I am sorry, but these kind of posts really chap my hyde. . . I wrestled in high school. I have coached wrestling from kids through the varsity level and am also a wrestling referee. I am so tired of hearing about all of the negative aspects of wrestling from those who trully are not familiar with the sport. Are there people who cut too much weight - YES. Are there wrestlers who get skin infections - YES. As a coach and a parent, as someone said above, wrestlers are not allowed to lose more than 1.5% of their body weight per week. All extreme dehydration activities are prohibited by national federation rule. Of course, there are ways around EVERY rule and there are always going to be those who "push the envelope". I never wanted any of my wrestlers to lose more weight than they were comfortable losing. I maintained a good line of communication with all of the parents of the kids that I coached and they were of the weight their son would be competing at. It is amazing how easy it is to begin losing weight once practice started and healthy eating began. A lot of time was spent sterilizing mats and preaching to wrestlers about skin care.
Wrestling teaches a lot of things that transcend sports. Discipline, hard work, dedication and patience among other things. It is one of the only sports that I am aware of where there is a direct correlation in how hard you work to success.
I guess if you want to look for the bad things in anything, you are going to find them. . . but if a kid wants to wrestle - I would not let cutting weight or the possibility of getting a skin disorder stop them. . .