Wrestling - Mixed Martial Arts Competition

Mixed Martial Arts Competition

A waist-hold is applied to a wrestler in preparation of throwing him down to the ground. In the background, two ancient athletes are pictured in a stance known as akrocheirismos (finger-hold) with their heads pushing against each other's.

Grappling and striking skills are both of importance in mixed martial arts competitions. Fighters who were accomplished wrestlers, gained respect during the early stages of MMA development. Some of these, went on to win several early Ultimate Fighting Championships (UFC 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12).

Successful fighters in modern MMA who began their training in various forms of wrestling, include Jon Jones, Frank Edgar, Cain Velasquez, former Olympic wrestler Daniel Cormier and Brock Lesnar, a former UFC heavyweight champion who was a NCAA wrestling champion in 2000 and achieved 2nd place 1999, and former champions Dan Henderson, of PRIDE FC and Randy Couture, a multi-time UFC champion, both of whom competed extensively in collegiate and Greco-Roman wrestling before beginning their careers in mixed martial arts.

Read more about this topic:  Wrestling

Famous quotes containing the words mixed, martial, arts and/or competition:

    There are certain queer times and occasions in this strange mixed affair we call life when a man takes this whole universe for a vast practical joke, though the wit thereof he but dimly discerns, and more than suspects that the joke is at nobody’s expense but his own.
    Herman Melville (1819–1891)

    What, then, does a chaste girl do?
    She does not offer, yet she does not say “No.”
    —Marcus Valerius Martial (c. 40–104)

    These arts open great gates of a future, promising to make the world plastic and to lift human life out of its beggary to a god- like ease and power.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    The elements of success in this business do not differ from the elements of success in any other. Competition is keen and bitter. Advertising is as large an element as in any other business, and since the usual avenues of successful exploitation are closed to the profession, the adage that the best advertisement is a pleased customer is doubly true for this business.
    Madeleine [Blair], U.S. prostitute and “madam.” Madeleine, ch. 5 (1919)