Catch Wrestling

My father grew up in eastern Pennsylvania, and was trained in amateur freestyle wrestling. He also learned catch wrestling, which we would call today submission wrestling. I don’t really know where he learned it from, I never had the opportunity to ask him, and when he was teaching me I was too young (9-12 years old) to know what even to ask.

Since I was wrestling in school (which was, back in the day, a sport just about everyone participated in during the winter in Pennsylvania), my father showed me some of the classic freestyle moves. Take-downs, escapes, etc. etc.

After we would practice for a while, he would then bring out the catch wrestling moves. He usually told me that they were used to stop an over aggressive opponent who might be trying to hurt you. He would come up with clever names for these moves, and tell me stories of wrestling strongmen who would arrive in town and challenge the local men to try to beat them in a wrestling match and putting up some money as incentive. The locals would pay the entrance fee with their own money to compete and enter the roped off area (usually in grass) and they would start, with the wrestling strongman usually winning by applying some form of submission hold. These traveling wrestlers had colorful names, which are escaping me now.

Most of the moves that I remember him showing me involved arm locks and using the arm to leverage the opponent into other positions.

In fact, what was really interesting to me was that at a recent Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu seminar I attended, the instructor was explaining how you need to keep your arms in tight and not let them flounder about because it is easy to snatch and lock a loose arm like that.

Reminded me of my dad and our lessons.

Wish he was still here

Advertisement