-month-old son, Soto says one of his biggest challenges is balancing his passion for wrestling with his family life with his son and wife Leslie.

Soto’s father did not push him into wrestling, and the coach does not want to push his son into wrestling, either. “I plan to be smart about it and allow him to make the decision,” he says.

Now that he has the Honor Coach of the Year title, Soto plans to spend more time at home and work on the Father of the Year title. Soto will still be active in the after-school club team but plans to take a step back from the school team.

The club team started March 8 and is the first of its kind offered on the high school campus. The club invites middle school and elementary school wrestlers to develop their skills in a club team for $30 each month.

It is that kind of passion as a coach—to better his students—that gave CCS reason to recognize Soto’s efforts. He attended the award ceremony with his wife and family as CCS representatives told his wrestling and coaching history. “That’s what touched me,” he says, “Here I am the wrestling coach, and I started to tear up a little bit.”

His passion for wrestling started with his father and biggest supporter. “My dad didn’t miss any of my wrestling matches, as a coach or as a wrestler,” Soto says with pride, adding that it all started because “I was always interested in that one little trophy.”

For more information about Fremont High School’s after-school wrestling club team, visit www.wrestlernation.com.

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