Catch Wrestling United

Anybody see MVPs Toe Hold victory in Bellator? It was an interesting position to land the hold. Not sure if the technique was anything unusual though, didn't get a good look at it.
 
I'm really soaking up as much catch info as possible. Wow. This could be a great sport to watch. I love the little matches you can find online. I think watching BJJ is boring, but with catch there seems to be a lot more action because of the emphasis on top control/pin. Add in the subs and it's very exciting.
 
Roli calls it a lins lock....nasty hold. Lins lock or outside toe hold...either one will hurt you in a hurry
 
Here are the winners of the last California Catch Wresting Association tournament. It was our biggest turnout to date with 50+ wrestlers showing up and getting on the mats. The divisions were pools put together by closest weights.

Women

Lightweight - 1st Kay Hansen (CSW)

Heavyweight - 1st Shayna Baszler (CSW)


Men

150 - 1st Hector Porras

160 1st Adam Roman (10th Planet Costa Mesa)

170 - 1st Javier Garcia (CSW)

180 - 1st Logan Arguello (SubFighter)

200 - 1st Ethan Vistro (CSW)

Heavy - 1st Jaime Castanon


 
Our first seminar of this circuit is coming up here June 3rd-5th in Los Angeles. Come up the ante of your wrestling and submission game under the tutelage of Wade Schalles and myself at the Scientific Wrestling. Pin and Submit camps!

Details and registration for the Los Angeles and other camps on the link below.

http://www.pinandsubmit.com/
 
Hey everyone its been awhile and wanted to say hey. I was doing wrestling and no gi for a good bit in the Baltimore, MD area, Wrestling at the local college club and No Gi at Ground Control. I loved it but took a break as didn't have my life together and needed to get that straight. But not grappling for a long time has really sucked and really happy about going back. Seems like the grappling scene is flourishing more and more I just watched highlights from the UWW European grappling Championships and wow it was amazing..

Mostly wanted to say hey, I really loved this form when I was on here but any advice/ comments would be appreciated. Needless to say my favorite Styles are Catch Wrestling, Wrestling and no gi. But its all Grappling and grappling is amazing and I'm opening my mind to the gi more.

I hope everyone is having fun Kicking butt and taking backs
Regards

CF
 
Josh's double wristlock takedown of Arlovski was pretty cool I thought. Shades of Saku.
 
Shades of Billy Robinson.



A lot of little details that make a lot difference in this video.
 
Just got on board the thread.
It sparked my interest, because I'll be competing in a catch wrestling super fight in Mexico City on September 23rd, part of a series of the "Billy Robinson Cup" they started here a few months ago.
Dan Severn will be having a shoot the same day, which will be cool.
First time i'll take part in an event like this, but what i have to say about catch wrestlers, is that in general they all have a very positive, open attitude and seem to love their trade.
 
Just got on board the thread.
It sparked my interest, because I'll be competing in a catch wrestling super fight in Mexico City on September 23rd, part of a series of the "Billy Robinson Cup" they started here a few months ago.
Dan Severn will be having a shoot the same day, which will be cool.
First time i'll take part in an event like this, but what i have to say about catch wrestlers, is that in general they all have a very positive, open attitude and seem to love their trade.

"Billy Robinson Cup"? I can't find anything on it through Google. What is this? Where is it happening and who is promoting it?

In your first post you sure created a lot of questions to be honest. Who are you and how did you get involved in this? Why Mexico as that seems really strange.

This whole thing seems strange and to be using Billy's name at that , but if it's something we as a community should be supporting then it really pays to let people know.

Josh
 
"Billy Robinson Cup"? I can't find anything on it through Google. What is this? Where is it happening and who is promoting it?

In your first post you sure created a lot of questions to be honest. Who are you and how did you get involved in this? Why Mexico as that seems really strange.

This whole thing seems strange and to be using Billy's name at that , but if it's something we as a community should be supporting then it really pays to let people know.

Josh

Hey Josh, big fan, and so is my 3 year old son (for reasons we haven't figured out yet). Anyway, I found this:
 
"Billy Robinson Cup"? I can't find anything on it through Google. What is this? Where is it happening and who is promoting it?

In your first post you sure created a lot of questions to be honest. Who are you and how did you get involved in this? Why Mexico as that seems really strange.

This whole thing seems strange and to be using Billy's name at that , but if it's something we as a community should be supporting then it really pays to let people know.

Josh

Hey Josh!

The events so far have all been in Mexico City, this is the third or second event of the series, the "Billy Robinson Cup". It's a cup format, with team vs team and superfights, under catch wrestling rules (20 mins, only submissions and pins, winner is 2 out of 3, any other result, is a draw). Winners rack up points for their team and move up to the cup finals.

The next event is exactly the one MilkManUk posted about. Can't find much in google, other than Facebook, where they do most of the promotion.

The promoter is LCS (Liga de Combate Supremo). Robert Hernandez, aka "Soleil", is one of the main promoters, he is a pro-wrestler and has fought MMA/catch/shoot, including Japan, i think.
I chatted with him briefly, and he tells me he met you at Antonio Inoki's IGF in Japan, and that you left him waiting (lol?). He'll elaborate on friday when i meet him.

Why they chose "Billy Robinson" for the cup name, i wouldn't know. I'll ask. I figure it's because they big fans of him and it's as some form of tribute.

And as for why Mexico, i'd say it's not that surprising. Pro-wrestling culture is quite big here and many of the pro-wrestlers in Mexico come from a freestyle or greco background. I know for a fact there's more than a few pro-wrestling gyms where they also love "some" form of catch wrestling, shooto, pancrase and/or submission grappling.
I have personally visited two "luchadores" gyms in the past, to have grappling matches, and not only where they willing to have legit submission matches, but they knew their stuff. Some were very old school (as, in, their coaches were some retired, old guys) who had their walls full with photos of themselves with japanese wrestlers, like Antonio Inoki, both from events in Japan and Mexico. Since i'm not very familiar with either mexican luchadores or japanese wrestlers, i cannot elaborate, but in both gyms the coaches said they learned their submissions during the time they spent with some of those guys.

And i'm Gabriel Mercader and i run a sambo gym and team: "Dinamo 38", in Mexico City, where i'm the combat sambo head coach. I've participated in SAMBO for some years, Panams, world/international cups, etc.
My team was invited to participate in this cup, because, well, we may train sambo, but we compete in judo, BJJ, mma, grappling, etc, and this looks like a new challenge with a very interesting ruleset. I got a superfight against the wrestling/grappling coach of Bonebreakers Team (couple of their fighters just fought this past weekend in the UFC In Texas).
 
Hey Josh!

The events so far have all been in Mexico City, this is the third or second event of the series, the "Billy Robinson Cup". It's a cup format, with team vs team and superfights, under catch wrestling rules (20 mins, only submissions and pins, winner is 2 out of 3, any other result, is a draw). Winners rack up points for their team and move up to the cup finals.

The next event is exactly the one MilkManUk posted about. Can't find much in google, other than Facebook, where they do most of the promotion.

The promoter is LCS (Liga de Combate Supremo). Robert Hernandez, aka "Soleil", is one of the main promoters, he is a pro-wrestler and has fought MMA/catch/shoot, including Japan, i think.
I chatted with him briefly, and he tells me he met you at Antonio Inoki's IGF in Japan, and that you left him waiting (lol?). He'll elaborate on friday when i meet him.

Why they chose "Billy Robinson" for the cup name, i wouldn't know. I'll ask. I figure it's because they big fans of him and it's as some form of tribute.

And as for why Mexico, i'd say it's not that surprising. Pro-wrestling culture is quite big here and many of the pro-wrestlers in Mexico come from a freestyle or greco background. I know for a fact there's more than a few pro-wrestling gyms where they also love "some" form of catch wrestling, shooto, pancrase and/or submission grappling.
I have personally visited two "luchadores" gyms in the past, to have grappling matches, and not only where they willing to have legit submission matches, but they knew their stuff. Some were very old school (as, in, their coaches were some retired, old guys) who had their walls full with photos of themselves with japanese wrestlers, like Antonio Inoki, both from events in Japan and Mexico. Since i'm not very familiar with either mexican luchadores or japanese wrestlers, i cannot elaborate, but in both gyms the coaches said they learned their submissions during the time they spent with some of those guys.

And i'm Gabriel Mercader and i run a sambo gym and team: "Dinamo 38", in Mexico City, where i'm the combat sambo head coach. I've participated in SAMBO for some years, Panams, world/international cups, etc.
My team was invited to participate in this cup, because, well, we may train sambo, but we compete in judo, BJJ, mma, grappling, etc, and this looks like a new challenge with a very interesting ruleset. I got a superfight against the wrestling/grappling coach of Bonebreakers Team (couple of their fighters just fought this past weekend in the UFC In Texas).

Thanks for the response Gabriel!

Ok, it makes sense and I am glad that they want to honor Billy's name with the event. The 5 v. 5 format tea challenge is pretty cool too. Gives the crowd something extra to cheer for beyond justthe individual wrestlers.

I left him waiting? Damn. Not sure what happened there but hopefully we'll cross paths again. I'm glad to hear of people putting together competitive catch wrestling rules events as without a competition space it's hard to really get it out there.

Good luck in your matches and to your team!

Josh
 
Thanks for the response Gabriel!

Ok, it makes sense and I am glad that they want to honor Billy's name with the event. The 5 v. 5 format tea challenge is pretty cool too. Gives the crowd something extra to cheer for beyond justthe individual wrestlers.

I left him waiting? Damn. Not sure what happened there but hopefully we'll cross paths again. I'm glad to hear of people putting together competitive catch wrestling rules events as without a competition space it's hard to really get it out there.

Good luck in your matches and to your team!

Josh

Thanks to you on the follow up!
The event was a mixed bag. The organization was not the best and there were too many matches scheduled for just one night. There were K-1, MMA, and catch wrestling matches.
The team did very well, even though there were some inconclusive results.

The ruleset:
Unlimited time, submissions and pins (3 seconds) to win a fall, unlimited rope grabbing to escape, best of 2/3 falls wins.

The matches were very evenly matched, and with this ruleset (combined with not a huge ring), made it VERY hard to win.

Going back on your posts, i think it's would be good to have some alternative rulesets, with a combination of time limits, points awarded for takedowns, points for pins under 3 seconds, and a rope grab limit.
Coming from SAMBO/Judo, where passivity is heavily penalized, i have to say i felt frustrated at times with my opponent being overly passive. I can't blame him because it was a good strategy based on styles, he was sticking to his gameplan to try and capitalize on a throw attempt.

All of the superfights had to be stopped before they were finished or the promoter changed the rules on the fly, because the audience was getting bored and they had to finish the card, somehow.
The best match was a 2vs2 catch match, which had to be stopped after 40-45 minutes, and postponed for the next event.

What do you think would be a good alternative ruleset for catch? In particular, to make it more spectator friendly and to lure in competitors of other grappling styles?
 
Thanks to you on the follow up!
The event was a mixed bag. The organization was not the best and there were too many matches scheduled for just one night. There were K-1, MMA, and catch wrestling matches.
The team did very well, even though there were some inconclusive results.

The ruleset:
Unlimited time, submissions and pins (3 seconds) to win a fall, unlimited rope grabbing to escape, best of 2/3 falls wins.

The matches were very evenly matched, and with this ruleset (combined with not a huge ring), made it VERY hard to win.

Going back on your posts, i think it's would be good to have some alternative rulesets, with a combination of time limits, points awarded for takedowns, points for pins under 3 seconds, and a rope grab limit.
Coming from SAMBO/Judo, where passivity is heavily penalized, i have to say i felt frustrated at times with my opponent being overly passive. I can't blame him because it was a good strategy based on styles, he was sticking to his gameplan to try and capitalize on a throw attempt.

All of the superfights had to be stopped before they were finished or the promoter changed the rules on the fly, because the audience was getting bored and they had to finish the card, somehow.
The best match was a 2vs2 catch match, which had to be stopped after 40-45 minutes, and postponed for the next event.

What do you think would be a good alternative ruleset for catch? In particular, to make it more spectator friendly and to lure in competitors of other grappling styles?

Unlimited rope escapes and no time limit is a set up just destined to fail as a live, spectator event like the above. The matches ar ebound to go on forever. With just an addition of limited rope escapes the matches would have sped up considerably and winners would have emerged.

Josh
 
We love to talk about Catch Wrestling plenty so here's an opportunity to get on the mats and actually compete!

Last event we had over 60 people compete and even the heavyweight division had a full bracket.

Double elimination!

 
Hey josh, a while back I heard kyle Snyder was looking to get into mma; you and wade should get in touch and see if you can hook him up. He's mentioned he wants to do both mma and international wrestling at the same time (well, you can't say hes not ambitious at least), so a wrestling heavy pressure based grappling game would probably be the best fit. A gameplan that let's you train in way that can benefit both by building off of the existing skill organically rather than just trying to cut and paste new looks on top of it.

If you know you're a ground specialist, and your opponent knows you're a ground specialist, step one is getting the other guy down and keeping him down. Life or death depends on getting past step one, so if you spend more than say even 9/10ths of your training time on that step one, that's probably time well spent. That's something you can apply on the mat or in the cage.

There's plenty of wrestlebox camps like AKA, TriStar, or Jackson-Wink, and plenty of jitsubox camps like Kings or Alliance, but not too many that can or will specialize in that particular flavor of grappling first/takedown and submit game planning. Besides you guys/Paulsons, maybe AMC Pankration, ATT, or Maia's or Gokor's shop.

I also sense potential opportunities through there for exposure or expansion of the sport of catch; an NCAA connection is a particularly interesting possibility.
 
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@Josh Barnett

Is there any book you could recommend about the principles of Catch and its techniques?

Surfing Amazon, I've singled out the following and I'd like to know what you think (I live in Spain so I don't have access to the whole Amazon catalogue):

- Wrestling: Catch-as-Catch-Can Style by E. Hitchcock, a reprint of a 1854 book.
- Say Uncle! (the title is looong) by Jake Shannon.
- The Lessons in Wrestling and Physical Culture - Grappling, Wrestling, Submission by Martin "Farmer" Burns.

Thank you in advance.
 
I didn't know Josh posted here i just tweeted him. lol

Was wondering if there is any cross over for leg lockers and catch wrestling? Do the Danaher guys, Marcin Held, Ryan Hall style fighters naturally gain catch wrestling technique and abilities doing what they do besides the wrestling?
 
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