Catch wrestling

[DdlR]

BJJ does definitely tie up with the band of wandering grapplers of judo, CACC and JJ practitioners travelling the world in the 1800's and early 1900's doing challenge and shoot matches.

However, today, hundreds of thousands of people are training BJJ or derivatives while few are training legit CACC making any real rivalry which could spark some interest hard to achieve.

Blame it on the Olympic Games committee, way back when the modern Games were first being organized. At that time, the idea was to choose sports that represented the original (ancient) Olympic events, and the committee chose an obscure French folk-wrestling style because they felt it was the closest to ancient Greco-Roman wrestling (and, possibly, because they were French).

That style, originally called la lutte a mains platte (open-handed wrestling) was then re-named Greco-Roman wrestling, and the rest is history. If the committee had chosen Lancashire catch wrestling instead, then that sport would have received all the glory and funding over the past hundred+ years and would probably be the dominant form of European wrestling today.

[265lbsfist]

Blame it on the Olympic Games committee, way back when the modern Games were first being organized. At that time, the idea was to choose sports that represented the original (ancient) Olympic events, and the committee chose an obscure French folk-wrestling style because they felt it was the closest to ancient Greco-Roman wrestling (and, possibly, because they were French).

That style, originally called la lutte a mains platte (open-handed wrestling) was then re-named Greco-Roman wrestling, and the rest is history. If the committee had chosen Lancashire catch wrestling instead, then that sport would have received all the glory and funding over the past hundred+ years and would probably be the dominant form of European wrestling today.

Cool. Didn't know that.

Have any source for that so I can read up on it?
( Guess I thought Greco was somehow more connected to the ancient forms )

[DdlR]

I've done some more extensive write-ups on it - try a forum search for "mains platte".

[265lbsfist]

I've done some more extensive write-ups on it - try a forum search for "mains platte".

Thanks! :)