I think some of the disappointment with the new wrestling room is the fact it didn’t address some critical limitations of the original room and had every opportunity to do so. Moving the room from the bowels of Carver where there was no opportunity for natural daylight to a new “best wrestling facility in the world” with all walls having exterior exposure, I think many assumed the new room would include windows in the most important room and showpiece of the facility.
Rather than having some glazing with natural light that is proven to boost mood, performance, focus, stamina, etc. and to warm up the look and feel and make people not get the basement/dungeon vibe, there are concrete walls all around and only lighting from artificial sources.
The same walls that are there extending up above grade, could have easily accommodated some windows and avoided the frequent knock on the new space. This was an intentional choice, and still no reasoning provided on the obvious omission of what is standard in any new facility with a building program where natural light would be beneficial.
This is just another in what seems like a long line of simple and obvious missteps along the way that add up to create a larger issue and fails to maximize its impact and ability to deliver on a primary goal for the new facility to help Iowa catch up to the competition that seem to be doing the little things we are not prioritizing or executing.
The new facility is a huge improvement in many ways from the old space and I applaud them pulling this project off. I’m still just trying to overlook the best wrestling training facility in the world stumbling at step one of building design 101.
