If anyone knows what it takes to be successful as a high school wrestler, it's Justin Petersen.

Petersen finished his scholastic career at Palmerton with a record of 137-22, including a 43-4 mark as a senior, which also included a trip to the PIAA Championships in Hershey.Despite such a distinguished career on the mat, Petersen is now learning what it takes to triumph off of it in his first year as the head coach of his alma mater."I think it's a learning process all the way," he said. "I really enjoy it a lot. There are also some headaches, too. But that comes with the territory and I'm learning to deal with it."You can't coach the team all together in the same way; you have to coach each individual and I'm starting to understand that more and more. I knew the kids before, but now I'm starting to really understand them and learn how to deal with some of the things, because it's more than just wrestling."Petersen doesn't have to look far if he needs advice, with his father, Rick, coaching at Palmerton's junior high level.Rick was also Justin's head coach on the varsity team from 2005-06 to 2007-08 before giving way to Dave Lavin after the 2008-09 season.Knowing he has that support has helped make the transition easier for Petersen.Erick Kresge has moved up from the junior high level to be an assistant varsity coach and former Palmerton head coach Rick Anderson also helps out."All the guys that are around me, I chose for a reason," he said. "They have a lot of good experience and they're going to help me."As a head coach, you have a lot of tough choices to makes that don't have anything to do with wrestling and sometimes you're not prepared for that until you get put in that situation. It's good to be able to bounce ideas off of all the these guys, and they all have a lot of passion for the program, which we hope will help draw kids in."For a team with low numbers, Petersen is trying to do all he can to create interest in the program to keep it growing."We've tried to get kids from football and all the other sports," Petersen noted. "We're a small school, and when I wrestled we had low numbers then, too. It's just part of the game and you just have to try to get kids to do multiple sports."I always encouraged that and I think it's great. It's okay if you really love wrestling and want to do it all year, but I think it's nice to branch out a little bit. We're trying to build up the junior high program and we always try to have a positive relationship with our youth programs."It always starts with your feeder programs and works its way up. If we don't have anybody coming to us, we can't build what we want to do."Working with a team that's produced multiple state qualifiers in recent years, it shouldn't be hard to get people to notice what the Blue Bombers are doing.And when they do, expect the accomplished Petersen to make the most of it, whether relating through his triumphs or failures."I think the success helps, but I think the bigger thing is that when I wrestled I fell short of some of my goals that I really wanted," he said. "And I think that helps me motivate the kids more and helps me put it in perspective. I didn't accomplish some things, and I want to make sure they don't get to that point and not reach their goals."It's going to really fun once we get to the postseason. We keep gearing up for that and we'll see what happens."*****LOOKING AHEAD ...Wednesday will feature several intriguing contests throughout the Times News area. In the Schuylkill League, Pottsville will travel to Lehighton, Blue Mountain will visit Panther Valley and Columbia Montour Vo-Tech will travel to Jim Thorpe, while Tamaqua will visit North Schuylkill. In the Colonial League, Pen Argyl will be at Northwestern, Bangor will trek to Palmerton and Northern Lehigh will venture to Catasauqua. Allentown Central Catholic will be in Eastern Pennsylvania Conference action at Pleasant Valley. All matches are scheduled to start at 7:00 p.m.*****TOURNAMENTS ABOUND...This Saturday, Lehighton will host its Indian Duals, which will also feature Palmerton. Jim Thorpe will be in action at the Line Mountain Duals. Additionally, the annual Schuylkill League Wrestling Tournament is scheduled for the following weekend, Jan. 16-17, at Blue Mountain High School.