In the realm of Martial Arts there are those few that a not
practiced often today but yet one has become a dying art with a little heart
beat left and that’s the sport of Catch As Catch Can Wrestling. It is a style
of wrestling that requires great practice (as does most Martial Arts) but yet
it has a scientific feel for it, it’s a mind game like Physical Chess, you have
to think certain moves ahead in order to defeat an opponent but it never gets
easy. It may be a dying art but it hasn't sunk into the grave yet and has been
rising in the last decade. This is the pinnacle of Submission Wrestling.
The first
rule of Catch is to get into the best condition possible. The reason why is
because if you’re in a fight and you have your technique down but don’t last
too long, you’re a goner before you can say “Damn.” Before you ever step on a
mat, you should train with great intensity to become a conditioned individual.
No one knew this better than the great Karl Gotch. To be able to get something,
you have to earn it. I've heard about a lot of guys that love wrestling but
never get down to condition because they don’t care about the work that goes
into it. You want it bad enough; get your ass into gear.
There
aren't many who are left to teach the sport of CACC because most of them are
gone including the late Karl Gotch but there are those that are out there that
can help bring the sport back from the dead with the new generation. The one
that sticks out the most now is the legendary Wigan
wrestler Billy Robinson who coaches and helps out with seminars around the
country with Scientific Wrestling front-runner Jake Shannon. Learn from who you
can because it’s not everyday you learn about wrestling from the old school
ways.
Catch
Wrestling has been around for decades has its roots in England , Eastern Europe and even in America with
greats like Frank Gotch, George Hackenshmidt, Tom Jenkins, Farmer Burns, Fred
Grubmyer and possibly the greatest American wrestler Ed “Strangler” Lewis aka
(Robert Julius Fredrick). It is important to learn about our roots about
mankind’s oldest sport and how it became what it is today. It is man’s
birthright to wrestle, you didn't start out with a ball or a track or a racket,
you started by getting your man to the ground and making him cry uncle to be
the dominant man. You didn't have the Romans duel to the death by shooting a
basketball, you certainly didn't have the Mongolians take down half the world
by scoring touchdowns, they fought with powerful weaponry and the might of
their body to wrestle and kill if needed to. From my understanding Catch is
probably at the top of the list of being the great self-defense program and if
you can strike, kick and wrestle masterfully, you’d be a dynamo.
Not many
want to earn their place because of how tough it is to get there. Look at this
from a perspective, the conditioning is actually the easy part, it’s the
consistency to keep it up and wrestle over a period of time is the hard part
but that’s the beauty of it. Training is a constant state of motion and yeah it
takes guts and the balls to get through it but at the same time it’s a
preparation to help you stay in the game. Very few see that perspective and the
rest bitch that they can’t handle it so they just up and run away like a scared
mutt. I love wrestling and I've learned that if I want to be good at it, I have
to earn my way to get there just like when I had my accident, I wanted so bad
to train and walk again but I had to earn it through progression, drive and the
will to get what I wanted and I made it happen. If I want to wrestle and learn
the holds, I have to go through the trenches first to get there and if it means
getting up to 500 Squats and 250 push-ups consistently so be it.
To learn
Catch Wrestling, you have to catch yourself and grab a hold of your
conditioning and your will to get to where you want to be, if you want it bad
enough, you won’t turn it into a nightmare, you’ll turn it into a dream you’re
making come true and knock down the metaphorical brick wall to make that
happen. Get at it and catch that light that is Catch As Catch Can Wrestling.
