Evolution Of Wrestling Essay

One of the oldest form of competition, practiced by some of the most dominant men in history, wrestling has been around since ancient times. The first real traces of wrestling date back 5000 years to the time of the Sumerians. Sculptures and artwork also show evidence of wrestling in the egyptian culture. Almost all ancient cultures practiced some form of wrestling, but it was never done in an organized fashion until the Roman and Greek empires. For the Greeks, wrestling was a science and it represented important training for young men. Men wrestled naked, with their bodies covered in olive oil and coated with a layer of very thin sand to protect the skin from sunburn or from cold during winter events. After the match, they scraped this layer off with an tool called a strigil and washed themselves with water. Matches were similar to those of modern Greco-Roman wrestling, as shown in drawings and inscriptions from that time, the competitor who first threw his opponent or first
In freestyle wrestling or as some call it catch as you can wrestling, both wrestlers started the match standing and then a wrestler tried to hold the other opponent's shoulders to the ground this is known as a “fall” or a “pin”. If no pin was achieved, both wrestlers continued grappling on the ground, almost all holds and techniques were allowed. Freestyle wrestling first emerged as an Olympic sport in the Saint Louis Olympics of 1904. All 40 wrestlers who participated in the 1904 Olympics were American. The 1904 Olympics sanctioned the rules commonly used for catch-as-catch can, but imposed some restrictions on dangerous holds. Wrestling by seven weight classes. They were 104.9 lb, 115.1 lb, 125.0 lb, 134.9 lb, 143.9 lb, 156.7 lb, and greater than 158 lb this is the first time in recorded history where athletes were divided by weight