The most ancient and aristocratic art is war.

Wrestling is a close second.

To the Greeks, wrestling, or πάλη, was the most popular and vital sport—the spectacle that turned men into immortal gods. Milo of Croton, a six-time Olympic champion and seven-time Pythian wrestling champion, won renown for his Herculean strength and incredible stamina. Some wrestlers, such as Topsius, came from the same bloodline as great philosophers (in this case, the brother of the skeptic Dio of Alexandria). Others so treasured wrestling and their wrestling accomplishments that they chose to go by their grappling names rather than their familial ones. The most famous example of this is Aristocles of Athens, who as a youth participated in the Isthmian Games as a high-level grappler. Aristocles’s strong, broad shoulders (“Platon” in Ancient Greek) and powerful physique earned him the nickname “Plato.”

Pankration was the next evolution in Greek wrestling. Introduced at the Olympic Games in 648 B.C., Pankration, or “total combat” or “total contest,” combined wrestling with boxing to form the world’s first version of mixed martial arts. Pankration, which was especially beloved by the warlike Spartans, featured bloody bouts wherein contestants engaged not only in strikes (both punches and kicks), but also joint manipulations, submission holds, and vicious attacks like biting and eye gouging. The Greek philosopher Dio Chrysostom (40-115 A.D.) once remarked that the Greeks honored the Olympic olive crown above life, and this quip was especially true for the practitioners of Pankration. The greatest of them all, Arrhichion (or Arrhachion) of Phigalia, chose death via a triangle choke instead of defeat during a fight. As described by Pausanias:

For when he was contending for the wild olive with the last remaining competitor, whoever he was, the latter got a grip first, and held Arrhachion, hugging him with his legs, and at the same time he squeezed his neck with his hands. Arrhachion dislocated his opponent’s toe, but expired owing to suffocation; but he who suffocated Arrhachion was forced to give in at the same time because of the pain in his toe. The Eleans crowned and proclaimed victor the corpse of Arrhachion.

This Occidental obsession with wrestling is still alive and well, with the United States producing high-quality grapplers from almost every state, and the wrestling heartland of the Midwest and Southwest predominating at the high school and collegiate levels. In the world of MMA, Brazilian jiu-jitsu specialists and strikers are second-class fighters compared to wrestlers, especially the fearsome Dagestani grapplers connected to Khabib Nurmagomedov and current UFC Lightweight champion, Islam Makhachev. Wrestling, the oldest and basic combat sport, remains king.

However, a perceptive reader may notice that there is quite a leap in time between the death of Arrhichion and the rise of the UFC. What existed between the ancient world’s premiere combat sport and the today’s MMA? The answer can be found in the rough-and-tumble and thoroughly working-class county of Lancashire in England’s northwest. Lancashire wrestling was a type of folk wrestling performed during holidays such as May Day, Easter and Whit Monday. Hard-bitten miners, farmers, and factory workers would square off for a half-gallon of beer or simply bragging rights. The best Lancashire wrestlers, known as “hookers,” became popular local heroes in and around Manchester, Wigan, and other blue-collar towns. Unlike Greco-Roman wrestling, Lancashire-style matches did not end when an opponent was thrown to the ground. The matches continued until someone was either pinned with both shoulders on the ground or was forced to submit to a choke or joint lock. This brutal style was later rechristened as “catch-as-catch-can,” or simply catch wrestling.

Catch wrestling professionalized in the 1820s, and by the 1840s, England had several catch-wrestling superstars like the heavyweight William Swann of Ashton and Sam Hurst of Stalybridge. Catch wrestling was particularly popular with Royal Navy sailors, some of whom engaged in grappling contests all around the world against opponents using different arts, such as Indo-Persian Pehlwani. The favor was returned when some of the best Indian wrestlers, such as the Great Gama, were invited to London to compete against Englishmen well-versed in the three main styles of English grappling (Lancashire wrestling, Cumberland and Westmorland wrestling, and Cornwall and Devonshire wrestling). These contests drew money and attention, and once English grappling was given a ruleset and a governing body known as the National Amateur Wrestling Association (NAWA), catch wrestling became an internationally recognized sport. Catch wrestling was part the Olympics from 1904 until 1936. Here, plug-ugly men with cauliflower ears could slap on wristlocks or toeholds and win gold medals for doing so.

Catch wrestling made its way to the United States sometime in the late nineteenth century. The sport became a fixture of the traveling carnivals. Catch wrestlers were often also strongman performers, and they would make money by challenging any spectator, or “mark” in wrestling parlance, to a grappling match. These contests were real, and as a result the wrestlers had to be proficient in submission holds in order to subdue strong farm boys or rowdy drunks. Modern pro wrestling was born from these sideshow performances, and the business’s lingo (“kayfabe,” “face,” “heel,”) is pure carny.

Before catch wrestling became the worked-fight world of professional wrestling, the sport enjoyed widespread popularity, and its top-tier athletes were some of the biggest celebrities of the early twentieth century. Martin “Farmer” Burns (1861-1931) was the Iowa-born wrestling champion whose 20” neck was so strong he could survive a six-foot hangman’s drop. Farmer Burns did this stunt at many carnivals during his career, and it was only possible thanks to his strength and conditioning regimen which emphasized neck bridges alongside dumbbell exercises and aerobics. Another legendary catch wrestler, the “Russian Lion” George Hackenschmidt, transitioned to grappling after a career as one of the best bodybuilders and powerlifters in Europe. The Hack Squat was invented by the wrestler, and Hackenschmidt’s weightlifting routine remains a favorite with gym enthusiasts to this day.

The Hackenschmidt Workout:

• Day One—Chest, Shoulders, and Triceps

1. Triceps pressdown—three sets with eight reps.
2. Lateral raise—three sets with eight reps.
3. Close-grip floor press—three sets with eight reps.
4. Single-arm dumbbell raise—three sets with eight reps.
5. Bench press—five sets with five reps.
6. Clean and jerk—three sets with four to six reps.

• Day Two—Legs

1. Barbell Hack squat—five sets with five reps.
2. Romanian deadlift—three sets with four to six reps.
3. Leg press—three sets for eight reps.
4. Seated calf raise—three sets for ten reps.
5. Standing calf raise—three sets for ten reps.
6. Leg curls—three sets for eight reps.

• Day Three—Biceps, Abs, and Back

1. Plank—three sets for one minute each
2. Hanging leg raise—three sets for ten reps.
3. Dumbbell curls—three sets for eight reps.
4. Barbell curls—three sets for eight reps.
5. One-arm row—three sets for eight reps.
6. Rear lateral raise—three sets for eight reps.
7. Bent-over barbell row—five sets for five reps.
8. Pull ups—three sets for eight reps.

Besides his rigorous strength training regimen, which the “Russian Lion” paired with active recovery days dedicated to long walks, cycling, and running, Hackenschmidt was also a cutting-edge dietician who gave lectures on how best to eat for athletic contests. Hackenschmidt ate a diet that was proportioned 75-percent vegetables and 25-percent meat. Hackenschmidt ate whole foods, usually either raw or lightly cooked. He got his sugar from fruits, and besides drinking heavy quantities of milk (supposedly up to five liters a day), the Estonian-born grappler preferred organ meat to the usual cuts. Overall, at his peak, the world wrestling champion consumed an average of five thousand calories a day.

Hackenschmidt’s greatest opponent and the man who beat him in his final contest was the Iowan Frank Gotch. Standing five feet eleven inches tall (180 cm) and weighing 210 pounds (95.3 kg), Gotch used his speed and reach to best the smaller but heavier Hackenschmidt (5’10” and 220 pounds) during their exhausting contests. Gotch was also a master “hooker” who was famous for his toehold submission. It was the heavyweight champion Gotch who popularized the cry of “Uncle,” which was the catch wrestling precursor to today’s tap out. The rivalry between Gotch and Hackenschmidt drew millions of dollars across the world and inspired other athletes to either try their hand at catch wrestling or defeat the discipline’s best stylists. In the latter contests, catch wrestlers usually came out on top. German-born grappler Ad Santel, the Light Heavyweight champion between 1898 and 1901, proclaimed himself the world’s champion of judo after he defeated fifth-degree black belt Tokuguro Ito with a slam.

This victory, along with Santel’s other victories over jujutsu (Japanese jiu-jitsu) practitioners inspired matches of honor between the Occident and Orient. Santel had hours-long contests against judo and jujutsu black belts like Taro Miyake and Daisuke Sakai, the latter of whom was a student of Jigoro Kano, the founder of judo. Santel’s success in these contests, especially his innovative use of submission holds like bicep slicers and kneebars, inspired the Japanese to incorporate more submission holds into their grappling. From here, Japanese grapplers, many of whom also crossed paths with Britain’s greatest catch wrestler and teacher, Billy Riley, brought their knowledge to South America during the massive wave of Japanese immigration to Brazil. It was judo master Mitsuyo Maeda, a veteran of matches against catch wrestlers, who introduced Carlos Gracie to judo and jujutsu, and from there the Gracie family developed what would become Brazilian jiu-jitsu. Lesser known is Lute Livre, or Lute Livre Americana, the Brazilian version of catch wrestling that often defeated Gracie jiu-jitsu fighters during the 1920s and 1930s. One can even say that despite BJJ’s popularity and its omnipresence as a discipline that is widely available anywhere, catch wrestling is still getting the better of the fight. After all, no-gi Brazilian jiu-jitsu is more popular than traditional gi-based competition, and this is thanks to catch wrestling and Lute Livre, both which never competed in anything other than shorts or singlets.

While catch wrestling is a minor novelty today, there are still those who keep the discipline alive. Erik Paulson and his student, former UFC Heavyweight Champion Josh Barnett, are the best-known practitioners of the art today. Barnett frequently touts catch wrestling as the brutal, more vicious cousin of BJJ, and the “Warmaster” has defeated several Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belts using classic and contemporary catch wrestling techniques.

The Snake Pit in Wigan, England, which produced the great professional wrestler Billy Robinson, still teaches students the art of Lancashire wrestling. Catch wrestling remains alive and well in Japan, where many popular pro wrestlers are students of the art as well. In the Land of the Rising Sun, Karl Gotch (no relation to Frank) is still considered a “god” of pro wrestling because he was one of the first Westerners to introduce the Japanese to shoot-style, or real catch wrestling. From Gotch came Shooto and Pancrase, two MMA organizations that predate the UFC by several years.

 

The Gotch Bible

            Karl Gotch believed that wrestling was a working man’s sport, and thus did not require fancy gym equipment or novel techniques. His workout routine emphasized cardiovascular conditioning and bodyweight strength. Thus, to properly execute Gotch’s workout for wrestlers, all one needs is a deck of playing cards.

• Spades: Hindu squats
• Clubs: Jump squats
• Diamond: Hindu push-ups
• Hearts: ½ Moon push-ups
• First Joker: 40 Hindu squats
• Second Joker: 20 ½ Moon push-ups

Red cards require the face value, but all black cards require a doubling of reps. For instance, if a five of spades is drawn, the individual must do ten Hindu squats.

Catch-wrestling gyms and classes may be hard to come by these days, but fortunately Erik Paulson and others regularly demonstrate moves and positions to students on their social media and YouTube accounts. Some catch-wrestling associations still exist, with Snake Pit U.S.A. being the premiere organization for all things catch wrestling. If you want to get started, all you need is a pair of wrestling shoes and grappling shorts. Also, you will find that Brazilian jiu-jitsu practitioners are generally conversant in catch wrestling and can show you some moves, although BJJ tournaments generally disdain catch-style neck cranks and spinal locks. You have now been warned about that…

If you are a true novice, then start here with the foundational catch wrestling maneuver—the double wristlock.

 

How to Perform a Basic Double Wristlock:

1. Grab your opponent’s wrist with the opposite hand. If you snatch the opponent’s left wrist, do so with your right hand.
2. Reach over the opponent’s arm with your left arm and grab your own wrist in a locking position.
3. Push the opponent’s arm towards his shoulder blades while also raising his wrist into the air.

The double wristlock can be performed from standing, from your back, from side control, or from the mount position. Once captured, a double wristlock can be used to throw your opponent onto their shoulders, or it can lead to a reversal if the opponent is on top of you in the mount position.