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| Tuesday October 10 2023 - RobyC | Recent matches | ||||||||||||||
| RobyC is from Montreal and he joined MeetFighters about 4 months ago. I thought I had initially reached out to RobyC, but looking back at my messages, it was RobyC who reached out to me and I truly appreciate that. We live in a world where both sides are too scared to do the first step, but RobyC clearly shown that he was the braver and better man. π He dropped a "Nice wrestling profile you have there ;) " and I honestly think that's a very great invitation to tangle. I've decided again to put the mats on the floor in my bedroom beside my bed and invite him over. I can't do this all the time for family reasons, but this was a good time to do so. It's sometimes, moments of opportunity like this that reminds me that I constantly need to put an eye out, seize it and take advantage of it. This alternative is better than renting hotel rooms where the opponents doesn't show up. Anyhow, during our match, RobyC kept being worried about not providing me a challenge and I kept reminding him it's more about having fun. I love sharing my holds with my opponents, giving them tips and tricks, teaching them what to do to break free or to make their holds more effective. RobyC has a very strong upper body and definitely knows how to tangle despite being new to the scene. He has a good build and a nice beard. I definitely want to have his build when I'm at his age.  Roby learns new moves pretty fast and you can see that he has a shining fiery passion about it. We've all been through this when we discover that there is a whole community out there that shares your interest. π RobyC explained me that his childhood made him a fighter today. He told me that he is of Italian descent. We wrestled light to medium submission with a couple of give and take. I described to him my understanding of the word "promission", which I believe is simply a cross between submission and pro wrestling. We made sure to pace ourselves carefully so that we don't drain all of our energies in just one bout, so we ended up wrestling for a good 90 minutes. He is the first guy that I've wrestled who wears a watch to time and measure the calories spent and the hearts per minute. Hey, why not? We just had to be mindful not to hit his wrist. Scissors was definitely an instant win against RobyC, but I did tell him that with a couple more matches under his belt, he could easily avoid my legs and defeat me. I think a re-match here is definitely in order. π Lastly, I had forgotten to mention that RobyC is also an avid fan of gut punching which I take would make a perfect match against WalterG. They both are capable of giving and receiving a lot of gut punches and they are always taunting me to give them harder. To that, I usually tell them that the only thing I would be willing to crank harder would be my scissors. π | |||||||||||||||
Blog ID 358  | |||||||||||||||
| Sunday September 24 2023 - WrestleWriter | Visitors in town | ||||||||||||||
| WrestleWriter was in town for a visit. He is originally from Toronto and I had the honor to be his 3rd opponent. For someone who is only at his third match, he definitely knew what is he doing. WrestleWriter is very strong and has natural instincts in wrestling. He has experience in kayaking and in hiking and that definitely gives him an advantage for other sports. He always been following wrestling for a long while, watching on TV and due to personal circumstances, he was only been able to start doing it recently. Anyhow, WrestleWriter is not a rookie by any means in my book. π We tumbled around with light give and take and I realized I had to increase the notch up or two because he definitely could handle anything that I was throwing him. We still took it easy by taking breaks in between and he suggested that I lift him up. His reaction to a bearhug was funny because he wasn't expecting me to lift him. He was quite stiff in my rack and I had to tell him to relax, but that's a normal reaction for a first time rack. All in all, I think he had control of most of the match even though we took it easy and the irony was that he though I was going to destroy him and I thought he would be a walk in the park. I guess these encounters continue to remind me to never underestimate new opponents and never judge a book by its cover. After our match, we went and meet up Ttaree Moss Dwa Le at a coffee shop. Yes, he was also in town and he also comes from Toronto. WrestleWriter had a few reservations about Ttaree, but a nice chat with coffee cleared up any clouds. I wish I could take Ttaree as a 2nd opponent, but I've decided to listen to my body and do only a maximum of one match per day. Ttaree kindly later gave us a lift to subway and I gave another brief hug to WrestleWriter who yelled "NOOOO!" because he didn't want to be lifted again. π For sure, I made a new friend here and we will be meeting again in the future. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 356 | |||||||||||||||
| Wednesday August 9 2023 - RickSF and SFBruce | Visitors in town | ||||||||||||||
| RickSF (id 8839) and SFBruce were in town last week-end. It was part of their multi Canadian city visit going from Toronto for the Canadian Wrestlefest, then with a hop to Ottawa and then to Montreal. I was their tour guide for 2 small days. We walked and biked (using electric bikes) to the Old Port, passed beside Habitat 67 (built for the Expo in 1967, Expo 67 was an international and universal exposition, or, in short, a world fair), dashed beside the Osheaga Rock festival on the Concorde Bridge and visited the Jean-Drapeau Park which hosts the Gilles-Villeneuve Formula 1 race. Unfortunately, the track was under maintenance, but we still managed to biked through the small gardens. We then went to Chinatown to eat at Sammi & Soupe Dumpling, which was pretty good. In the evening, we hung out in the village, visited the Campus Strip bar and the bear bar Stud. We also met two of their wrestling friends from San Francisco.   RickSF and SFBruce on the Concorde Bridge The next day, we biked further to the edge of the canal Lachine where the Rene-Levesque park is located and our way back, SFBruce pinpointed a special restaurant called "Le Taklamakan" that specializes in Uyghur cuisine. It was luckily near our bike path. SFBruce explained to me that Chinese restaurants that have Mandarin and Cantonese cuisine are plentiful in San Francisco, but Uyghur cuisine is impossible to find. Nevertheless, we were all thrilled to try this experience with him and we had the opportunity to taste delicious lamb dishes. On the map, that restaurant is denoted by that L-shaped detour we did on our bikes. π   I did manage to wrestle both of them a bit... and in the evening, I invited LumberG (id 250) over to tangle with them as well. SFBruce kindly went from submission to light give and take because I did told him to go easy on LumberG. RickSF was able to determine through the tangle that LumberG was safe to wrestle so we had a four way match on the small little bed at their hotel. We were then famished and LumberG suggested that we tried our specialty: Poutine, a dish made of fries, gravy and cheese curds. It's actually overrated, but still a great thing to make tourists try. π  Rick asked me why I didn't attend the fest in Toronto to which I explained that I'm still recovering from my shoulder injury and didn't want to make it worse. I did replace both my workstations with standing desks, but it will take some time before I fully recover. It's technically my arrogance, stubbornness, stupidity and my strong desire to rack heavy guys that had gotten me in this much trouble. I just need to be a bit more disciplined and ask people for their weight before racking them and set myself reasonable limits. Here's a shot of RickSF with a triangle head scissor on me :)
And here's a rare shot of LumberG (id 250) getting out-muscled and dominated by SFBruce even though LumberG is a heel at heart. π  Both RickSF and SFBruce gracefully suggested that we visit San Francisco, to which we would be more happy to do eventually :) I did give both of them my friendly bear hug before parting ways. We actually had a trip planned the next day to Ottawa to meet with CanWrestle and Kevin_Nova, but LumberG's back was hurting and I was tired. In any case, Kevin_Nova was sick with a throat bug, so we simply went for dinner and had a nice chat with CanWrestle. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 352 | |||||||||||||||
| Saturday March 4 2023 - Meet your heroes: Kayden Keller | Visitors in town | ||||||||||||||
| CanWrestle (id 9693) is known to publish wrestling fiction. Many of his works were initially published in chapter portions on his MeetFighters blog, but he eventually consolidated them and is currently selling them as books on Amazon. As his work gain traction, Kayden Keller eventually stumbled upon them (hey, our community is pretty small and niche... there isn't a lot of books covering gay wrestling on Amazon). So, he reached out to CanWrestle because the wrestling scenarios, stories and topics covered by his work intersect with Kayden's interests. They eventually make a trip to Montreal and I had the honor to wrestle both of them yesterday. I never thought I'd meet the Great Kayden Keller himself. He's an absolutely charismatic and exceptional guy all around: he is so down to earth, very humble, polite, well-mannered and quite intelligent. Should you meet him one day, remember to ask about his profession, he has a lot of things to share. He is definitely a superstar is in my eyes and he's an outstanding wrestler with an amazing personality. π€© Kayden appears in more than 70 matches in BG East's videos and he is excellent and consistent throughout all of his performances, but meeting this guy in person and seeing how nice he is in real life is really something else. He's the introvert by day, extrovert wrestler with an outgoing and heeling persona by night. One may be intimidated by this titan measuring 6'2" and weighing 215 lbs at the time of our match, but truth be told, this giant beast is a gentle and tamed teddy bear. π§Έ CanWrestle and Kayden rented a spacious hotel room in downtown Montreal and they borrowed my mats so that they can have a few local matches on something a bit more safer and pleasant to tangle in than a mattress. I couldn't host at my condo because my mom lives with me. I took a ride with them back to the hotel and I was worried about how we would be able to sneak in the mats without the reception eyeing us or flagging us someway or another. Luckily, their hotel had an underground parking lot. We simply carried the mats into the elevator and that lead us directly to the floor where the room was located. No need to pass awkwardly and unscrupulously in front of reception with eight large gigantic pieces of flashy blue suspicious mats. π I had a great and memorable evening: we wrestled a bit, ate at the MVP sports bar, went back to the hotel for some more tango and LumberG (id 250) eventually joined us. We proceeded with a nice round-robin where Kayden evidently and effortlessly destroyed each of us, being the experienced wrestler that he is. When I was ready to speak to Kayden for the first time, it went something like this: "You probably get this often, but yea.. I'm a big fan. What really impresses me with your work is that you think outside the box. Most BG East matches I've seen follow a same format or template, they just feature two different wrestlers and they repeat the same stuff over and over. Your matches contains holds and maneuvers that only belong in fantasies and you make them a reality." He smiled and he explained to me that they are indeed many that belong to the category of wrestlers that just want to shoot the video and leave with their paycheck ASAP, while there are others who understand the community and take the time to produce the kind of content that we actually want to see and put a lot of love and passion into it. CanWrestle has already filled him with the info of my site and my main strengths so he went and picked me up in a bearhug, started tackling me down, letting me put my scissors on him.. which obviously and virtually did nothing. That's where I realized I was wrestling a concrete wall, an invincible brick and that there was nothing I can do aside from being defending and delaying the inevitable. Kayden also does have BJJ experience that made him untouchable and impervious to anything you could throw at him. He was definitely on a completely different level, but he will still adapt to your style, gradually apply his holds and he's super safe and nice to tangle with. Kayden was nice to cheer me up by saying that I was strong when he is clearly 10x stronger than I am. π He shared this story that he had fought an opponent that was downplaying his skills, but when Kayden fought him, he realized that his opponent had a lot of training. His opponent later told him that he never show or tell his abilities and skills in advance because most people would be afraid to wrestle him or think they would end up with injuries. Many would believe or think of a scenario where they are this Level 1 Newbie Wrestler facing a Level 100 Maxed-out Opponent that will one-shot them and kill them, when the reality is the complete opposite: facing a highly experienced opponent means that you have less chances of being hurt, because your opponent knows exactly what they're doing. Here's a couple of pics where Kayden clearly had control over me, but at the same time, he was taking very good care of me. π
You can actually get a different clip where LumberG took a video of Kayden doing a different rack on me, but standing up and turning around in [  Clip ID 426 ]Mind you, I did wrestle CanWrestle too. He did short work of me. I always love being his jobber, even though I tease him that he enjoys being my ***** once in a while. We did very light stuff and I eventually got racked three times in a row at one point. Once by Kayden, once by CanWrestle and once by LumberG. I think I needed a little break in between them, because the pain in my shoulder started acting out... but it was still very fun nonetheless. π I enjoyed all the racks and these guys do it all very safely, all like professionals! LumberG did told me at point much later that he would have wanted to be racked too... but he was too shy to ask Kayden, so let's put that on our bucket list for now. π LumberG and I tangled a bit and we went: "It's been a while we haven't wrestled each other." So, CanWrestle asked: CanWrestle: "Don't you guys wrestle each other all the time?" LumberG: "Not really... since he injured me." Yeah.. I used to put those leg scissors on LumberG on a regular basis until his sciatic nerve reminded him that it's not something he can take it anymore. I eventually stopped ever putting leg scissors on him, but I also stopped wrestling him competitively by fear of hurting him again or further. Since then, our matches are just a couple of give and take and roughhousing like playful gutpunching or light scissors with little pressure on my end unless Lumber politely asks to crank it up. It did took a couple of months for him to heal, but ever since, I am now still very cautious with LumberG so not to repeat the same mistakes or cause his nerve to enter in a regressive mode. LumberG had his fair share of fun with Kayden. He actually came in not knowing who Kayden is until I much later showed Kayden's catalogs on BG East after the match. π Once they locked up, it didn't take long for LumberG to determine that he was no match for Kayden's strength and experience. However, he was trying not to lose fast, because unlike me, LumberG doesn't like to be publicly humiliated although having Kayden flex on top of you is quite something!  LumberG flexes while enjoying a sight of Kayden Keller's biceps π LumberG eventually said that the reason he doesn't wrestle people taller than him is because he doesn't want to lose. CanWrestle didn't hesitate to throw this: "Well I'm shorter than you and I can beat you." π LumberG mentioned to me that CanWrestle was stronger this time around than in Ottawa, but that was because we only informed him of our visit a few hours prior and that day, CanWrestle have had 5 trainings on boxing and BJJ so he was pretty tired. This time, he was all fresh and ready to tackle LumberG and show him his real strength. When Kayden flexed on top of me, I literally said out loud: "I never imagined that this is something that I would ever be able to see in my life!" π Yes, Kayden has always been a super hero of the gay wrestling world in my eyes, but seeing him flex, wrestle, rack and bearhug me was definitely like a dream come true... somebody pinch me! Our match was really fun and I honestly think this was one of the greatest thing that happened to me in a very a long time. π€ Kayden also mentioned a story where he downplays his looks and I had to interject with: "Please, Kayden, you are gorgeous!" To this day, LumberG still pokes fun at me for throwing such a blatant over-the-top adjective. π After our night, LumberG and I left around midnight to catch our last subway home. As I snuggled up to LumberG, I asked him: Loserboy: "Did you take a shower?" LumberG: "No." Loserboy: "You smell like Kayden Keller." LumberG: (sarcastic) "Do you want to sleep in the other room?" π | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 344 x 1 | |||||||||||||||
| Sunday August 21 2022 - New boxing and MMA gloves | Gear | ||||||||||||||
| I learned the hard way that boxing gloves deteriorate over time... not necessarily through wear and tear, but by long time exposure to warmer temperatures and just having them idle seems to damage them over time. The leather on the gloves just crack depending on the quality and type of material. Both my former MMA and boxing gloves were lost because of this, so I bought myself some new ones. These are my new black MMA gloves. I had the boxing shorts for quite a long while ago... so no, those are not new.
... And these are my new boxing gloves. Let's have a flex at it...
Or... let's have one where I punch you. π€ͺ
I do have a couple of wrestlers that are also into boxing. Mind you, I never did an active sparring match. What I think I would do with these gloves is simply a give and take format, meaning my opponent stands still and I gut punch him a few dozen times and my opponent does the same for me. I don't have any boxing training, so it's just play/fun-boxing for now. π If an uppercut or face punch was used, I probably just pull & receive fake ones, because I can't really really show up to work with a black eye or some broken teeth. π That... and my boyfriend would probably not allow me to go wrestle & box ever again. π | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 336 | |||||||||||||||
| Tuesday April 12 2022 - Submission Wrestling Weekend in Sherbrooke | Wrestling event | ||||||||||||||
After a 4 year hiatus, I finally attended a full-fledged wrestling event just last week-end. It was called "Submission Wrestling Weekend #2" and it was hosted by Fighting4Fun at his home in Sherbrooke where he has a basement full of mats that are very nicely laid out, ideal for competitive submission matches. By the way, Sherbrooke is a small town between east of Montreal and west of Quebec city. I think this is the first time I'm attending an all-out submission event. Events I've attended in the past or either pro, hybrid or one-on-one hotel room events where the type of match is really up to your opponent. Anyhow, I wasn't sure if I was ready for this, because I am currently carrying a shoulder pain that lasted since a couple of months. I made the mistake of racking someone above my shoulder's tolerance, but all in all, I think it went pretty well. Friday April 8 2022 I had an agreement with Fighting4Fun who came to pick me up in Montreal to drive to his house in Sherbrooke. Once we reached our destination, my host kindly made me a tour, showed me his marvelous basement and we took the opportunity to warm up just us two to prepare for the upcoming onslaught or beatings that I was going to get. π Our last match together was 3 years ago. Obviously, been an MMA expert and having won numerous medals around the world, each time I see Fighting4Fun, he just gets better and better. Mind you, he's 61 now, but age is just a number: with his experience, knowledge and skill, he is still the best among all of us. In addition, he became a teacher now of a dojo, training students and sparring his students almost on a daily basis, which kind of makes him now an unstoppable force. Fighting4Fun has this methodology where he toys with his opponent, he lets them think that he has the upper hand and then he'll make you tap when he feels he gave you enough freedom. π That is no exception for me.. however, he was kind enough to let me put on my ankle locks, my body scissors and my leg scissors on him without him resisting back every once in a while. It's basically the only 3 holds I know how to use in submission if I can't use my arms or if I determine that my opponent's arms are stronger than mine. Anyhow, Fighting4fun gave a couple of free taps, but not without him making me tap a hundred times fold the legitimate way afterwards. π After all, there is a price for free submissions... All I can do when he goes in attack mode is to defend and delay that inevitable submission. Armbars are the hold (or weapon) of choice and I'd have to say I have never received as many armbars as I had this week-end. After an hour of sparring or so, our host Fighting4Fun kindly prepared my bed so I can rest up for the full array of matches that's waiting for me tomorrow. Saturday April 9 2022 My host prepared a nice breakfast for me, the usual scrambled eggs and bacon and we continued a brief hour of sparring. I was supposed to meet up with one of Fighting4Fun's top student (apparently, M4st3rP), but he canceled due to family obligations. I was thinking "Thank goodness", because there's enough matches lined up that I would have been dead or zombified after dueling a UFC-style fighter that has a hundred times my level of experience. Around 1 pm, the remainder of the roster showed up: it consists of Kicksands, Sunny_DeLeon, CanWrestle, WrestlinBoi and Zodikry. The event could host 8 wrestlers, but 7 was already more than enough as we went overtime over Fighting4Fun's planned schedule. CanWrestle, WrestlinBoi and Zodikry had to leave shortly after arriving because they had already planned a match with another wrestler in Sherbrooke in a AirBNB. Their main objective of this first visit was to drop off the other wrestlers since they car pooled. Hence, Kicksands, Sunny_DeLeon, Fighting4Fun and myself started doing round-robin submission matches. I had already wrestled Kicksands in October 2019 in Ottawa. Back then, I was able to be in control of him in the sense that I could make him my jobber... sort of. He'd try to defend, but I felt that I had an easier time dragging him left and right. Kicksands reminded me that I made him submit to the most basic hold in wrestling: the bearhug. I actually forgot about that and looking back at the blog entry I wrote for our Ottawa encounter, I never mentioned it in order to preserve some respect and dignity for Kicksands. π It really doesn't matter now anymore, because since then, Kicksands attended martial art classes regularly in a gym, training fiercefully to become an absolute beast of a fighter. He completely redeemed himself: when we fought in our submission match, I could tell that he was no longer the same wrestler that I had fought in 2019. Kicksands' strength, skill, agility and movements skyrocketed π and I realized that I was facing an opponent that is almost as equally skilled as Fighting4Fun. The big difference is that Kicksands is younger, faster, has more stamina and has this urge, an aura of determination or revenge, call it what you want, this undying sensation to teach me a lesson for the terrible treatment I gave him 3 years ago. I could latch on my ankle locks, but his fighting heart only showed me that it takes much more than a weakly pathetic hold to beat him. He fought back, showing me that with his stronger arms and technical knowledge that he can toy with me and make me submit with armbars, chokes and a dozen of other holds I can't even name. To make a long story short (too late), I was no match for the much stronger and superior Kicksands. As we will see later on, Kicksands is the 2nd strongest fighter in our group, right after Fighting4Fun. However, give him a little bit more time (maybe a year or two?) and he will probably manage to give Fighting4Fun a very good and challenging run for his money. I also sparred with Sunny_DeLeon. Our last match was in October 2021, but our fight this time around was also different. When we met in October, he was already exhausted because of a similar submission event he attended. He was simply letting himself being a jobber because he had no strength to fight back, having already being subdued by a dozen matches. I toyed with him back then in a give and take session where I would lock on him hold after hold. Well, in an submission environment setting like this one, Sunny_DeLeon showed his true inner strength and I saw his fierce burning fiery heart: he is no longer a passive jobber. Still, he was easier to tangle with. I think our levels were quite a bit more evenly matched, but ultimately, Sunny has better training, skill and stamina than I did, so he eventually managed to make me submit quite a few times. At this point, I think I had 40% of my fuel reserves left for the day, starting to feel the exhaustion of back to back bouts, not to mention I had to spar with Fighting4Fun in 1 or 2 more rounds that I was destined to lose. This is where I realized that I need to wrestle in a "Defensive Passive" mode, otherwise, I would have no energy left for the remainder of my match-ups. "Defensive Passive" is a mode where you just let your opponent attack you while still defending to prevent and delay a submission, but if you do see an opening or if you opponent is also defensive passive, then you strike an attack. The other guys (CanWrestle, WrestlinBoi and Zodikry) came back from their private AirBNB fight and we started wrestling in long-sleeve spat shirts and long sleeve pants. Spats are the stuff that lots of bicycle bikers wear when they do long stretch biking circuits. The point here is to simulate oil wrestling... without the mess of oil. When you were these types of pants and shirts, your arms and legs are in a sense slippery because your hands will slide on this fabric, forcing you and your opponent to use different strategies to make them submit. My upper portion of the spatz (the long-sleeved shirt) was smelling a bit of sweat-to-skin from probably a previous owner/wearer. I didn't have one and I was given one, but I think someone forgot to put it in the washer before handing it out to me. Eventually, I traded my upper spatz with just a t-shirt. Anyhow, regardless of the difference in this style of fight, I believe Sunny and Kicksands made short work for me. You can see here Sunny finishing me off with some sort of choke/scissor combo. I had no chances of survival. π
Then I had my first tango with WrestlinBoi. He seems shy, and reserved, but also intimidating. When he finally reached the mats and we locked up, this is where I saw him express himself wonderfully: he is skillful and playful, he has great power in his scissors and strong arms to back them up. You feel safe when you wrestle him. He'll smile and at this point, I just melted and I only wanted to keep him near me and make the match last as long as I could. π Sunny and Kicksands mentioned that this would be "The Battle of the Scissors" ββ because WrestlinBoi sports a very strong one in his pockets. We shared the body scissors and WrestlinBoi was kind enough to let me have the title of a stronger scissor. You can see me here trying to resist WrestlinBoi's crushing thighs while trying to escape from his arm grasp as well. I actually taunted him to squeeze harder, sharing with him my fondness for scissors and that this liking allows me to resist scissors easily.
Regardless, he was still able to beat me up at the end of the match using an armbar or a variant of it. I also had a spatz match with Zodikry, who is WrestlinBoi's partner. Zodikry is stronger, but has less technical skills. However, he is very expressive and a big giggly.. a bit like me I guess π I took advantage to catch him off-guard in this match by putting him in an ankle lock that he did not suspect. This was probably one of the few wins I had this week-end. Zodikry and WrestlinBoi complement each other: While WrestlinBoi is shy, reserved and introvert, ZodiKry is outgoing, talkative and extrovert. They are an extremely nice wrestling couple. They both live in Winnipeg and they occasionally spar with Sunny_DeLeon as well, who also lives in Winnipeg. We broke out of submission in very few short lapse of moments in between sub matches, so I was able to get this full nelson body scissors on Zodikry that I usually can't get in a real submission competitive match.
This particular image is quite a bit unusual because it feels like Zodikry is enjoying the hold while I seem to be the one suffering from it. π Last, but not least, I locked horns with CanWrestle. We've met again about 9 months ago in July 2021 and he is still is more skillful than I am. We then all went for supper and when we returned, we went into our singlet matches. My memory is starting to fail me now, but I do remember that even after a meal refill, I was operating at 10-20% of my capacity so much I was exhausted. Luckily, both Sunny and Kicksands took a lot of pics to help me rebuild the images in my brain. Had they not being there, I don't think I would be able to provide the quality level of photography that they were bringing with my camera. I do remember having a 2nd bout singlet-style with at least every wrestler. Based on the photos, I guess Sunny got me in a side scissors and I seemed to have enjoyed it. π It's either that or I'm trying to concentrate so hard so that I do not submit... or that I do not fart! π
At some point, Kicksands and WrestlinBoi were dueling, but CanWrestle ended up making a commentary that made both of them turn against him. So yeah, CanWrestle's snark comments earned him a double-teaming reward. π  For more photos, you can check Sunny's Instagram, CanWrestle's Instagram, Kicksands' Instagram or WrestlinBoi85. I felt I needed to open up an instagram as well so they can link me, but I probably won't be as active as they are. I feel like a dinosaur π . My instagram is scissormtl. The only other thing I remember for this evening was that while the double-team was in progress, I jumped on Kicksands to give CanWrestle a fighting chance. Kicksands was surprised that I would shield and dared to attempt to save CanWrestle. I tried to argue that both Kicksands and WrestlinBoi have greater strength and skills over the defenseless CanWrestle... and I even later changed my reasoning saying that I just wanted to wrestle Kicksands... that I don't tangle with him enough. π I wish I could include a picture here between me and Kicksands. I later realized that there are no photographs in our album showing any tangle between me and Kicksands. All the photographers were busy. π’ Anyhow, I was defending against Kickands' attacks left and right when suddenly, CanWrestle freed himself from WrestlinBoi and came to my rescue, fighting again against Kicksands. At which point I was now facing WrestlinBoi. I manage to steal what WrestlinBoi refers to as a smurf kiss on his chest. I didn't know if I was out of line because Zodikry is his partner. WrestlinBoi later explained the terms of agreement with his partner and that my action were ok. Phew! π Around 11:30 PM, we were all spent and we called it a night. Sunny and Kicksands stayed at our host. Zodikry, WrestlinBoi and CanWrestle went back to their BNB and I had reserved two nights at a local hotel called "Hotellerie Jardins de Ville" that was a 5 minute drive away from our host. There's even a bus system that connects to it. Sunday April 10 2022 We all needed our beauty sleep and luckily, our next match was not before 1:30 in the afternoon. Sunny, Kicksands, Fighting4Fun and I went to an Italian restaurant to start building our reserves. Sunny commented about my ankle locks: he didn't recall me using them the first time we met. I answered that there wasn't a need to. He was a jobber and back then, I was doing give and take of holds that I are usually enjoyable. There was really no need to use my unpleasant ankle locks that I usually reserve for submission fights. π After we replenished our energies, we all met up around 2 pm and everybody was wearing a gi (the traditional uniform used for martial arts combat) and we got our first group picture:
From left to right: WrestlinBoi, Fighting4Fun, Zodikry, Sunny_DeLeon, Kicksands, Loserboy and CanWrestle I almost skipped this portion of the event because I needed more time to recover from all the sores of sub matches. Luckily, the overnight sleep and the Italian Cannelloni I had really boosted me, so I was back on track. Also, I've set in my mind to use only 40% of my strength, with the occasional max if I manage to put one of my three holds. The gi format makes everybody start with a white belt. If you win a match, you get promoted to blue belt. If you lose a match while having a blue belt against a white belt, you trade belts. If you another match while in blue belt, you get purple and so forth. No holds are currently barred: you can use the gi to chose your opponent or you can even use the belt to tie up your opponent, but if you do, your opponent can do the same. Hmmm... I don't look half bad in a gi π I have absolutely no training in Jujitsu or martial arts. The last time I wore something like this was a trial judo class where a girl 5 years younger than me placed me in a submission hold as I was squealing like a little girl for mercy. Hoperfully, this time around, this uniform will bring me luck...
... or not. I lost against Fighting4Fun, CanWrestle, WrestlinBoi, Sunny_DeLeon and Kicksands. π I kindly asked Kicksands if I could have a freebie scissor because he was making me tap over and over even after our match ended... and because I was trying to cheat by jumping on him, but he always had his guard on and never allowed me to sneak in. He told me that I need to earn my scissors on him. They were not given for free. π So no, I never made him tap a single time in this week-end... even as a freebie. π My only win in git-format was against Zodikry. I feel like cheating. Just because of this win, I was promoted from white to blue belt. Yay! π We tumbled left and right and Kicksands took this shot that I absolutely adore. It looks very sensual, but what's actually happening here is that while Zodikry is pinning me, he's scrambling to get out of the ankle lock I had on him... I think. Without the right context though, it looks as if he is about to lean down... and uh... kiss me. π So that never happened, but I did end up biting for half a second his right nipple when I was able to flip him over and pin him down later on during this match! π€£
Many million thanks to Kicksands for capturing this shot. He also beautifully captured this next shot at the end of the match where I scissored Zodikry.
Here's another shot of Kicksands excellent photography skill where I was struggling against Fighting4Fun, trying to flip him over, but his stance and position allowed him to use my own weight as leverage, making him impossible to turn him over.
After around 3 hours of gi matches back and forth and putting together the endless amount of combinations of wrestlers, we were due for another break and went to a distillery called "Siboire". During our dinner, CanWrestle commented on how our waiter has big muscles and in a kidding manner, CanWrestle told us that he'd like to ask the waiter if he can touch his bicep. Sunny, WrestlinBoi and me all dared him to do it, but he refused, so we've decided to do it for him. When the waiter returned to our tables, I was hesitant at first, but I look at WrestlinBoi's eyes and he signaled me with a gesture to do it. So I went with it and asked the waiter: - "Uh.. sir. My colleague here ... is wondering if he can touch your bicep. You have a very impressive build." Before I could even say the fifth word of the above quote, CanWrestle slapped me on the thigh with the back of his hand and I jumped a bit. He did threaten me to take my head and slam my forehead down on the table, but in practice, that would have been awful, so I'm happy with the compromise. I think our waiter laughed and he was probably ready to do it, but we were all so embarrassed that we all laughed it off. CanWrestle also said "No! No! No!" to the waiter and brushed it off. In return, most of us increased the amount of tip he was receiving because we left the waiter (and our whole table) in an awkward position. π Both WrestlinBoi and Sunny explained to me that had I not done it, they would have done it instead, but since the waiter was only talking french, they would have a little bit more difficulty doing it. Hence, they gave me the priority. It was still nice to know that I had 2 backups that would have done this dare in my stead. This reflects and outlines the general positive mood, playfulness and happiness at our table. As we rode back home, I was in the car with Fighting4Fun driving, I was his co-pilot and in the back was Sunny_DeLeon and KickSands. I then noticed on the side of the streets a franchise selling fried chicken called "ChicKing". For some reason, the pun made me burst into laughter. KickSands commented: - "And that broke him. When I saw the name of the restaurant earlier, I rolled my eyes." I asked Fighting4Fun: - "Is the street we are driving on King Street? It's one of the main commercial artery of Sherbrooke?" Fighting4Fun replied: - "Yes it is. And there are at least three of those restaurant franchise on this street." It took me a while to contain my laughter, but I guess I can't resist a terrible pun. π When we got back from the restaurant, the schedule changed. Everybody was tired. We probably ate too much, drank too much. There were some missing gi matches that still needs to be fulfilled, but they were all canceled. We shifted the planned schedule to a personal request zone. It was filming or photography time :) WrestlinBoi asked me if I could help him do a scenario where he pins me, flexes over his victory, gets full nelsoned by his partner and I gut punch him in revenge. Hey, compared to the stuff I've been doing, this is a very easy scenario to perform. I was more than happy to oblige. In return, he allowed me to perform on him and Zodikry a separate rack on each of them. He also lifted me in a knee backbreaker with gut punching... in which I farted for real. π¨ Hey, we just ate! π
CanWrestle and I also filmed a match up that he posted on WatchFighters: https://www.watchfighters.com/posts/canwrestle_vs_lb200-chvsswdd I know.. there's a price, but please support him. π In the meantime, here's a camel clutch and a bearhug from the match. π I didn't notice until much later how bruised I am in this picture. All the sub matches left marks on my skin, but it does add some form of realism to the pic. π
We took it easy for the remainder of the evening. The wrestlers mentioned how they get recording custom requests that they occasionally fulfill and all the intricacies of the different holds, maneuvers and interests they need to cover to realize those requests. I went back to my hotel feeling not as tired today compared as yesterday. I actually felt 50% less tired than the day before, because, throughout the day, I was able to pace out my stamina between my matches more carefully, slowly calculating when I should expense more energy and when it is best to preserve it, maybe give up a bit sooner to avoid that overflow that would have drained too much energy for nothing. I looked myself in the mirror and noted all the bruises. It does not hurt at all: I have a skin condition where my skin marks easily and it looks like I'm bruised, but I'm not. I guess it's sort of a sensitive skin reaction? Most of those simili-bruises are pressure caused by the Gi when it is aggressively pulled outwards or push inwards. If the simple soft fabric of a Gi can do this, then I guess you can imagine what pressure without fabric does. π
On my back, I had larger vertical marks. The wrestlers all thought I was getting whipped... by Fighting4Fun. Fighting4Fun defended himself saying that the marks on my back was there before we started our match on Friday.... so I finally figured it out afterwards that it was caused by wearing my knapsack for a long period of time. Either I get bruises from pressure or from prolonged wearing/carrying. Monday April 11 2022 We all met one last time at our host to exchange our goodbyes for this event. I gave everybody I could a bearhug. Zodikry wanted to give me one, but I caught him in one first. π Fighting4Fun drove me back to Montreal and he spoke to me about his personal life and I shared mine as well. He is at his most humble and down to earth state among all the times I've seen him. He's still very optimistic about wrestling submission-style despite his age. His next goal is to travel to California or to Brazil to meet the many opponents that are waiting for him. He also suggested that I come back a week-end to wrestle him and his students. All in all, I had a wonderful trip. Despite being worried about the state of my shoulder, the wrestling I had was safe and it gave me a boost and signal that I am ready to attend future events. This still makes me realize that my days as a submission wrestler are numbered. I'll try to take advantage of it as most as I can, and people like Fighting4Fun and CanWrestle are there to show me that if they can still tangle competitively, so can I. Here's to hoping that I can attend new wrestling events soon and hopefully travel outside Canada. I went to see Lumber_Jack_G on my return to Montreal after the event and we had a small and light tumble. In his opinion, the bruises/scars on my chest and shoulders were making me a bit more attractive and a bit more believable as a wrestler. π | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 328 | |||||||||||||||
| Thursday November 11 2021 - First home match: Wrestling mats | Recent matches | ||||||||||||||
| I invited Vicious and Sylvain for my first home match. I technically can get this setup around once a month (one day on a given month)... it's complicated. Knowing this, I bought before hand 8 mats that each measure 80 cm x 160 cm (32 inches x 63 inches), costing 80$ each... so yeah, it's a setup that costs 640$ (Canadian), but I think this is a good long term investment. Hey, it's cheaper than a hotel, considering that the hotel I was using that has a large amount of space has started requiring a minimum booking of 2 days, meaning a minimum spending fee of 400$. Anyhow, these mats have Velcro on each side so they can be attached all together for a 4 x 2 big mats setup equalizing 320 cm x 640 cm (126 x 252 inches), which is enough to have 2 separate matches going on at the same time. These velcro are rigid enough to prevent the mats from separating during a bout, although I still had to move them around lightly once in a while... they do somewhat get detached depending on the force being used, but that happens rarely enough (Thank goodness!)  Vicious (id 5128) and Sylvain (id 2636) were obviously my guinea pigs and we had some good fun. The mats are stable and adequate for wrestling. The best part is that it's very easy to remove the mats and store them away once were done. In the absence of a wrestling ring, I think this is the next best thing.  I haven't seen Sylvain for 2 years and a half so we caught up quite a bit. I had forgotten that Sylvain was previously an Olympic wrestler. We have always fought pro or give and take. I think this might be the first time I wrestled sub with him and I realized that aside from him letting me put him in body scissors, there's nothing I can do against him. If he wants to, he can become technically a brick.... and if you apply a wrestling hold on a brick, you're just gonna tire yourself. Sylvain was kind enough to show us a few warm up moves and useful technical wrestling hints to prevent us from injuring ourselves in a full blown sub match. As for Vicious, I wrestled him not too long ago, so no need to catch up there.  He did learn a lot from Sylvain though, so maybe it was a bad idea to put him together with him. The end result is that I can't make Vicious my jobber anymore in the long term.  Of course, an encore is required, but in due time. I'll go one-on-one next time if the opportunity comes up again next month. 2 days later, Ttaree Moss Dwa Le returned to Montreal and we fought again. Unfortunately, this was held back at the hotel because my private space was not available. Our match was very short and we ended up resting most of the time because he was tired from his travels. I also admit that week-end I was pretty low in energy. We'll have to catch back again in the future and he suggested maybe to take some pictures. We'll see. Anyhow, he'll be back.  | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 322 | |||||||||||||||
| Sunday October 20 2019 - Ottawa week-end | Travel matches | ||||||||||||||
| I took a trip to Ottawa by train this week-end. This was sort of a last minute trip. I usually plan my travels at least a month in advance. This was an exception, but I'll get to that shortly. Previously, both CanWrestle (id 9693) and MineBuster (id 5188) came to visit me in Montreal several times in the past few years and at least twice separately in the recent months, so it was only a matter of time that I would repay them the favor. The other reason I had to do this now is that there's a possible career/job change for me in the coming weeks that will technically restrict any travel that I can do for the next 6 months due to a probation period that I'll be going through. Anyhow, I took a stay at the Albert at Bay Suite Hotel in Ottawa and purposely selected a Luxury King One Bedroom Suite which would give me a large 1,000 square feet room that would cover my needs for a wrestling space. I transported the king bed to the living room (gosh, that was terribly difficult), put on the bed straps at each corner and I was all set. CanWrestle told me previously that he worked as a front desk attendant/clerk previously and I had completely forgotten about it. This is the reason why he recommended me this hotel and why I always pick this one when I'm in town. It's spacious and ideal for wrestling. I had a match early morning with ZeakMartin. A nice Pakistani wrestler, smaller than me, but with a drive for heeling that is far beyond mine. He's a very very sensual guy, preferring a one-on-one sessions and flaunting his prize and his slim and lean body over his opponents. I would call our match a passive submission match, where I would just let him apply his holds, defend from his attacks slightly and let him strike a submission after another. One thing I did notice is that ZeakMartin does not reset when a tap is made. Instead, he'll follow up with the next move. However, I'm sure if I had asked nicely, we would have gone right to a lock-up position. From his small frame, I determined that I could probably make him tap easily with a body scissors, but he already knew that and he made really sure to stay clear from them. His accuracy, unparalleled flexibility and speed and his heel-driven mind are what best describes ZeakMartin. This heel-driven aspect allows him to switch from one hold to another effortlessly. His reaction speed makes it such that if you blink for a second, you'll find yourself under ZeakMartin, not knowing what had just happened. MineBuster (id 5188) was my next match right in the afternoon. He was actually the one who suggested that I get in touch with both ZeakMartin and KickSands, the latter of which who would join us two hours later. MineBuster was at an advantage because my left side was sensitive. It's as if my left ribs would react intensively on any body scissor impact or friction. Since MineBuster's thighs are thick, it covers a wide area and can easily press me in such a way that I will immediately laugh and undoubtedly submit. With this handicap in mind, MineBuster easily crushed me and I felt totally useless and unworthy of his might and power. I was able to get a video with MineBuster, but he did ask me not to show his face. So, all you get is a mysteriously strong and handsome wrestler crushing me to death with a body scissors.
Since KickSands was coming in later, I skimmed quickly his devastating, terrifyingly awesome reviews, and I knew that a sub match was coming. With that in mind, I switched to an energy conservation mode in preparation for the dreadnought that would arrive shortly. I suggested to MineBuster to do a give and take session where I can give him a handful of head scissors for him to enjoy. This would allow me to recover slightly from the mild injury of my left side. When KickSands came in, I took the opportunity to let MineBuster and KickSands go at each other. Lo and behold, I was devastated to see that KickSands was utterly in control of MineBuster. He was swirling around, giving MineBuster such a very hard time. MineBuster told me he was a bit disappointed at his own performance because he believes he could easily handle KickSands due to his smaller frame. I was scared. If KickSands can destroy MineBuster who looked as if he was twice his size, how would I get out of there alive? I locked in with KickSands and immediately took out my best weaponry, the big guns  , sort of a desperation attack: I latched on him my infamous body scissors. To my surprise, KickSands submitted. I then took back a bit more defensively, trying to see what kind of attacks KickSands would throw at me and I determined that he was executing holds that I could relatively defend against and that I had enough resistance, willpower and pain tolerance to sustain most of what KickSands was locking into me. We were puzzled, if not shocked. I can't do anything to MineBuster and MineBuster can easily destroy me within a few seconds, but KickSands can destroy MineBuster with relative ease. KickSands had trouble dealing with me, but I was able to have a relatively good control of him: a body scissor, if above the coccyx, was a guaranteed win if I don't let KickSands use any pressure points. We eventually determined that this 3-way match was more a game of rock, paper and scissors.  MineBuster beats Loserboy, Loserboy beats KickSands, KickSands beats MineBuster.... and the inverse is not necessarily true. It was pretty amusing. KickSands gave me an example how this is possible: MineBuster's thighs are large and spread the pressure on a wider area when he gives a body scissor, which gives KickSands an easier time to defend against them. My thighs are smaller, so my scissors press on a concentrated area and have a higher efficiency on KickSands. I guess this would be the equivalent of saying that pushing 2 ribs is easier than pushing 5 ribs. Later on, we've decided to even out the odds by double teaming each other. Funnily, I ended up being the traitor quite frequently. I was either helping MineBuster beat up KickSands, or I was helping KickSands beat up MineBuster. I don't think I've ever put used the arm scissor with the arm lock as much as I did in this encounter. It was pretty fun to hold an opponent down and let your tag team opponent lash out his revenge or his desire and appetite for destruction. I would classify KickSands and MineBuster both as heels, both of which seem to hold a pride and honor for their willingness to fight and their persistence to win. Being more a jobber-oriented wrestler, it doesn't really matter much for me if I win or if I lose. I will still give my best if asked to do so, but if I lose, it doesn't shatter my pride as much as these guys. I guess that made me less of a target. One thing I've noticed is that KickSands and MineBuster would still struggle and try to break free when they are being double-teamed. I give up and stay almost defenseless (if not, motionless) when I am being double-teamed. What's the point of fighting back against two people at the same time? Unless you have the strength of a hulk, it's pretty impossible and useless. It would mean spending a lot energy to avoid the inescapable and getting out of it completely spent, worn-out and incapable of fighting any further. KickSands came up with a funny remark during our match. Whenever I stopped helping MineBuster, KickSand suggested that "Your partner meter is now empty." MineBuster later had to leave for his D&D night, so I was able to get some time alone with KickSands. I took the opportunity to toy with him a bit and occasionally, letting him get a few free locks and wins because it was a very fun thing to do. In the evening, we've both decided to attend a theater play where CanWrestle (id 9693) is the lead actor. It was called "The Boys in the Band" and this was shown at the Gladstone Theater. CanWrestle was also the a co-director of the play. I had a friend that also does community theater as well and I can see the investment: a mountain (months) of effort, rehearsal, time, sweat and dedication that all of this represents. The play was terrific and I adore CanWrestle's rendition of Michael. I was glad to attend this because I've never seen this side of CanWrestle before. On top of being a great wrestler, he's also a great actor.  I was able to recognize some of the parts of the play because CanWrestle and I rehearsed a couple of lines when he visited me back in August. I'll reiterate that I'm still very impresssed at him being able to memorize and act out so many pages and lines of text. After the play, CanWrestle spent the night at my hotel and the next morning, we've tangled lightly. Giving his exhaustion, I went very light and cooperatively took any holds he was willing to lock in. I had KickSands come in again for an encore later, but CanWrestle scooted out in fear of being KickSands' punching bag. Heheheh... I went a lot lighter with KickSands and I've noticed that he started understanding the weak points of my thighs and legs and pressed on them as much and as hard as he could. I did manage to insert a few subs of my own to annoy the hell out of him. I learned from this meet that KickSands has a mix of cubano/chinese descent. He tells me that this puzzles most people. I find it charming. It's a nice mix. Overall, perseverance, strength, sportmanship, consistency and agility are the core values of KickSands' wrestling skillsets. By sportmanship, I am referring to KickSands' consent of opponent-made rules: he never rejected my request to go back on the center of the mattress whenever I asked for it. That being said, to come back on the subject of pride, I saw KickSands and MineBuster go at it on each other on the carpet on numerous occasions during our match this week-end. I had told them that some of my wrestling comradeship have been destroyed by carpet burns, but they wouldn't listen. I guess carpet burns means nothing when you can successfully land a submission on your opponent.  As the week-end ended, I realized that, CanWrestle aside, I was older than KickSands (26, 163 lbs), ZeakMartin (26, 126 lbs) and MineBuster (26, 240 lbs). I'm 39. Gosh. These guys make me feel old. I'm gonna cry.  I dunno what it is with the 26s, it's probably sheer coincidence. Needless to say, I had an amazing week-end in Ottawa and I'll be back for sure. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 272 | |||||||||||||||
| Thursday September 19 2019 - MainEagle93: 7 years later | Visitors in town | ||||||||||||||
| I wrestled MainEagle93 (id 1086) today. He remembered that we wrestled about seven years ago and that back then, I took the position of a heel. He even came up with the name for one of my holds: The Loserboy Lock. I also think I was one of his first opponents. Well fast forward today, MainEagle93 had numerous matches since then, he also ran in several marathon and took Judo classes. He beefed up quite a bit, gained solid strong legs and his fighting style clearly shows that he mastered a great arsenal of holds and an even greater passion for wrestling. Our match was supposed to be light submission, but I think it ended up becoming a jobber/heel match with a healthy dose of give and take. Before hand, I was sure I would come in as the heel again, but he definitely turned the tables around to show me who's in control. It's as if the student that surpassed the teacher. Nothing I could do would budge this guy. I could feel that his strength has skyrocketed since our last meet. MainEagle punished me with holds after holds, some I couldn't even spell the name. He enacted his revenge by applying The Loserboy Lock back on me and even applied my own signature. He touched the right chords because I eventually laughed: I was receiving the right amount of pain. Eventually, MainEagle lowered down his guard, cooperated with me a bit more so I can put on him his own fair share of favorite holds: body scissors, grapevines, schoolboy pins and a fondling rack. I did take the time to read a few notes that I've put aside for him: it mentioned that I should whisper these sweet nothings: - There's only one submission I accept from you. - The Loserboy is beating you now, so humiliating. - How does it feel to be in my rack? I tried remembering them by heart, but I had very little opportunity to cue in these quotes during our match because he'd rarely give me any control. I never realized that MainEagle93 was of eastern European origin. To be specific, he told me that he had a mix of Polish and Slovakian ancestry, which is a very nice mix in my opinion. I also don't remember him having a hairy chest, but all the better for me.  He actually drove a *ALL* the way from Washington to Montreal (Google estimates this as a 10 hour drive), and drove an additional 4 hours back and forth to Mont Tremblant for sightseeing. Thankfully, the main reason for his travel was for a family event. Otherwise, I would feel bad just wrestling 90 minutes against so many hours of travel. As I told him, I can never drive more than one hour before falling asleep behind the wheels. On the contrary, despite the fatigue settling in, MainEagle did not show any sign of weakness when we tumbled. He agreed for me to bring my camera, but we didn't use it after all because we had so much fun wrestling and we forgot about it. I was unsure about the camera at the beginning, because I do remember him being very concerned about his privacy the first time we wrestled. Over the years, he became very chill about it and started to include wrestling pics in his profile. That was the hint that pushed me to ask him if I can bring my camera. Nevertheless, we gave ourselves an objective to do pictures the next time we meet again. Either I go down to Washington D.C. or he comes up to Montreal again.  MainEagle, if you are reading, thank you for coming all the way up here and thank you for a wonderful evening match. I do remember MainEagle telling me that I should probably define on my blog what is The Loserboy Lock. However, I think it's something that can only be defined one on one against my opponents. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 266 x 1 | |||||||||||||||
| Monday August 19 2019 - CanWrestle, round 5? | Visitors in town | ||||||||||||||
| I have been busy as of late due to a newborn in the family. I however still managed to sneak in a match with CanWrestle (id 9693) who was in town for pride. He invited me into his hotel which he had already per-disassembled to transform into a proper wrestling environment. He tells me he never wrestles on the bed without properly dismounting the frame/base and putting the bed on the floor. I replied to him that when I meet guys that don't want to dismount the frame, it is more likely that they are into give and take rather than sub. We tangled for a little while and later on, AllStar joined us, but he was a bit tired, having attended the Otaku Anime conference during the whole week-end. He even built his own cosplay costume from the Naruto Series which I believe is Kakashi Hatake. Despite being tired, AllStar and I still joined forced to tag team against CanWrestle. I'd have to admit, even with 2 against 1, CanWrestle did pretty well. CanWrestle suggested that I bring my camera, but he ended up using his phone to take a few shots. For some reason, the way his cell took this triangle head scissors makes it look like it was taken in the 80s. It's nice (in my opinion). Credit goes to AllStar for taking this shot.
Anyhow, you can see that I seem to be either enjoying his hold... or sleeping happily. When AllStar left, CanWrestle and I wrestled a bit longer and then... at the end of match, CanWrestle suggested something a bit out of the ordinary: he asked me if I could be a reader and run a few lines for a theater script entitled "The Boys in the Band". It's a play by Mart Crowley. Just like wrestling is a passion to many of us, one of CanWrestle's passions on top of wrestling is doing theater work. I never heard of the play before, but he explained to me that this was quite something back in 1968, being the first play that featured gay characters. He was able to memorize several pages of script and I was simply reading the lines of the other characters. I don't think I can memorize more than a page and if I ever had to do this in front of an audience, I would probably forget half the page. Kudos to CanWrestle to be able to do theater work on top of his usual work and his wrestling passion! | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 260 | |||||||||||||||
| Saturday July 27 2019 - Fighting4Fun and AllStar | Recent matches | ||||||||||||||
| I met with Fighting4Fun (id 7583) and AllStar today for a match. I thought I didn't had a match with Fighting4Fun since 5 years ago, but looking back into my past blog entries, it seems we've wrestled in October 2017. As for AllStar, I thought I had wrestled him before, but nope, this is apparently my first time and AllStar told me that I probably mixed him up with someone else. He decided to join us so he could take a video while holding the camera, but that doesn't mean I don't get to wrestle him still... More on that later. Fighting4Fun has evolved quite a bit since I last saw him. First of all, he closed all of his wrestling membership sites to dedicate his time to train Jiu-Jitsu at a school. You see this coaching heart in him and the gentle man that knows what strength to use to teach or to stand in combat. Despite that, he's still unbeatable. Agile, fast and strong. With a name like Fighting4Fun, it's a bit obvious that we went into submission, but moderate submission (so instead of tiring out after 5 minutes, you should tire out after an hour or two). His training and experience in Jiu-Jitsu definitely makes him a tough cookie. We are kind the inverse of each other. He is strong in his arms, weak in his legs while I'm strong in my legs, but weak in the arms. It doesn't take him much for him to avoid my legs though. That's where is agility and technique comes into play. He spoke about hosting his previous WrestleAxe videos on YouTube, but eventually he had to remove them, because even if you wear a speedo, the community will *still* flag it as "nudity". Obviously. This is exactly why I don't host my videos on YouTube. So instead, he hosts them now on Vimeo and he sets three checkmarks that protects his videos: adult, violence and nudity. He can now keep them there without being worried about seeing them being eradicated the next day. He told me that on YouTube, it usually takes about 30 complaints to cause your account to be deleted. I told him that I begged to differ: it only takes a single complaint.  AllStar previously had a match with Fighting4Fun before I arrived, so he was a bit exhausted. We tangled lightly and I lowered down my strength to match his. We've then decided to do something better: the two of us, me and him, we teamed up against Fighting4Fun. Now, that is a great definition of fun. You have an elite, expert, experienced guy like Fighting4Fun, now in a handicap match with the two of us, each holding one leg and one arm. Still, Fighting4Fun put up quite a fight. This was the perfect moment for me to hold him in an arm scissor: immoblize one arm with my legs and immobilize the other arm with both my arms. And then I told AllStar: - "He's all yours!" We still struggled quite a bit, but eventually our teamwork got the better of him and he tapped out once. Yay.  It's not really fair for Fighting4Fun, but he really welcomed the challenge.I think AllStar is camera shy, so all you will get today are pictures between me and Fighting4Fun. We'll start with some basics from me: a grounded bearhug and a full nelson body scissors (this was one of the few times we did a give and take hold, because normally, it's near impossible to lock this in a submision match). Again, credit goes to AllStar for shooting these.
As you probably will expect it, Fighting4Fun's moves are quite a bit more technical. You have this sleeper and then, this hold... that I thought was an one-arm choke, but that's not it. There's a different term for it and I couldn't figured out what it was. If you do what is the name of this submission, by all means, please do let me know. Fighting4Fun looks very nonchalant and zen in this signature hold, but it actually does work on him pretty well. That is, if he cooperates. 
These are all screencaps from a few videos. Fighting4Fun told me he'll do some editing and then he'll post it on his profile. I'll try to do the same on my end. After 2 hours of submission, both of us were pretty much drained. I gave him a big bearhug, but he showed me how to do it properly: put your arms lower on your opponent's lower back, put your chin just underneath your opponent's shoulder, bend him and push your chin forward. I have to admit, he did it on me: it hurts. That's not the type of bearhug I like. I felt an arc in the back and a bad ache. Nope. I'm going to stick to my traditional bearhugs. I did a lighter bearhug for AllStar, and hopefully, I'll get to wrestle him again. He's a very nice guy. He's light on his wrestling skills, but just a little bit of training and practice can easily change that. One last thing I'd like to mention is that I wrestled both of them on a bed sheet that we placed on the wooden floor. Fortunately, we were aware of our surroundings and of the limitation of this setting. Whenever someone was against the floor, we made sure not to push or to put pressure, because the spine against a hard surface is never a good idea. It's actually quite dangerous. I think I'll insist next time to put the mattress on the floor. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 255 | |||||||||||||||
| Saturday July 6 2019 - MineBuster | Recent matches | ||||||||||||||
| MineBuster (id 5188) was in town yesterday for a conference. It's been a good 2 years since we've last wrestled. We did so in November 2017 and August 2016, but I never had a chance to wrestle him alone until now. We've started with a great submission match and gradually switched to a nice long held submission holds session: I was putting him in an array of head scissors and he locked me back on a barrage of body scissors. Previously, we never had a chance to do this because being around with other wrestlers is a bit awkward. Usually, you would round-robin a sub/pro match, but it's rarer to round-robin a long held give and take session when there are more than two wrestlers involved. I had the honor this time to see him shirtless. I still didn't get to rack MineBuster, but we did part ways with a nice bearhug. MineBuster is a big powerhouse with very strong scissors, but he is also the kind-hearted gentleman that watches over you and makes sure that you aren't hurt. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 253 | |||||||||||||||
| Sunday January 27 2019 - BeastMtl and D28383 | Recent matches | ||||||||||||||
| BeastMtl (id 10067) told me previously that because of his size and strength, he often heels and rarely gets a chance to be a jobber. Hence, whenever I see him, I'm more in the mindset of being the heel since I get to job most of the time anyway. He taught me a new hold: it's sort of an Abdominal Stretch, but on the ground. He is laying on his stomach, I sit slightly on him near his pelvis, then I take his right arm and bring it behind my back and turn him around almost 120 degrees so that he could be facing me. It stretches both his back and abs. Now, we experimented a bit more: while I had him on a Reverse Indian Deathlock, we've decided to add this Abdominal Stretch on the ground. When combined, it offers quite a nice stretch and BeastMtl gave it a new name: Darkhan's Death Stretch. "Death" makes reference to the Reverse Indian Deathlock wihle "Stretch" refers to the Abdominal Stretch. Darkhan is actually BeastMtl's wrestling handle or nickname on MeetFighters. I particularly liked the session we had and I've decided to make a commitment to at least wrestle BeastMtl on a monthly basis. This will also help me develop the heel side in me and perhaps, improve my thinking speed when switching between holds. It also goes in pair with my resolution to do an effort to wrestle more frequently. I met with D28383 (id 8921) for the first time. D28383 kindly hosted me in his apartment. I knew he like scissors, but however, I had no idea that he likes side body scissors rather rear body scissors. What's the difference? Well, rear scissors put pressure on the ribs, whereas side scissors puts pressure on the stomach and on the back of your opponent. In rear scissors, you usually position behind your opponent and put one leg on each of his sides. In side scissors, your opponent is on his back, then arches his back so that you can put your legs in: one behind his back and one on his stomach, then squeeze. The pressure points here are completely different. That being said, we traded both type of scissors anyway, but I have to admit I have a lot more trouble submitting someone in side scissors rather than the rear ones. After all, it's easier to contract your stomach than contracting your ribs. The amount of pressure required on side scissors is way higher. This is where I told him that I'll bring my wrestling boots next time to help me out. I took the risk of meeting D28383 despite not knowing his face. He asked me why I didn't ask for a picture. I told him that many faceless wrestlers remain that way for a reason. It's usually because they want to stay anonymous and/or the internet freaks them out because we live in a culture where we are surrounded by cameras everywhere we go. It's also by experience that when I ask for someone's pic on a faceless profile, I often no longer get any replies afterwards. It's a deal breaker for some. So.. I didn't want to take the risk. D28383 explained to me that he would have given a pic to me without any issue, so I could recognize him when he picked me up at the subway station. Anyhow, we did mostly some give and take and took it easy. He has this nice hairy chest and I felt that he was quite shy, but I tried to make sure that he was relaxed and calm during our session. We exchanged bearhugs, I picked him up in a rack, but he was uneasy because being picked up off the ground in the air like that always makes anyone uncomfortable, especially on the first try. Before leaving, I did tell him to give me a shout if he'd like to be squeezed again. I did forget to ask him something though: I still don't know what his username stands for. Then again, it could just be random characters and digits. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 229 | |||||||||||||||
| Tuesday December 11 2018 - Boston | Recent matches | ||||||||||||||
| Before leaving for Boston, I met on Thursday Ben (id 4427) again for a rematch. The hotel room we got was not ideal. They gave us two double beds in a cramped room. Technically I could put the bases up on the wall and the mattresses on the floor like I always do, but we weren't sure if the bases were movable and Ben didn't want to go through all the hassle, so we opted for wrestling on the elevated bed instead. We obviously had to be careful and it made me realized that it's not as fun. It's like living in constant fear that you'll fall in a pit. Anyhow, Ben took a rather more aggressive stance and I've toned myself down a bit to give him a chance. You know the saying that a beginner should wrestle with an experienced wrestler to avoid injury? I noticed that when Ben started doing moves on me that could have been dangerous if I didn't had any prior training defending myself. Lucky for me, I resisted some of the holds or made it very difficult for him to pull it off. I suppose I should let him know that some of his moves were a tad dangerous, but I wanted him to be a feel free trying to pull out as many holds as he can to practice, because it's a good way to learn if someone can shield or block them. I think next time, what I can do is pause him in a give and take session and show him the proper way to do a given move. Nevertheless, we had a good amount of fun otherwise. Our session was a bit longer and it was nice to see that he built up more stamina. I chose the TownePlace Suites near the Logan Airport/Chelsea in Boston as my location. I felt the prices were reasonable for the given space and my friend that told me that the prices are indeed better than in downtown Boston. However, being at the outskirts of the airport and in East Boston, the area around the hotel isn't very nice: It's full of petrochemical buildings and industrial factories, but who cares? I didn't come anyway to explore the area. I just need a good amount of space to wrestle. I met with Zeev (or Romeo (id 3164) on bearhugger) on Friday after my arrival to Boston. I was still caught in a mild dizzy spell from my flight, butI took an Uber to Lynn anyway because Zeev have wrestling mats available. Zeev is quite a nice and handsome guy. When we locked horns, I knew I probably could manhandle him easily. He did tell me to tone it down though because he prefers to have the advantage. I was glad to agree because of my jobber heart. We did submission with promission. I told him that he could be harsher on his holds on me and to hurt me a bit more, but it was a bit of concern for him, so I then told him to take it easy and employ any intensity that he prefers. Zeev eventually found a handful weaknesses on me and was able to pin me down and make me tap a couple of times. He had this chicken wing move while he is on top of me when I'm facing down: you are technically screwed. You just can't do anything. On the other hand, I didn't think I could scissor him, but that worked well. He's very squeezable, but I understood that he wants the pressure more on the moderate side. Not a problem. We hugged it out a bit more, I locked him down a couple of times, watching his eyes (and beard) and smiling at him as he struggles. It was an absolute blast wrestling him. Nip play was not listed on his profile, but I understood it has a little bit of effect on him. I was going to get back to my hotel afterwards, but Zeev invited me out to a delicious Mexican restaurant. After our meal, we had to digest a bit. He suggested a bit of Zulu (Chicago Fire, The Conners) to digest and he invited me to spend the night with him. I actually slept better than I thought, but he felt I was restless. The next morning, I returned to my hotel and slept further in preparation for my next matches. All in all, I connected very well with Zeev. When I return to Boston, I'll put more time aside for him so I don't have to hurry back. Zeev's schedule is also very busy and he often travels for work, so I was quite lucky to get some time with him. He is originally from Mexico. Zeev told me that cameras are distracting so I respected his request and left my camera at home. Nothing though will remove the fond memories I had in my match with him. Steve came over on Saturday morning. That's the Steve I met during the Clash twice and that doesn't any profiles on any wrestling personals, networks or sites. Steve is definitely a bigger jobber than I am. He doesn't need to do anything to get the Biggest Jobber award a the Clash. He started leading the match just like any great jobber would get an early advantage, and I would later on turn the tables around. Still, while I had him in a headlock, I had to ask to make sure:"So, should I be this agressive heel that ignores even your face rakes and your futile attempts to escape and fight back? Or should I be this nice and tender jobber that just follows your lead, getting crushed and punished in every of your moves? You get to decide, Steve. Or maybe you just want to stay down so I can manhandle you. To me, that looks exactly like what you want."It ended up being some good back and forth. He's very easy for me to lift in a bearhug, a rack, a knee backbreaker. On the other hand, Steve is well-versed with his pro moves, keeping me in check and in control whenever he felt like it. I tend to stick to pro fantasy with no pressure at all when I'm with him, but he didn't hesitate to tell me to put a medium-size amount of pressure. Steve was also nice to comment the match, doing a double role of being both the wrestler and the announcer in our match. While he held me down in one of his submission holds, he'd say something along the lines: - "Oh no! Loserboy is in trouble! Can he take it? Or will he submit?" Then our match got a little bit more intense and charged afterwards, but Steve told me to resume it on my blog as such: "It was a nice match." I also learned from him the experience that led him to remove his online profiles and that he once held a public match. He's much braver than I am for sure. Before he left, he asked me if I would come to the Clash next year. I usually do every other year and since I've been to the Clash in 2018, I would probably skip 2019. He announced that 2019 may be his last year at the Clash.  He asked if the Wrestlefest was an option and I replied that my family has decided to go for a family trip in the South at the same time the Wrestlefest in NYC is being held. 2019 may be calmer for me since I did most of my wrestling trips this year already.Steve commented that he's a bit of a gear collector and that he needs to get rid of some of his speedos because their colors are fading away. I panicked: - "Hey! I'm also a gear w****. Don't throw them away! Give them to me!" As such, Steve kindly gave me two speedos.   I think both speedos are showing too much of my junk, but then again, that's the definition of speedos... Steve actually wanted us to use the BG East ring while we are in Boston since that is where the company holds their headquarters and films many of their matches. However, Steve did the preliminary follow-ups and the ring was not available for renting. He was a good sport to wrestle me anyway, because I do recall him telling me that he no longer wrestles in a hotel room. Once you tumble in a spacious and formidable ring, it's very hard to go back to tiny and crampy hotel rooms. No wonder why the custom officer at the Vermont border asked me if I ever break anything. MCIC was an unscheduled match between 3 pm and 6 pm. This was such a last minute and short interval to work with that all the wrestlers I tried to reach out for a match declined because of the limited time availability. So, I simply ended up listing "Boston" as my location for December 8 in Meetfighters and luckily, MCIC pinged me and asked if he can come. He always carry his gym bag in his car and had gym shorts and compression shorts with him, so he was ready to tumble on short notice. He is a mix of Italian/Syrian/Irish/English/French, which is a very nice mix. He considers himself as a mutt, but I was thinking in my head: "Wow, mutts are handsome." He's lighter than me, weighing 150 lbs (I'm leaning towards 160 lbs), but he is one tough cookie! He did races such as Tough Mudder, Spartans Race. It builds up his endurance by ten fold! MCIC and I went into full all-out submission. It's been quite a long while I didn't do competitive submission on this level. He knew what he was doing and you can feel he is very experienced. Don't ever let your guard down against MCIC because he won't hesitate to use his arms to make you submit. He went for that armbar you see in MMA matches, but I wouldn't let him, but he had me with ease in a reverse headlock, and man, IT HURTS! I could catch him in a leg lock, a body scissors and eventually a leg scissors that could make him tap... BUT his body and his style works like some sort of self-learning defense system. The more I would lock on him these holds, the more he'd be able to defend himself from them. Eventually, he could counter my leg locks by hardening his legs and power me out easily. He learned to harden his body to resist my body scissors and nothing left was working on him anymore... except for that illegal leg scissors on his leg with my kneecaps. My scissors were weakening and he was getting stronger by the minute. I later learned that he was toning it down for me. He even purposely let me put that leg lock so that he can show that he can now power out of it and also because he liked the feeling of my leg locking his leg. That does mean that the real MCIC is much more powerful than what I had encountered. He was curious and wanted me to try something else. "What pro moves do you like to apply?", he asked. I gladly applied the rack, the full nelson body scissors, the reverse Indian Deathlock, the full nelson camel clutch. Despite being full sub, he did some pro as a young kid, but deep his heart, as he grew and fought opponents, full out sub was his main and favorite style. MCIC actually countered the rack once I put him down. He immediately locked on me a sleeper, a choke.. actually he does that often when we stand up to take a break. Very sneaky, but I love it. An hour passed and I got winded out very fast, but he was just getting started! He would pin me down, look at me with a very big grin, occasionally letting me put a body scissors on him. I'd squeeze him with all my might, and he would still be there with a big grin, able to resist it without any problems and then he'd look straight into my eyes and say: - "Nope. Doesn't work anymore. Nice try though". His cockiness made me furious, but also made him more charming in our particular fight. Hairy chest, nice salt and pepper beard, MCIC is so dreamy for me. He matches very closely my wrestling style. He had this fierce look and smile when he wrestles you and knows that he has the advantage or knows that he's going to win. It's as if he was saying through his looks: "You just wanna make me tap in that scissors of yours, but you can't. You don't have the strength for it anymore. I'm smiling because I can take it. Better save your energy for I will put you in holds that will make you squeal and regret your actions." We were closely even matched at the beginning, but I ran out of stamina very quickly and he easily dominated me afterwards. I was sweating crazy while he was chill. Don't let size ever fool you, this smaller guy was able to beat my a**. Another dangerous move of his was that frontal arm choke simply by pushing his arm against my neck, but he'll do it moderately. I'm a bit ashamed to say it, but when he applied this while he was on top of me and smiling at me, I actually got a hard on... Anyway, overall: MCIC has a very effective wrestling style that is hard to defend. His neck choke from behind and his sleepers are equally strong weaponry in his arsenal. Talented and experienced, remarkable and unstoppable, infinite stamina and deadly arms all makes him one of the toughest and fiercest opponent I have ever faced. Yet, he is a very nice and sweet guy that will look out after you. Moderated and controlled aggressiveness makes MCIC a very safe and fun wrestler to tangle with. I quickly asked him before he was ready to leave if I could take a picture with him. A little selfie.  That beard... it really REALLY makes me melt. He kindly allowed me to take a few shots and then I later realize I possibly could have asked him to let me record the match, but again, I was a bit too shy to ask him. I'll try it next time, because I definitely want to wrestle him again. I hoisted him in a big nice goodbye bearhug and he did the same: but he lifted me at the legs level and lost balance. We both fell backwards, but luckily, no one was injured. - "I guess I got carried away", he laughed as he stood back up from the fall. After he left, I slapped myself on the forehead because I still don't know what the acronym MCIC stands for today. However, we kept in touch through MeetFighters and he eventually told me that his online handle represents a truncated version of his name. My last match of the day was with Tonyboy. His style was more into the sensual area of wrestling with grabs and all, and some cuddles, but we wrestled a bit of promission and he'd let me make his life difficult by putting him in an arm scissors where I could play with him. His bearhug is quite strong. He is definitely a powerhouse and can easily break holds. Body scissors have no effect on him because I couldn't close them. Leg locks work up to a certain extent and leg scissors are still effective. At this point of the night, the recurring pain on my right shoulder has started coming back, so we took it lightly. Too much wrestling. Because of this, I had forgotten to put him in either a rack or fireman's carry. I was very thankful though that Tonyboy made it a relaxing night by easing up on the wrestling. We also watched together a YouTube video with Ivan Putski bearhugging Superstar Billy Graham. It's one of his favorite matches of all time. We commented on the part where Graham just raises his arms, reaching for his head to express the pain of the bearhug, but not without flexing his muscles. I offered Tonyboy to stay the night, but he had to leave after two hours. We had some good fun nonetheless. I'm getting old.. three matches in one day is no longer something I can do. I'm so sore and so tired. Sunday was a day reserved for Wrestle123. He came two months ago to Montreal and I've decided to return the favor by visiting him in Boston. He's the main reason of this trip and I simply extended it in order to meet additional wrestlers. Wrestle123 picked me up at my hotel and drove an hour north of Boston to his place in Derry, New Hampshire. It's a nice small town of 30,000-40,000 people. He has a big house where he has a huge space, wrestling mats and a gym. Apparently, a couple of Wrestle 4 Hire matches were filmed in his basement. Since we didn't take any pictures last time he was in Montreal, he strapped on a nice blue speedos, kneepads and boots so we could take some good ones in his basement. Apparently, he always wrestles in singlet, but since I told him I do like his hairy chest, he kindly wore a speedo just for me. We had three cameras set up, my Nikon, my Panasonic and Wrestle123's Sony. The Nikon was switched between videos and 1/2 second interval photos while the other two were set to videos. I managed to put a fireman's carry on Wrestle123 who told me that he was around 297 lbs, down from 350. I was however unable to put a proper rack, I felt my shoulder had not recovered and couldn't take any more weight or damage. He did his research on leg scissors and found a way to be immune to them. Full nelson body scissors works on him, but with only with the extra power given to me with wrestling boots, otherwise, I would not stand a chance. I always think that my boots have the following properties if a futuristic science fiction device could secretly read the benefits, bonuses and attributes a wrestling gear can give to a wrestler. I was worried for Wrestle123 because he seemed winded, so we took a few breaks in between our shots. Speaking of shots, here's my typical signature on him:
Being so tall, I asked him if he can pick me up in a bearhug... which he did.
When I left it for Wrestle123 to decide, he came up with this fierce head scissors.
And this non-standardized hold that I rarely see people apply on me. It's painful, but comfortable at the same time. I know.. I am full of contradictions.
We took it easy the rest of the time. Wrestle123 showed me an interested YouTube clip with Simon Sinek about Millenials. We also watched a movie called "Searching" featuring John Cho and "Airplane!" featuring Leslie Nielsen. His roommate Jordan joined us for supper at T-Bone. We then watched afterwards a TV series about R&B history and a few trailers on Kingdom Hearts 3. Jordan was pretty excited about it. The next morning, I was lucky to wrestle Jordan. This 22 years old kid has a ton of wrestling experience. He is also respectful and skillful, and is way WAY above my level. He practiced wrestling way back in high school and along the way, he also picked up and tried all the different types of wrestling you can name. In case you wonder, I don't think he has any listed wrestling profiles on any of the major networks. He doesn't need any to get or have matches in my opinion. For our match, he displayed on to a screen a timer. I think it was 3 sets of 2 or 3 minutes round with a one minute break between each match. - "This is how you need to it when you wrestle someone that's faster and bigger than you.", he said. We started standing up and he understood as I locked up that I needed to be down. As such, the following sets, he started by kneeling down to accommodate me. As I locked on to him, I did feel that he was going easy on me. This was still definitely a full all-out submission match anyway, at least for me. I can't really speak for him. I think I was a bit easy for him. I was already worn out after round 1. I knew there was nothing I can do, none of my leg work would cut it. Starting round 2, I was only defending myself, trying to delay a submission. In round 3, I struggled and there were many times he could have made me tap, but he was very kind with me and never applied more than necessary and never applied his holds to the point I needed to tap. He started going after my legs to immobilize them and to make me submit. When the screen rang the last round, we shook hands and said it was a good match. I did wish we would wrestle longer, but we both knew that if we did, he would have overpowered me easily, so it was a nice and respectful way for him to end it without a humiliating defeat for me. I had to be sure and I asked him after our match if he went easy on me. He replied that he always use the first round for "Data Collection", to get a pulse of his opponent, know his style and determine in the rest time between the rounds what moves he needs to do. I'm sure if this beast went all out with me, he would have crushed me like a bug. - "Thank you for giving me the time of the day to wrestle me", I said at the end of our match. Jordan is a very busy guy. Our match was at 7 am, but he woke up before for training and then he had to head to work at 8 am. Jordan's dream is to become a wrestling coach and he definitely has the talent and the making for it. He is definitely a real and passionate wrestler, not to mention incredibly strong and incredibly friendly. Probably one of the toughest, but also one of the nicest opponents I have faced. Wrestle123 kindly gave me a lift back to the Boston Logan International Airport. On the way, Wrestle123 spoke to me a bit about developments in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the Sophia robot that can answer philosophical questions and one day become cognitive and conscious. I was a bit wary about it because I was thinking that somebody could just simply type out the answers behind her programming, but Wrestle123 believes that we have already progressed very far in AI. I asked him if he was worried about it at all: I've heard that in a few decades, AI would do everything better than humans. This would mean each of us losing our jobs, especially those working in Information Technologies. In the contrary, Wrestle123 is very excited about the advancements in AI. My conversations with Wrestle123 are quite interesting. He is very knowledgeable, stays up to date with the current trends and developments of tech, analyzes things in a very meticulous and insightful style. Wrestle123 is full of wisdom: in both wrestling and in life. After an hour, Wrestle123 dropped me off at the International Terminal. I held his hand firmly and thanked him for everything. I wasn't sure if it was appropriate to hug him at an airport. My flight got delayed by one hour. As we approached Montreal around 5 PM, I took this shot from the window of the plane (cell phone shot, by the way, so mediocre quality):  The purple lights on the bridge is a project that was built last year to illuminate it for Montreal's 375th anniversary. The green towers to the left are the Desjardins centers that are partially hidden behind the thin layer of clouds are landmarks of my childhood. Those towers also somewhat define the downtown area as you will be able to identify the other skyscrapers to the left of it. If you click on it, you'll get a better view. Anyhow, it was nice to see Montreal from this angle. Yet, in some way, this nostalgic view kinda reminded me that my time in Boston was too short. Wrestle123 suggested that I should stay longer at his place the next time I come back. If I ever want to be able to reach the many wrestlers that are in the area, something tells me that I need a minimum of a week in Boston followed by a week-end at Wrestle123's place. Time will tell.  I know, I should have taken a shot from Boston instead. Heck, I didn't even go to the downtown core! It didn't really matter since I already did a tour about a decade ago, so it was something I was happy to pass anyway. Boston wrestlers are pretty nice: I scheduled four matches, and I received a total of six because of two unscheduled last-minute or referral matches. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 214 | |||||||||||||||
| Sunday November 25 2018 - A Wrestling Week-end in Burlington, Vermont | Recent matches | ||||||||||||||
| The customs officer at the US border patrol was very inquisitive this time around. I told the truth once again because if I lied or tried to hide anything, they would know. As I discussed in a previous post, I'll reiterate that these officers have interviewed hundreds of thousands of passengers in their lifetime and they've become experts in breaking people to make them tell every single ounce of the truth. Hence, the lady officer was surprised that I would wrestle in a hotel. She smiled as she interviewed me and asked me what happens if I break something. I replied that I've been wrestling for quite a while now, I always take a large room or a suite and I put things out of harm's way before I rumble. She was also very curious and asked me what was the name of the website where I meet my wrestlers. There's always the question of whether I am getting paid for my wrestling or if I will take part on tournament with prizes, but I always reply that I am a casual wrestler that does it just for fun, in private, and I never take part in public or any type of regional competitions. I stayed at the Homewood Suites by Hilton in South Burlington, Vermont. A very nice hotel with a good amount of space to put the king bed on the floor for a good wrestling week-end. I came in prepared again with my usual 4 bed sheet clippers to make sure that sheets are not sent out flying when I roll on the mattress. One of the wrestlers later informed me that this is one of the rare hotels that actually provides you a fan. I know.. I already messed up the blankets and the covers, but that's what happens when you are a hotel/motel wrestler.  I met with with VTWrestleFun on Friday. We actually had our first match ten years ago and I still remember that back then, it was a submission bout where he was drenching sweat on me. I was however surprised in this encounter to realize that he shifted to pro. He enjoys this style a lot more, it doesn't get as sweaty and judging from his response to my actions, he prefers that I do not defend from his holds. He seems to be a pure heel, liking powermoves, specializing in lifts and slams, pulls them out very easily due to his strength. If I was lighter, he would press me over his head. Lucky for me, by "lifts", this included bearhugs and racks, which we applied to each other. He was very nice to have it recorded and he told me that he does not intend to run for president anytime soon, so sharing it with you guys would not be an issue. We'll start with a few stills since it'll take me some time to process and edit out the setup frames and the silly parts of the videos. This is my attempt of racking him: he bends nicely. I only wished he'd wear a speedo or something, but heck, I'd wrestle him in anything as long as he goes shirtless to show me his hairy chest.
His rack also packs quite a punch! You know.. considering the TV and the furniture on the background, it's no wonder why people are wondering with skepticism whether I have a history of breaking stuff in a hotel match. Had I or my fellow wrestlers lost balance, we could have utterly fell back and broke that screen or that nice wooden furniture, if not the wall or the window.
Luckily, nothing broke, because we are masters in the elegant art of racking. So now, I'm taking my revenge with a bearhug. How dare you rack me? It's funny, in this pic, either VTWrestleFun is expressing some pain or he is in a state of ecstasy. Which one is it?
But my revenge is never complete without my signature hold: The Full Nelson Body Scissors! The smirk on his face simply shows that VTWrestleFun can take it like a pro.
He told me previously that I can apply my scissor only up to 75% of their maximum power, but I understood from that message that I simply shouldn't put any pressure at all. Hey, I can learn too. I'll adapt my style if it means I can wrestle this hunk often. When we tangled, I realized that it was better if I was just following his moves and let him apply what he wants. I can defend, but just a little bit. Each time I would try to put something on him, he would make it very difficult. I'd pretend to do a face rake to take control, but it has no effect on him. Or maybe he thought I was caressing his face. I told myself that he probably wants to retain control. He likes half and full nelsons a lot and he usually goes for smaller guys. Incidentally, I think he stopped doing nelsons when I commented out that he seems to like them because of the frequency of its use, which is a bit sad because I absolutely adore nelsons.He tells me some of the wrestlers he meet are disappointed because they wanted to be punished, roughed brutally, because it seems to be the general look that VTWrestleFun seems to portray from his general look and profile. I told him to take it as a compliment. He does look like a heel that would destroy you. Deep down, VTWrestleFun is like a harmless lamb. He takes things very easy, his moves are light and he is prudent when he manhandles his opponent. He's quite a strong guy, he slams, lifts me upside down and throw me down laterally and diagonally in a very firm and secure way. We wrestled briefly for about an hour and we discussed about our wrestling styles and preferences. Big vs small are matches that definitely fits his cup of tea. I even think I might even be a little bit too big for him or that I felt he'd prefer me a bit more in shape. I did offer him to stay the night but he had to tend to his 3 cats and cut firewood so they can stay warm. Suggs (id 3009) was my Saturday match. I try to be a bit more reasonable and scatter my matches by limiting myself to one per day. Sunday will be an exception though. What can I say about Suggs? Well, for starters, he is definitely the funniest and the most talkative wrestler I've ever met. He's incredibly handsome in my book. To top of that, he also has a very nice personality. He looks like Seth Rogen and when he puts on his cap backwards in an attempt to make him look younger, it actually makes him look like Drew Carey. I actually see him do a comedy show or host a game show. He told me he could absolutely do Family Feud. There's nothing very difficult about saying: "And survey says?" Wrestling-wise, this guy is pretty versatile, but prefers the promission style or total squash. Due to his shoulder injury, he plays it safe and light: he can be a complete tough heel or a submissive jobber that gets caught in a total squash match. You wouldn't expect that from his build, right? Suggs is just full of surprises. Both his wrestling style and personality will blend in with yours easily. Suggs admitted to me that he often gets to be the heel, so getting to jobber once in a while is quite refreshing. In addition, having seen my history of losses, he'd like me to score a win with him. I did not read his profile carefully enough to realize midway in our session that his all-time favorite hold is the head scissors... and wow, this guy can really take it. He's one of the few that can take head scissors like a pro. No matter how much strength I put, he wouldn't tap. That being said, I should have been careful anyway because I apparently moved one of his tooth. That's why I don't usually apply head scissors to full strength. In this case, I probably should have verified that my legs were more around his neck. I was a bit too near his jaw. Also, let's forget about the body scissors. If he can stand the head scissors, then the body scissors won't even make him feel a thing. I flirted with him a couple of times, but I don't think I am really his type. He's totally my type though, but then again, which bear have I ever declined? He was nevertheless a very good sport to wrestle as much as he did. He mentioned he was out of shape and had little endurance, but I felt he did great. In the future, I wouldn't mind being his complete heel since it would spell less work for him and since he's made so tough that virtually nothing would make him submit. I also need to remember he also loves bearhugs, camels and boston crabs. Suggs complained about his belly, but I told him he is perfect how he is. He replies he wants to be able to see his "pipi". Yeah, It shows his type of humour.  He did make it down from 260 to 230, so he can be self-disciplined as well. It felt lighter than expected when I was racking because I was mentally set for 260 and it really did not felt that way (not to mention he totally cooperated very well and he knew exactly what to do).Suggs has one of the Strongest Bearhugs I've ever had the luck to be crushed in . Check out the video under [ Clip ID 350 ]. I was selling his bearhug badly, until midway through, there was a sudden change in my facial expression. I felt I was in trouble. I was actually thinking: "Ooof! Ungh... URGH! This is a strong bearhug. I have trouble breathing... He's crushing me so hard that I might have to give up if he doesn't stop... but ... but.. would it be silly of me to submit in a bearhug live while the camera is recording?!?". Not that I mind though. I love big burly men with strong arms and strong bearhugs ...that look like Seth Rogen. Hehehehe. Near the end of the video, Suggs adds to the bearhug a wedgie. It's apparently his favorite.  He was very flexible about producing content and offered me right in advance the possibility of taking pictures and videos. We took mainly videos, but I was able to get a few stills. You'll notice the same format because I tend to like racks and bearhugs  I racked him first and there was a little oopsie because I couldn't reach his trunks.
Suggs then showed that reaching for someone's trunk is never a problem.
And of course, I needed to apply that signature. You probably know the name by now. I'll spare you the repeat.
... And that bearhug! Suggs is a great seller. With his clenched fists, Suggs is in the fight for his life to resist the crushing might of his opponent! Will he break free and muster enough strength to turn the tables around? Ok, now I'm just employing the sentences I use as description in my matches.
Suggs is quite sarcastic. I asked him if I could put my arm on him just to hold him in a cuddle and he'd say no with a funny face, but I think he was kidding me and I took it the wrong way. I'll just force myself next time or hold him regardless. Or even better, keep him down instead with a schoolboy pin. As a matter of fact, I believe he likes doing that while slapping his opponents in the face. I remembered that because he eventually flexed on top of me and I told myself that was such a nice sight to see. I eventually gave him back his own medicine though. A few days later, I received a note from Suggs telling me that our session was a total blast and that he can't wait until next time. That definitely gave me the boost needed to really cheer me up and look forward to our next encounter. I also remembered afterwards that I asked Suggs what he'd like to do if he could choose his career. Being a roadie to setup/mount big concert stages for a popular rock band and doing tours traveling around the world were one of his passions. It does come with a consequence that it does hurt his ears a bit. The other was to be a pilot. He enjoys turbulence in a plane. The rockier it is, the more excited he becomes. BadBillOfVt was my afternoon match. We've corresponded for ages as well, but neither of us took the steps previously to cross the border. Since I was on my way to Burlington, I gave him a last minute shout and he compassionately made himself available. We took it very easy, more along the style of give and take. Our chemistry was good and we each trusted each other pretty quickly. I was able to raise him in a Fireman's Carry, but we had a bit of trouble with the Torture Rack, so in order to play safe, I've decided not to pursue the rack after a first failed attempt. Doing it again might have spelled disaster. I know my limits and I should respect his. We took quite a few shots, but I can only share the ones with mask or the ones where we don't see his face. So here it is: guess what? My signature again. Yes, that's a record: three signatures move on a same week-end. What better way to restrain big burly and cuddable opponents?
He also applied this nice reverse bearhug on the mattress:
And this rare technical Cobra Clutch. I almost was going to call it a half nelson, but a Cobra Clutch is a much more complex and effective than a half nelson.
I'm sure you realized by now that it took me a total of three separate trials/photoshoots to finally realize that I had to move the sheets, covers and pillows that I was accumulating on the sofa bed to another area so that a mountain of junk does not show up in the pictures. Sometimes, I can be pretty retarded. For a few examples, just look at the previous pictures I took above previously (scroll back up), before my matches with BadBillOfVT.  BadBillofVT is very nice guy and an often misunderstood wrestler. During our tumble, he was a bit tired, breathing fast and I was quite a bit concerned. As we made sure to include resting times between our lock-ups, he eventually recovered. He spoke and shared about his career and the development of his passion for wrestling. He started pretty late because of the taboo of wrestling in the past decades and also because he was very shy about it. He kindly gave me this very nice spandex singlet. It has a very cool look. I'll be forever thankful. I love the pattern on the lower half and the whole gear is pretty high quality.
He did contact me afterwards to let me know that he was a bit sore, so I was apparently still a bit too rough. WrestleInMN (id 3305) was my last match, on a sunday evening. Oh boy, there's a reason why I kept him for last. We've met about five times before, he always came up to Montreal to wrestle me. It was about time I paid him a visit. I haven't wrestled him since May 2018. He came in July and August 2018, but he was only there for Montreal events (Fireworks and Highland Games). That being said, WrestleInMN has a sudden volcanic surge of energy this time around. He did one of my favorite moves when he's on me: he had me in a reverse headlock where his bulging hairy chest was on my face. I couldn't budge, do anything... Not that I really want to do anything. He's one of the few wrestlers I can kid around by saying he is the Pillsbury Dough Boy. I also flirted him many times and probably blurted out one of the cheesiest sentences I've ever dare to say: WrestleInMN: "Once I get out of this, hell you're gonna pay!" Loserboy: "With you, it's always heaven!" I actually couldn't believe what I've just said myself. Somebody reading this would probably be slapping his forehead right now. WrestleInMN has gotten considerably stronger. He learned to resist and make himself immune to leg scissors. He was able to tense up his leg and bar off the pressure I use, even with my knees. This guy is really incredible. WrestleInMN taunted me about my useless legs now. - "Where are the powerful legs that so many wrestlers have ranted about? What happened to those legs of yours? Why would wrestlers submit to those wimpy legs?", asked WrestleInMN. Yeah, WrestleInMN loves to tease me now that he's virtually invulnerable. The only thing that can make him tap are the head scissors (and even there, I think I ended up pinching his skin or hurting too much a side of the neck unintentionally) and the reverse indian deathlock which requires his cooperation. We still had an intensifying nipple pinching contest where he can be the only winner since he can still take it much much more that I can. I started to preemptively tap out to make sure that my nipples aren't too sore for the upcoming week. I want to be able to put a t-shirt and not flinch each time the fabric touches my nipples. It would remind me of WrestleInMN each time, although it's not necessarily a bad thing. I had him in sort of restraining hold by holding his arm with both legs and holding his other arm with one arm, but this does limit the things I can do on him as well. As for the rest of the time, he was on top of me, holding me down, pinching and toying around with me. He knew that I didn't mind at all. I was actually exhausted after 3 matches this week-end and he knows it as well. I need to review and update my notes about him: I've learned this time around that he can't get deep tissue massage because he would hold his breath and pass out. I suppose it either tickles him too much or it hurts him too much. However, touching him softly tames him. He knows me a lot by now, so he is always on his guard no matter what I do. He called my attempts to tame him with a soft caress on his back "Fake news" as in a deceptive way to get him to calm down, so I can plot to do a hold on him that would miraculously make him submit. He's not wrong, you know. How else would I fulfill my title? After our 2 hours and a half match where he mostly dominated me, he took me out to see Burlington. He showed me the beautiful Church street. It's peaceful and serene, yet vibrant and beautiful on a Sunday night. Yep, it was already decorated for the holidays.  We walked around a bit and he was ranting about going up a hill. There's quite a bit of slopes in Burlington. I threw at him a little insult: - "Are you going to be okay going up the slope or are you going to tumble and roll down the hill?", I asked. - "Wait until I get you again in my holds", he replied. Despite my sarcasm, he treated me out to a nice bistro called Sweetwaters where i overate. I learned in this dinner that he is a bit of a holiday grinch, but I had a very fun and amusing evening with him. He's sweet all around, has such a nice laugh and smile and his life is full of passionate things to share. After dinner, he showed me around the city a bit more and drove me back to the hotel. He is an absolutely amazing wrestler, a formidable host... and a very handsome bear, but I've already mentioned this before. He kindly escorted me back to my room, we gave each other a big warm hug and I sighed as he left. He had to tend to his dog, so he couldn't spend the night. Burlington has quite a handful of animal lovers. I'll try to bearnap and raip this evasive bear another time. WrestleInMN also has great empathy: he actually contacted me everyday I was in Burlington to make sure that I was fine, that I didn't need any food or drink or was not too lonely or left alone. Truth be told, I should have spent more time with him. Maybe I could have locked him down after the bistro, but I didn't want to regurgitate my burger in case he puts his weight on me. I think both WrestleInMN and Suggs would get very well along with each other. Unfortunately, with the housing crisis in Vermont, nobody can host, so they never followed-up or met in any shape or form. They are very close in personality and character, they are both very witty, funny, extrovert and talkative, so I'm thinking of helping them host so they can both be together the next time I'm around. Incidentally, they both have the same age and they are both younger than I am. This is like bear haven. 4 matches out of 4. 4 was just the right amount over 3 days. Not too little, not too much. I am not too sore. Best of all: no cancellations. This is what happens in a small town of Burlington with a population of 43,000 people and 600,000 state-wide. The wrestlers here are respectful and welcoming. They do appreciate the people that come in to wrestle them. This is probably one of my best wrestling trips in my book. I renewed friendship with an old friend, made two new great acquaintances and nudged the friend I had seen not too long ago. My only complaint is that a fun week-end like this passes by so fast. Last thing I needed to mention that is a bit off books was that I gambled a bit by opening the Growlr application and caught a fellow called "B" who works as an opera singer. A very studly and big bear who is a very nice cuddler. Not a wrestler though, but he kept me company on a day where I was waiting. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 210 | |||||||||||||||
| Monday October 22 2018 - Tz126, GoodBoyMtl, MuscledWrestler2001, Keith_DC | Recent matches | ||||||||||||||
| The last time I wrestled Tz126 (id 6866) was about 3 years ago. He came all the way from North Carolina to Quebec again last Wednesday. I had a day off so I picked him off at the airport and accompanied him to his hotel. I took the opportunity to do a few touristy stuff with him by going to the old port and incidentally, we also ended up eating at the same restaurant and attending the same light show as with WrestleInMN back in May... which kinda reminds me that I probably need to broaden my horizons and try something different for my guests. I did show him how the Montreal underground is great to avoid cold weather. However, because it is structured like a complex maze, it may sometimes be worth it to just walk outside to get to your destination. Anyhow, we had two small separate sessions where I was locking him in a couple of holds. I'd say it was mostly give and take and I had to be careful with the amount of pressure being applied. He warned me not to bounce the rack because he had a bad back. He showed me an interesting alternate variant for the reverse indian deathlock: It consists of putting your feet behind your opponent's kneecap and bend the leg backwards when your opponent is facing down. I realized in this meet that Tz126 had a fondness of anything leg stretching related: figure-fours, deathlocks, ankle locks.... We discussed previously about being okay to take private pictures, but I veto-ed the decision since I felt that he didn't seem too comfortable with the idea. It should have been clear to me that when someone only puts a single image in his profile, then it should be a hint that privacy may be of a concern. I met with GoodBoyMtl on Friday. We've spoke at least quite a few years ago, but things never worked out until recently. This guy does Jiu-Jitsu, holds and organizes tournaments and events and even have his own wrestling submission subscription-based website under the name Submission Fight. However, like other people venturing into this business, he suffered greatly from the rise of YouTube where a majority of his subscribers eventually migrated to the free content available online. The pre-YouTube era was really the golden age of independent wrestling submission streaming hubs. It's mind-numbing to see everything that YouTube destroyed in its path when it reached its peak. In addition, the province of Quebec recently instated a law to ban private submission competitions/leagues, which is really nonsense. It was probably put into effect to allow bigger corporations (like UFC) to dominate the industry. Anyhow, because of this, he had to cease his activities. This law will however be overturned later this year, so he did told me that he'll restore his website soon and he will resume organizing his competitions. GoodBoyMtl also showed to me the high-end audio visual equipment he has to create, capture and perform video editing for his site. It's quite something. He spoke about the good old times where people on his website were given a small video of the size of 360 x 240 pixels, whereas today, the technology given to us allows us to provide 4k videos that are almost 10 times as big (3,840 x 2,160 pixels). While I grew fond with Nikon over the years, Nikon specializes in taking pictures whereas he believes that Panasonic has an affinity for capturing videos. Lumix GH5 is the model he recommends. It looks rather like a photo camera, but it is well-known for its superior video taking capabilities. The price range though is a bit excessive, but it really all comes down whether you want some homegrown amateurish or professionally-made crystal-clear quality imagery. For the time being, I think I'll stick with my Nikon. Back to wrestling, GoodBoyMtl showed to me his vast and great knowledge of Jiu-Jitsu. He can easily get leverage from any given position. He insisted that I show a couple of pro holds since he's done mostly sub in his life. He bought from Wal-Mart 8 mat puzzle-pieces as his wrestling mats. They were pretty effective. I initially thought we'd place this in a 4x2 fashion, but he insisted a 3x3 layout with a corner missing a puzzle piece. It was still small nonetheless, but adequate to give and take holds. If he had more space than this and if we wrestled submission, he would probably win against me very easily. MuscledWrestler2001 (id 8009) was in town this week-end, so we've hit it off with a match. We also corresponded at least a decade ago. Distance was a little problem, but MuscledWrestler2001 has decided to do the extra mile by driving all the way from New Hampshire in a 4-5 hours drive to Montreal. I will be forever thankful for this big gesture. So, we finally got to meet and we got along pretty well: our chemistry was nice. Then again, this guy's personality and humor makes it very difficult not to get along. My assumption was he was more into sub, but he geared up in pro. We ended up doing light sub and promission. This guy is pretty strong despite recovering from a medical condition lately. I would hate to know how strong he is had I faced him in top shape. He can resist body scissors pretty well because of his frame. Mind you, he did went down from 300 to 270. Leg scissors work amazingly on him, but I think I may have overdone it. He mentioned at one point if it was the only hold I can do, so I stopped doing it. Ankle locks was pretty unfair for him since his condition doubles or triples the pain he feels near his feet. He would have been pretty okay with pictures, but I had so much fun that I had forgotten all about it. Silly me for not having taken the opportunity considering that he's pretty open to almost anything. I can feel he was lowering down the level on me and avoided using all of his weight. Not only this guy has great empathy, he is experienced and very careful. He also owns his own gym and trains/mentors a few recruits. Overall, he is very fun to rumble with: never pass an opportunity to wrestle him. You know the saying that a beginner should always wrestle with an expert to avoid getting injured? MuscledWrestler2001 is that expert: he will show you the ropes and he knows exactly what needs to be done to make you discover and love wrestling! He also works in the IT industry and he mentioned some pretty scary things about security. He told me that no matter what protection we have on our systems, there's always some sort of malware sitting there unknown to us all that can be activated at any time. The only safe computer is one that is unplugged from the internet. It's just like the saying I heard a while ago that the safest hard drive is one that is buried underground. I wrestled Keith_DC on Monday. He was in town for business and it was his first time in Montreal. We also were very compatible and we wrestled promission as well. His style reminds me of Lumber_Jack_G's wrestling style. I think both of them would have gotten along very well. There was some nice and charging intensity in our match. You could tell we would sometimes yield each other into holds we purposely wanted to be held in... after all, that's part of the definition of promission. Deep down, Keith_DC is a jobber, but he's a great heel. He likes guys near his height. He also wrestles pro and loves the abdominal stretch as a finisher. I once again over-abused my scissors on him and it really works miracle. I learned from our rumble session that "Nice!" meant "I give!". That made me realize that I should probably have agreed with a safe word with him before starting the match, but I just assumed that he already knew them considering his high amount of experience in wrestling. Overall, I felt that we were pretty even matched. Nice build, strong arms, great wrestler and an excellent personality reinforces all of his nice traits. We went out afterwards in Chinatown to eat some dumplings and I learned more about his life and career. He's one of the few exceptions, where he was able to find a comprehensive husband that also wrestles and that allows him to wrestle people around the world. Interestingly, Keith_DC asked me if Montreal is affected by the don't-wrestle-guys-in-the-same-city-you-live-in syndrome, to which I replied that it affects Montreal as well. Truth be told, just like in many big cities, on top of the usual syndrome, wrestlers are usually very picky and they want poster models as well... except for a small amount of people. By the way, GoodBoyMtl does go by SubFight (id 7506) on bearhugger and Keith_DC goes by Keith (id 4340), but these profiles have been abandoned since a while now, so I prefer to point you guys to their MeetFighters' counterpart. MuscledWrestler2001 (id 8009) goes under Wrestle123 in MeetFighters, but he seems to be active here as well. There are months where I get no wrestling at all and there are months like this one where there would be a sudden flux of wrestlers visiting Montreal either for business or leisure. With the wrestlers I've met this past week been moderate and respectful in strength and intensity, I'm happy to say that I currently don't have any sore muscles... just a few regular bruises as usual that normally goes away after a couple of days. I've started tracking this by creating this somewhat automatic calculator that counts the average of matches per month and per year. This year is already marked by a decline of matches, but the year is not over yet. I'll try to catch up on the ground I lost. A little note: When I hold an event gathering multiple wrestlers or when I go to a wrestling event, I count that as one match. Otherwise, if I put a big number, it would greatly skew the average amount of matches I get per month. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 206 | |||||||||||||||
| Sunday July 29 2018 - A modest amount of activity | Recent matches | ||||||||||||||
| Near the end of last month, I had a visit from Ed Scissors from the UK. If you read his pseudonym carefully, you can actually read the pun "Head Scissors" from his name. I actually didn't get it the first few times until he told me about it. Hence, our match was mainly a one-sided, give and take session. I tested out my head scissors of different intensities on Ed. Ed's fondness for this hold is the shifting between a near-submission strength head scissors, in contrast with a regular, non-threatening head scissors with almost no pressure. He's quite a nice guy and you can ask him to do holds in return as well. I invited EvilDark (id 1077) to Montreal 2 weeks ago to watch one of the fireworks from the Loto-Quebec International Fireworks competition directly at the site of La Ronde, part of Six Flags. The firm ApogΓ©e was representing Canada and they did a fairly good job. I never miss any of these shows. You could say I'm a pyromaniac. No, not in the sense of burning things, but seeing lots of fireworks in the skies. Nevertheless, we did manage to wrestle a wee bit afterwards. That being said, EvilDark is also a head scissors lover. That would make three people fond of headscissors I've met recently. Maybe in another life, I should have made this page the headscissors.net website instead of bearhugger.net? I went and checked the URL just for fun and it seems that someone has already acquired the domain name. I also had a short visit from WrestleInMN (id 3305). We only had time for fireworks as well, but he was luckier because he was able to watch the presentation from Dragon Fireworks representing Philippines. It was definitely one of the better display this year. In fact, it was far better than Canada's display by a mile. WrestleInMN left shortly after the show because of his complex schedule, but we've agreed to try to reschedule something in the weeks to come. You may find the video down below boring.. but being there in person, surrounded by all these fireworks... it's really something! Last, but not least, BeastMtl (id 10067) kindly invited me for a Just For Laughs festival show with Jack Septiceye. He may be a YouTube phenomenon, but I've never heard about him until now. Jack's show was pretty good: he's a nice comedian and has excellent motivational speaking skills. He was explaining to everyone how he reached his point of life by starting from scratch. I have to admit that, in person, he has quite some charisma, because I went and watched a couple of his videos after the show and there was no way I would, in normal circumstances, follow someone like that online. He is very expressive in his videos. I guess his style is a bit different for me. I suppose my last two encounters don't really count as wrestling, but I will be following up with both wrestlers for a match soon enough. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 198 | |||||||||||||||
| Wednesday June 6 2018 - Clash XXII: Atlanta Clash of the Titans 2018 | Wrestling event | ||||||||||||||
| My 3rd year at the Clash of the Titans has come to an end. Another year, another memorable event where I met great wrestlers and made new friends. I mentioned about a week or two ago that I would take it easy at the Clash. Truth be told, it actually went the opposite way. Thursday May 31 2018 Fun4Us (id 8822) was my designated driver this time around. I was quite spoiled. I reduced my role to a co-pilot or navigator holding my phone in GPS mode to guide us between our hotel in Mableton to the event's venue in Austell, which are suburbs or counties west of Atlanta. Both areas are about a half hour drive from Atlanta when there's no traffic.  We arrived at the venue at around 8 pm and the ring was already set up. The first people I see are the commissioner Big Joe, Harley, Kevin_Patrick, TampaChaser (id 11434). I immediately gave them all a big hug. Even though I barely interacted with Kevin_Patrick and TampaChaser two years ago, we've talked as if we were lost buddies and suddenly found our way back. We've instantly recognized each other and I'm sure we've both wondered and told ourselves why we didn't spend more time to get to know each other two years ago. Luckily, I won't be repeating the same mistake: I'll be catching up with TampaChaser later on. LatinJock4_U, Steve, BigJohn and Viper (known at the event as Armani) were also around that evening. JackBouvier and Destroyer (id 2190) joined in an hour or two later. Shawty (id 520) accompanied us and took on the mats for a few sub matches. He preferred staying on the sidelines, so he avoided the ring because he wasn't ready for it yet. Fun4Us, Kevin_Patrick, TampaChaser, LatinJock4_U and Viper climbed onto the ring and started doing a round-robin tag match. I watched them in awe wrestle each other off for a good half hour and then took a deep breath: I wanted some of the action so I've decided to join in. Well.... little did I know that I became the jobber to pick on. That's what happens when you're small. The guys wouldn't let me tag out and they were just using me as a practice dummy. No, I'm not complaining. On the contrary, it was very exciting. According to Fun4Us, it allowed the wrestlers to break glass and go all out. When things calmed down a little bit, I was lucky enough to get some private time with LatinJock4_U. We tossed each other around and I was able to lift him up in a rack. He instantly turned to me and asked me how to perform this move. It didn't take him long: he learned it instantly and easily grabbed and picked me up as if I was a light little feather. Previously, I thought of LatinJock4_U as a very intimidating wrestler. I was looking at the pics before meeting him and I was telling myself that this is a guy that probably would not wrestle me. I was obviously wrong as LatinJock4_U is probably the nicest and most open wrestler at the event. This guy is really incredible. He is absolutely humble, well-versed in pro, always willing to learn and has an exceptional personality. I would even say his smile brightens up the warehouse. I also got some time with Steve. Now this guy is hard to find because he doesn't believe in online profiles, so he is not registered anywhere. He goes mostly under the pseudonym Jet Fan. Steve did sub wrestling in his previous years, but switched entirely to pro after an injury. He likes almost every hold in pro and loves to be the jobber. Ironically, for my match against him, I turned out to be the jobber. That's also because I have trouble chaining my moves as a heel and Steve honestly goes from one move to another without even breaking a sweat. His arsenal is infinite. He really knows what to do to get the momentum going in a match. I believe I also managed to squeeze a bit of time with both JackBouvier and The Punisher (also known as The Destroyer or The Crippler). Both of them are also great heel: all I had to do was follow their lead. Near the end of the evening, I spent some time showing TampaChaser (id 11434) how to apply the torture rack. He was really eager to master this hold. Unfortunately, I turned out to be a very bad teacher because my instructions led him to hurt his shoulders. This hold is easier said than done and performing it can be very dangerous. TampaChaser has a big shoulder frame and the way he positions his arms may have been a bit awkward for the rack. We've told ourselves we need to repeat and practice this somewhat complicated and convoluted maneuver another day. I eventually switched gear to have my first sub match. Lucky me, I was up against Viper (Armani). I later learned that this guy is a black belt, Muay Thai fighter. He is probably one of the toughest sub wrestler I have ever faced. To say that Armani kicked my ass is a big understatement. This guy is so far ahead, he is such a competent and formidable opponent that I don't have the slightest chances of winning against him. Armani didn't hesitate to play a few pranks by toying around with me. I really enjoyed my time with him, but I eventually stopped the match a bit prematurely in order to conserve my stamina. I know I've always said not to look back and not to have regrets, but I really would have love to spend more time wrestling him. A very charismatic, entertaining, dauntless and sociable guy. If you want to become a better sub wrestler, make sure you wrestle him. You can learn a lot from this expert submission wrestler! Fun4Us, Shawty and I stayed at the warehouse until Harley and Joe kicked us out at 11 pm. It seems that Thursdays has become the best day to wrestle people at the Clash. Why? Well, because everybody is at their top notch shape, they are ready for action and no one has injuries. Friday June 1st 2018 The following day, I did the mistake of starting the day with sub matches. I had 3 sub matches and they've drained me drastically. I quickly became significantly tired for the remainder of the day. Then again, had I scheduled my sub matches in the afternoon or evening, I would probably have collapsed. I started my sub matches with Wildwoolly (id 4258), an opponent that I have completely underestimated. In fact, all sub wrestlers at the Clash are usually all very good. WildWoolly had a defensive stance, but he knows how to chain up his moves and take advantage of mistakes you make in order to make you tap. Very talented and very nice guy off the mats. Next up, I had a re-match with Scottilla (id 3020) whom I have wrestled twice previously at the Clash and maybe another two times at the Wrestlefest. This fifth time, he still beats me pretty easily. Hey, he was an Olympic wrestler, I've never had a chance anyway... His skills, wisdom and his wrestling experience way surpasses mine.I also had a short sub match with LatinJock4_U where I tried showing him my ankle lock. It was probably the only match I could get someone to tap, but then again, this was the first time he was doing sub, so it was quite unfair for me to go full power on him. LatinJock4_U got pretty excited and he suddenly had this strong urge to learn more about submission wrestling. This guy has so much energy and is so passionate about trying new things to explore. A really awesome guy all around. Later in the afternoon, Timnbama showed up and he immediately took charge of the pro tournament. That also meant that he sacrificed his wrestling time to manage the matches and give instructions to each wrestler part of the tournament. Believe me, this is no easy task. This wasn't planned either. Joe had to step out for the remainder of the event and Harley initially panicked, having to manage the tournaments all by himself. Timnbama sided with Harley and gave him all the help he needed. This is why in my book, Timnbama has a wonderful and marvelous heart. Traveling all the way to help out Joe and Harley. I initially registered for the Pro Tag Team Tournament with Fun4Us, but later during the day, I was surprised to see the return of J. I wrestled with J two years ago, also at the Clash. We were in a handicap match: three of us against the Mighty Mongo. This year, J asked me if I can be his tag team partner and Fun4Us kindly freed his spot. J and I went on the ring to do a practice match and wow... J pulled off moves that I could never have pulled off. He went from ropes to ropes, bouncing from one to another to do stunts and maneuvers that require a lot of flexibility. Seeing him work out the moves was really mind blowing. J chose our tag team name: it was "Big Things Come"... from the full expression "Big Things Come in Small Packages". He explained to me that it does 3 stuff: - We are small, but we do big things - It has an innuendo - I can't recall the third one... I know, I'm terrible. Our first official tag team match was against Chip (id 1809) and Kevin_Patrick. J really had this under control and was able to lead the match. Kevin and Chip eventually managed to turn around the tables. I played a little bit of the bad guy by pulling out Kevin_Patrick's boot on one of the pins he had on J. Ultimately, J gave out the finishing hold that would put Kevin and Chip's tournament journey to an end and move both of us in Round 2. I actually wanted to lose, but Timnbama had other plans set aside for us: he instructed us to win against them. The heat was starting to have its impact. The Clash venue doesn't have an AC system and they leave the door of the warehouse wide open to circulate fresh air, but in the afternoon, the air can be warm enough to drench every wrestler in their sweat. Fun4Us and I eventually returned to the hotel to get an hour or two of rest in cool AC before eventually coming back to the venue. This is where I was very happy that he cranked the AC to the max. After several hours of heat, it feels heavenly to return to a fridge. When we got back to Clash, the pro tournament preliminary matches were over for the day. We were able to force Harley on to the ring. Timnbama also climbed up to have his share of the fun. You should see the pounding that Harley received. It was a way for all wrestlers to thank him for holding the Clash event. I think he was quadruple-teamed. TampaChaser (id 11434) and I locked up on the sub mats, trading scissors and such. I did not remove my pro boots so he managed to lock in a scissor counter by putting his boots on mine. Ow. Now I can feel the pain that I usually make the others feel. Saturday June 2nd 2018 Many of the wrestlers came on the Saturday: I saw WGA-Rassler (he goes under the pseudonym Rex Moros), Wrestle007, ChicagoMuscle, PiledriverVA, H2oWrestler and JJ_Sparks (id 2445). Unfortunately, I was unable to wrestle any of these guys. I was caught up in both the single and tag pro tournaments and I was pushed in the later rounds despite my request to make me a complete jobber and to end both my pro entries on round 1 for both tournaments. I'll explain this later on. I was however able to slip in a very short sub match against Chicago Piledriver. I think this guy became an even better sub wrestler because he was able to get out of my moves pretty easily this time around. I never stood a chance anyway. Why is that the case for every sub wrestlers I meet at the Clash? In the afternoon, the great Rasslin_Bodybuilder (who also goes by MuscleBuffBoy) walked in and um... wow, this guy is really something. Handsome, humble and kind. I was initially supposed to heel him in a practice pro match, but after he got me in a clothesline, he simply said: "I guess I'll heel then." and he immediately took over control of the match. He went on to pound me with multiple consecutive moves and then pinned me to the ground. Had I known he was just staying around for a very short time, I would have spent more time with him. Then again, it's hard to distribute your time with all the many wrestlers that show up, especially on a Saturday. I initially registered to be part of the submission tournament, but I opted out at the last minute because I knew I was going to be pushed for round 2 for both single and pro tournaments. It was probably for the best since I needed to take it easy this time around. I wasn't at my top shape, but the guys at the Clash really pushed me to do my best in pro. However, watching the preliminary sub tournaments was shocking. I would not have lasted long because every sub wrestler there were so skilled. I have to say that I admired LatinJock4_U who has decided to join the sub tourney despite being his first time trying sub. My 2nd round of tag team pro match started right after the preliminary sub matches. Now, this is the reason why I should write down blog entries like this the same day, because right now, my memories are getting blurry. This match was supposed to be against Roscoe The Rassler and WGA-Rassler. WGA-Rassler ended up coming later in the afternoon, so LS_Powerhouse (id 4337) took his spot instead. We were instructed to lose this match, when suddenly, at the last minute, J made a pin and we were moving on to the finals of the pro tournament. I couldn't believe it. I have no idea what happened and when the decision was made, but I went along with it. Heck, why not? I honestly can't remember what else happened in this match or how this match turned out. I think J recorded it, so I'll have to ask him for the video.I did eventually exchanged a few messages to Roscoe a few weeks after our match and he mentioned the he appreciated me selling some of the moves he threw at me. He said that I was not stiff or fighting every move. He gave me tougher stomps and punches and I did not complain about it. Honestly, sub wrestling does help me build up a bit of resistance to withstand incoming attacks from stiff pro. My first single pro match started around 1 pm-ish. I think we were ahead of schedule. I was set up against JackBouvier. Timnbama explicitely told me that I need to win the match because JackBouvier is a bit injured and is already exhausted by the previous matches he have had in the past few days. This match went easy enough as JackBouvier lead the match as a heel, locking me holds, dominating the whole match until he was ready for me to finish it off. His instructions were simple: on his signal, I would go behind him and apply the sleeper and win the match. After his defeat, JackBouvier asked me if I can take a few pics with him because he loves pics as much as I do.
The image above is actually ironic because he is shown here sleepering me out, while in reality, he submitted to a sleeper. My guess is that he likes sleepers.
What a better way to punish a jobber with a bearhug? JackBouvier has many more images, but he'll be sending them to me gradually over the coming weeks. I saw J wrestle against Viper, who wore a Spiderman costume. I have to admit that this was the most hilarious match in the single pro tournament. J and Spiderman went back and forth for quite a while, but eventually Spiderman decided to finish it off by using his "web slingers". He used a spray can that spreads some sort of sticky pinkish substance, I really have no idea what it is. It was funny, weird, yet creative. It's a good thing to see the wrestlers show off some originality and add up some spice to their matches.Fun4Us also had his share of single pro matches. He faced JJ Hart, followed by Peter Parker (the non-hero version of Spider-Man or Viper (Armani)) and eventually lost to Roscoe. While some of the single pro matches played out, I sat down with TampaChaser (id 11434). I told him that I was very thrilled that we got to wrestle a lot more this time around. I also told him that, two years ago, I was intimidated by him. He's a guy in great shape, wrestles other big guys with ease. I didn't think he was someone who would wrestle smaller guys like me. Well guess what he said? He replied to me that he was intimidated by me because I carried all the big guys around with my rack. Lesson learned: I've always wanted to wrestle TampaChaser and I should have taken a leap of faith and interacted with him sooner. TampaChaser and Kevin_Patrick are extremely nice guys. They get along with everyone so easily and they are funny guys too. Viper and I had a short chat on wrestlers across the world: he travels often and he recommended me places to visit. He shot down Los Angeles by saying that there are lots of wrestlers, but virtually every wrestler he was supposed to meet down ended up canceling or not showing up. On the other side of the coin, he said that London, UK was the best place to meet wrestlers. People there are apparently respectable and they will honor the wrestling meets. That city has the highest rate of wrestling meetups in his book. My second single pro match was up against DCJobber (id 3247), a veteran of the Clash. DCJobber is billed at 250 lbs, so technically, I would need to lose this match with my puny 160 lbs. Big guys dominate smaller guys, right? Not quite. We were both tired. DCJobber wanted to lose the match and I wanted to lose as well. None of us wanted to go to Round 3. We asked Timnbama, our pro commissionner/organizer, if we could both lose our match in a double count out or double disqualification, but Timnbama told us no. He needed someone to take on Wrestlg to be able to close his brackets for the tournament. Ultimately, I volunteered to win the match. It's ironic: people usually want to win matches, but at Clash, people were yielding for others. The heat and exhaustion from mass wrestling are big factors that come into play. Well-versed in both sub and pro, DcJobber wants his matches to look real, especially in pro. So, I suggested that we rehearse our moves beforehand. DCJobber gave me precise instructions to follow near the ending sequence of the match: throw him on the ring, give him a kick on the stomach, throw him again and give him a real punch to the stomach and on the third throw, he would hold the ropes. Once he regains control, he'd jump from the first rope then onto me in some form of a splash. He then climbs up on the second rope and brags to the crowd. This was my cue: I would need to do a low blow from behind him, grab him in a rack an proceed with an airplane spin. Normally I wouldn't do an airplane spin at 250 lbs, but he gave me his trust as he wanted me to go full power, he wanted me to spin faster and drop with a stronger impact to reinforce his wish for realism. He sold it well and actually so well that I thought I've harmed him for real. He's an absolutely terrific wrestler. My tag team partner J was kind enough to take a video while I was in the ring. In the following racks I've extracted from the clip, I honestly look like I'm out for revenge trying to uh... strangle someone. Maybe I'm trying a bit too hard to be into character and get into that wrestling persona. I'm sure these photos alone will prevent me from meeting new opponents. My evil, scary and aggressive look will probably chase people away.
I can hear people saying: if you don't want your back broken in half, don't wrestle Loserboy. He is a serial racker.
You can also check out Clip ID 339 for a short video sequence of the rack. I could not post the whole match because there was a couple of people in the background that do not want to be seen publicly on the web.I however took the time recently to listen to the audio track that goes along with this video and I just noticed that Jet Fan Steve was nice enough to be my personal commentator yelling at the top of his lungs: - "Oh! Oh no! Oh! It's his rack! He's doing it! Oh my gawd! The rack! Ahhhhh! He spins! HE SPINS!" I should personally hire him to be a commentator for all of my matches. So much excitement! Anyhow, with DC_Jobber submitting to the rack, I went on to reach the semi-finals of the single pro tournament to face Wrestlg (id 4402). He told me I should win the tournament with all my racks, but I told him I couldn't go on. Exhausted and sweating like crazy, he graciously took the win to get to the finals because I really really needed my beauty rest. My match with Wrestlg was actually a refresher as we were doing both sub and pro in the ring (I suppose promission). He got me in technical holds on the mats and I was actually giving him punches to his abs for real. I've always considered him an elite in both pro and sub and that he probably likes it anyway. I've wrestle him twice before and he has always gave me that general impression. My first time was in NYC, we were just horsing around. My second match was 2 years ago, at Clash 20, in a sub match where he out-skilled me by a great margin. This time around, it's a pro match where we agreed that he should win. That technically means I've lost all my matches against Wrestlg. Eventually, Wrestlg was pitted against Roscoe The Rassler in the finals, who incidentally defeated Fun4Us in the other semi-finals bracket. In the final bout, Roscoe defeated Wrestlg to win the Single Pro Tournament. Here's what the tournament bracket looked like from what I can remember. The empty spaces are blanks I need to fill. With that many wrestlers at the event, it's hard for me to remember who had a match against whom.  Single Pro Tournament Bracket Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4 = Quarter-Finals S1, S2 = Semi-Finals After an hour break or so, it was time for the Final Pro Tag Team Tournament match were J and I were matched up against the other tag team finalists: LatinJock4_U and TampaChaser (id 11434). Having spent most of my energy in my previous single pro matches, I've asked J to stand in for me for most of the match and thank goodness he had no problem doing so. J went on to punish TampaChaser and LatinJock4_U with his awesome flying moves and leet maneuvers. TampaChaser took control a bit, tagged out to LatinJock4_U and J was able to tag back to me. I really liked our finisher: it was an awesome tag team combo. I would pick LatinJock4_U in a rack, airplane spin him and kneel down. J would climb on the 2nd rope, put his fists together and land them on LatinJock4_U's chest. The momentum would flip me backwards to drop my opponent on the mats so I can do my pin... 1... 2.... 3 and we were pronounced Tag Team Champions of the Tournament. It was awesome. I gave J a great big hug and we did the same to our opponents. I suppose I should now change my nickname to Winnerboy. This is what I recall from the Pro Tournament brackets. You'll notice that I am also missing the names of 2 other team formations. The days went so fast that I forget who was in each team. As you can see, you only need to win 3 matches in the Tag Team Pro Tournament to make it to the end (as opposed to 4 matches in the Single Pro Tournament).  Tag Team Pro Tournament Bracket After another short AC break back at the hotel, it was time for the Battle Royale. I've decided to skip it out again, but the Battle Royale was actually quite entertaining. You had a feeling you were watching a Survivor show where everyone decided to form alliances to decide who would get booted out and in what order they should be kicked off the island... uh I mean... wrestling ring. Staying under the radar was the key and outwitting your opponent was crucial. Roscoe and Steve were on the microphone and they had a strong influence on who gets to be kicked out as the wrestlers on the ring seemed to agree with them on their decisions. Being booted out of the Battle Royale was based on a few criteria: - If you are a newbie, your chances of being kicked out were pretty high. - If you previously won a Battle Royale, your chances to survive were lower. Sensational Danny actually won the Battle Royale quite a few times in the past, so he was definitely targeted quickly. - If you are a heavy wrestler, everyone will likely team up against you. Bigger means harder to push out of the ring, so you were perceived as a threat. At times, the wrestlers outside the ring were chanting "Boring" because the wrestlers in the Battle Royale spent too much time negotiating or discussing who should be kicked out next. There was 4 referees for the match, one for each side of the ring. If 50% of your body was outside the ropes of the ring, then you were out. Harvey and Timnbama were on the south side, Kevin_Patrick guarded the west side, H2oWrestler monitored the north side and I was donning the ref shirt on the east side. I think there was nine wrestlers in the ring and the booting order was: Fun4Us, LatinJock4_U, Sensational Danny, JJ_Sparks, WildWooly, BigJohn, JJ_Hart and DCJobber became the ultimate winner... When two wrestlers remain in the ring, they can make the other tap via submission. DCJobber managed to put JJ_Hart in a move where he couldn't breathe, so he had to tap out. I think I missed one or two other wrestlers in the Battle Royale, I can't remember whom they were. Timnbama entered the ring at the last minute when DCJobber came out. They joked around, playing and bending the rules by mentioning that in a Battle Royale, you can enter the ring whenever you want, but the last man standing in the ring is the winner. Timnbama entered the ring just as DCJobber walked out. In theory, Timnbama becomes the winner of the Battle Royale. This is why later on, he received the Zucchini Award, which is usually given to those who do the silliest thing. In any case, he was given the Battle Royale Winner Award anyway. Around 6-7 pm, a feast was given to the attendees, you had cold cuts, deviled eggs, fried chicken, fruits to help everyone recover. Fun4Us was very sweet to do the extra mile to get the chicken. Shortly after, Harley climbed onto the ring with his trusty laptop and announced the winners of the various awards for this year's Clash of the Titans. Awards Best Jobber: Jet Fan Steve Best Heel: Viper (Armani) Zucchini Award: DCJobber (id 3247) Best Dressed Wrestler (Diana Ross Award): Wrestlg (id 4402) Shittiest Referree: Fun4Us (id 8822) Newcomer of the Year: Fun4Us (id 8822) Sponsors Award: Fun4Us (id 8822) Lightweight Sub Champion: LatinJock4_U Middleweight Sub Champion: Viper (Armani) Heavyweight Sub Champion: UWillTap (id 9117) Titan Sub Champion: ChicagoPiledriver Final Sub Champion: Three-way tie: Viper (Armani) + UWillTap (id 9117) + ChicagoPiledriver Single Pro Champion: Roscoe The Rassler Tag Team Pro Champion: Big Things Come (Loserboy and J) Battle Royale Winner: DCJobber (id 3247) Best Match: Armani + UWillTap (id 9117) (29 minutes submission wrestling match - it apparently beat the previous record of 26 minutes) Most Improved Wrestler: Loserboy Most Inspirational Wrestler: LatinJock4_U Rookie of the Year: LatinJock4_U Wrestler of the Year: LatinJock4_U  Not everyone showed up for the group pic because of privacy concerns. Missing in this image is Viper and ChicaoPiledriver. Jet Fan Steve was a good sport and joined us anyway, but I blurred him out because he usually does not want to appear online. For multiple award winners, I've decided to put only one of the awards. Otherwise, the image would be over-cluttered with captions. Yeah, LatinJock4_U pretty much racked up the best awards. That's telling how amazing this guy really is. That being said, my friend Fun4Us had his own share of awards: Shittiest Ref, Sponsors Award and Newcomer of the Year. Shittiest Ref may look like a lousy award, but it's actually nice to have it. Some years, this award is sometimes transformed to best ref. Harley said that it was impossible to get Fun4Us off the ring. Fun4Us was definitely very intense and energetic. He reffed almost all the matches and he wrestled intensively by reaching out to almost every wrestler at the Clash. He got along with everyone, he roughed it up or toned it down whenever it was needed; Fun4Us showed me that he has a lot more wrestling passion and adrenaline in him than I do. As everyone started to leave after a day charged of wrestling, Fun4Us and I stayed behind with the very few that remain to enjoy a bit of casual semi-sub, give and take and some light pro wrestling. I was able to put a few holds on JJ_Hart to experiment and I also managed to put some on UWillTap (id 9117). After locking my leg scissors by cheating with my kneecaps, I realized that there was absolutely no way I can hurt him. It's as if I was trying to squeeze a piece of brick. UWillTap could only grin at my futile attempts. He went on to wrestle Fun4Us and took care of him without any effort. I don't think anyone can beat UWillTap... except perhaps maybe Viper, but then again, both had wrestled to a draw. Had they not both declared this, I would have been curious to see who would last longer and who would emerge victorious. If there is one thing I learned in this match is that a submission match can be paused if both wrestlers agree that the sweat from both wrestler needs to be removed. I tried to get JJ_Sparks (id 2445) to come onto the ring, but the heat really didn't agree with him. I told him that we were lucky this year: the heat this year was actually less worse this year than the two other times I was at the Clash. Fortunately, JJ_Sparks did have a few matches. I saw him go against LatinJock4_U in a non-tourney match. Timnbama finished his work managing the pro tournament, so I was able to spend a little bit of time with him. I asked him if I can get him in a standing rack again... actually, all my previous racks on him were kneeling down, but since I felt so comfortable with him, I really wanted to pick him up standing. Fun4Us kindly took a shot of us. I was worried prior to the trip I could no longer pull stunts like this, but Timnbama is such an calm and nice guy to lift that he made it very easy for me to carry him.
This cuddly bear is full of surprises. In one of his non-tournament matches, he drank from a water bottle, kept it in his mouth discreetly until the moment came: he spurted the contents on a wrestler rushing towards him, just like on TV. He took advantage of this to regain control of his opponent. I really wish I had more time with Timnbama, but we were both spent from a full long day of wrestling. I still managed to be his boot boy by tying and un-tying his laces for his wrestling boots. It was my personal time with him... Later in the night, I was doing my usual body scissors, ankle lock and leg scissors on TampaChaser and he got excited, asking me how to apply that ankle lock. I switched back and forth with Kevin_Patrick on whom I locked on head scissors and body scissors. I then realized we shared a very similar mind. He loved to be squeezed and asked for more. He apologized for been greedy and I told him that it was pleasure to crush him... He explained to me the experience of the near submission sequence: everything starts becoming bright, you see the lights, you are about to pass out, but you tap at the very last second to stay conscious. That's exactly how I would describe myself the joy of being in a body scissors near submission. Honestly, I could squeeze Kevin_Patrick all day... except I don't have that much stamina to keep him that long. I need extra rest between scissor sessions. I have to admit, he can take quite a beating... or a squeezing and will definitely come back for more. Sunday June 3rd 2018 Most of the wrestlers have already left on the Sunday. Many have been exhausted, had to take an early flight or were injured in the previous days and couldn't come back on Sunday. By the way, by injury, it could simply be muscle pain. On my end, I only had a stiff right shoulder. I suppose I got lucky. No scars this time around. Nevertheless, I had a casual match with Steve. He showed me an interesting combo: I had to throw Steve into the turnbuckle, then I bend down, he hops over me, goes to the other side of the ring, bounces back and launches a drop kick! I can't do drop kicks, but Steve is so good that he pulls them out with ease. Mind you, one of his drop kicks did land on my groin, but I pushed myself back enough to reduce the impact. Thank goodness. Steve also told me he found my blog very amusing.. you know all the teddy bears I've been posting. I told him I use it mainly as a journal so I can remember my past matches. Fun4Us told me that I should post my stuff on MeetFighters' blog or on Facebook, but I prefer to keep this in my corner, without popping notifications in people's faces. If people want to know what's going on with me, they can casually check anytime they want. Facebook is a bit too mainstream for me and I can't control the notifications being sent if I create blog entries in MeetFighters. We also had a tag team match with Fun4Us being on my team and Steve and DCJobber as our opponents. I was out of energy and tagged often to let the big guys have fun. I also recall putting Fun4Us in a kneeling rack (I had no energy left to lift him) and lock him in a nice and tight full nelson with body scissors to thank him for accompanying me in this wonderful trip. Did he submit? Of course, he did. Nobody, not even the great and powerful Fun4Us can withstand the devastation of my signature move. WildWooly, BigJohn, JJ_Sparks, Fun4Us and I all helped out Harley around 3 PM to dismount the ring, remove all the equipment and clear/clean up the venue. Fun4Us felt that JJ_Sparks should have been given the Sponsors award because he was also there on Thursday to set up the ring and do the initial setup. Dismounting the ring is a lot of work and a bit dangerous, this is why we should stay behind to help out. According to Harley, the final count of attendees for the Clash event of this year was around 42. As with every year, about 10% of the roster ends up canceling for various reasons (more than 42 registered, but ended up not showing up). That being said, I consider this year an excellent success for the Clash. Again, Big Joe, Harley and Timnbama are the real heroes. Setting up an event like this is no easy task. These guys do it with so much love and dedication. There seems to be no boundaries for them. These guys are showing us that their wrestling passion is above all of ours combined. I spent the remainder of the day with Fun4Us, we chilled out and took it easy. We went and watched at the movie theater "Solo: A Star Wars story". Meh... mediocre and unmemorable movie. I was waiting for Emilia Clarke to unleash her dragons with her "Dracarys". I will always see her as the mother of dragons. Anyhow, we ate at Golden Coral and we've also put back some order to our hotel room which we had previously transformed into wrestling grounds. Fun4Us had no expectations prior to the event. He told me that this was probably one of his best trips. So many wrestlers, so many matches and so many memories. We both made new friends that we will both cherish forever. We parted ways the next day: we drove back to the airport, returned our rental car. He went on to take his domestic flight while I strapped my bag to get my shuttle for the international terminal back to Canada. Notes My rotation for the Clash is usually once every two years, but Fun4Us might return next year. I enjoyed it very much, but I did explain to him that for my next time, I would want to stay on the sidelines and perhaps do sub only. The awards are supposed to be for the new Clashers: it's a way to welcome them in our family or our community. I get enough ring time and the spotlights should go on to the newcomers. The Clash needs new blood. LatinJock4_U was the perfect example, and we need other great guys like him to keep this event going on and growing. Fun4Us shared with me the history of the Clash. In its starting years, it was a closed and reserved event and it took a while before it was open to everyone. It is perhaps one of the few events today where everybody can mingle together and socialize rather than shut oneself off in hotel rooms in private matches. Of course, you will always have people who will prefer the latter. Not everyone gets along with everybody, but at Clash, everybody does a great effort to include everyone without having any hiccups or discrimination. The Clash is your chance to integrate with the wrestling community and to participate, shine and have fun in the ring with other great wrestlers that think alike, sub or pro. By the way, I do have lots of photos taken at the Clash. It's just that a big chunk shows Fun4Us in action. You know what? Fun4Us has always told me that he'd create his own blog. Now's your chance to nag him to create this new blog and ask him to include these pictures. Mwahahahahah. I'm evil. Last we spoke, he already created a few entries using MeetFighters' blog interface, so make sure you check them out. Now that I think of it, the reason why I don't have that many pictures is because I would ask Fun4Us to take shots of me, but most of the time, he was busy reffing or he was reffing my own match. Another point I'd like to mention about the Clash is that the event and the tournaments allows you to match up with new people and with wrestlers you wouldn't get to wrestle one on one normally. The board of the Clash decide who goes up against whom and you don't get to decide, but their picks are usually excellent match-ups. At the venue, wrestlers will usually tone down or remove their restrictions and they will cooperate with you to make the tournament work or just to be of good sport. I'm thinking of leaving my camera in my bag for most of the time the next time I come to the Clash. I should only bring it out when a wrestler specifically asks for it. I may have made some wrestlers uncomfortable by walking around with a camera and taking as many shots as I did (95% were shots that were not of me). Not everyone wants to have their picture taken. Stuff I could bring next time I brought a first aid kit just in case and it turns out it was quite a bit useful. I however had insufficient waterproof adhesive tape for bandages, so I would need to pack an extra roll or two for next time. These are useful when you have a cloth around one of your limb and want the cloth to stay in place. There was requests from many people for Advil, so a bottle of that would have helped along with perhaps a bottle of Aleve for muscle pain relievers or maybe a few Salonpas or IcyHot patches. Just writing it as a reminder for me to pack these along for next time. Better safe than sorry. While I'm at it, I think a tube of Polysporin can also be useful. Thankfully for me, I didn't get any injuries this year. I had muscle pain on my right shoulder, but that was my fault: it was caused by bad positioning for one of the racks that I delivered. I may have lost a bit of balance while I was holding my opponent and I may have jerked the rack too abruptly: it caused weight to shift harder on the right shoulder. That being said, the rack is definitely a dangerous move... don't try this at home. I also had a little bruise on my right elbow due to rug burn on the base mats of the wrestling ring. I thought the fabric would allow friction without pain, but it's just not designed to let you slide or being pulled while you're down on the mats. To mitigate this, JJ_Hart suggested that I get elbow pads to go along with my knee pads next year. Finally, I think I've hit something outside of the ring while I was walking in the warehouse. It must have being a scratch or a cut from a prop or something, so I had to apply a little band-aid on the middle part of my left leg. That would have prevented me from getting that rug burn and scratching it for a few days. Other than that, I was still in great condition after the event, minus the fatigue from over-exerting myself lifting bigger guys and wrestling quite a bit more than my average habit. The solution is to probably slow down on trying to show off racking guys that are twice my size.... but I can't stop it! I love racking guys! It also makes unusually great pictures. How often do you see smaller guys racking big guys? | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 193 | |||||||||||||||
| Monday June 4 2018 - Atlanta Pre-Clash: Fun4Us and Shawty | Recent matches | ||||||||||||||
| Where to start? Where to start? I just came back from a trip to Atlanta and I've decided to split the summary of my time there in two parts: one for my hotel match with the boys which I will write right now (pre-Clash) and one for the Clash which I will write later. The Clash entry should appear in the next few days since that one will require much more to time for me to write and remember... I arrived in Atlanta last Tuesday and met up with the Fun4Us (id 8822) and Shawty (id 520) at the HartsfieldβJackson Atlanta International Airport a day afterwards (Wednesday May 30 2018). I've previously met with Fun4Us in April 2017 so I gave him a big huge hug. It's been more than a year, but we've kept in touch through the usual online communication streams. However, this is the first time I was meeting Shawty. I've only known him through chatting online. We've known for longer than I can remember: we used to trade wrestling pictures and I certainly remember approving and admiring his many wrestling matches/scenarios which he creates on the site. As you can see with his track record, he loves losing as much as I do. After catching up and getting to know each other better, we promptly headed back to our hotel where we've unmounted the frame of the bed and transformed it into wrestling grounds for our 3-way rumble. Fun4Us is still the very strong wrestler that I remember. He might even be stronger this time around. I had quite some difficulties managing him in sub, but I felt Fun4Us toned it down for me (been the nice guy he is). My scissors couldn't do much to him, but the ankle lock would work only if I had him low. As for the cheat of a leg scissors using my knee caps, that still worked well. I then locked horns with Shawty and I realized that I could easily overpower him, so I took Fun4Us' example and reduce my strength just a wee bit. It's not everyday I get to wrestle someone whom I outweigh by 30 pounds and this gave me a clear advantage over Shawty. To his credit, he did manage to make me tap anyway in a couple of technical holds. I always imagined Shawty a pro wrestler, but he is actually a sub wrestler. We eventually ended up doing some double-teaming. At that point, chaos ensued because the room became a war field where everyone was on his own. You never know if your friend will go against you. We erred mainly in submission and promission, but added a few give and take. The body scissors was often used as a benchmark to gauge our strength and endurance.
We obviously didn't used this hold exclusively. Fun4Us is shown here massaging my back with a camel.
And I am displaying here some tough love to Shawty: little bros like him should remain in a nice and tight headlock.
Overall, Shawty is a fierce fighter with lots of stamina. Give him a few more years and he'll also become a formidable wrestler. I'm sure at his age, Shawty has already wrestled more wrestler than I did. Later in the evening, Fun4Us had this bright idea to go to a male strip club, similar to what we did in Montreal last year. Atlanta holds many of them and he picked one that was called "Swinging Richards". The name itself cracked me up. At the same time, this would become Shawty's first experience and we really wanted him to break the glass and explore the underground. Let's just say that Shawty wasn't too shy to insert those one dollar bills around a dancer's band or underwear.... He was pretty generous with his ratings on the dancers, then again, I'm sure we'd wrestle almost any of the strippers at these clubs. Over the next few days, we also spent some fun time at the theaters watching The Avengers: Infinity War, Deadpool 2 and Solo: A Star Wars Story. Call it a breather in between the many matches that were intertwined with our schedule in the upcoming days. Wednesday was our day for all three together and our paths slowly diverged in the days to come. While Fun4Us and I headed to the Clash from Thursday onward, Shawty had scheduled hotel matches during that time: he felt more comfortable with a one-on-one setting rather than an open warehouse like the Clash. That being said, he was still available for two short evenings and wrestled various guys in submission matches at the Clash. Fun4Us didn't hesitate to remind me to write more blog entries, but then I slammed it back into his face again by repeating to him: the day he writes his own blog and updates it as frequently as mine, then I'll allow him to complain and judge its frequency. I should mention that Fun4Us gave me a new teddy bear and baptized him as "Beau", which means "Handsome" in French. Here's a shot of me showing off this new recruit in a silly selfie.  I actually look tired here, but after 4 days of consecutive non-stop wrestling plus the travel, I could use right now a healthy dose of beauty sleep. You'll notice you won't be able to rank this picture and that's because I don't want any 1s or 2s out of 10s on this image. This little fellow is a 12 in my book. Knowing that I do own a collection, Fun4Us had this burning rage and desire to augment it by adding a new cuddly member in the family. Does this new teddy bear have any special powers? Of course it does: his stomach smells like "Cake" and his paw has a button that will emulate his heart beat. Awwwww... I honestly fell in love with it instantly. Beau has other defensive abilities: I used him several times during this trip to warm me up by putting him on my chest while I sleep. The extra padding serves as a dual/triple-layer of warmth and protection. Fun4Us likes to cram the AC of the hotel room to the max while I shiver in coldness underneath the thin sheets of blankets. Despite this, Fun4Us' body is a furnace while mine is a Popsicle. Incidentally, Fun4Us also has his own collection of plush toys he carries around with him. His Star Dragon by the name of Orville is now his travel companion. I took a sneak selfie of him while he was busy talking to Shawty.  All right, time for me to get some sleep to go back to work tomorrow. It felt surreal being on vacation for one week, but it was certainly needed and it felt nice and good. I needed the rest... maybe wrestling for four days isn't a rest, but it's still better than typing on a computer all day. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 192 | |||||||||||||||
| Monday May 21 2018 - Warming up... | Recent matches | ||||||||||||||
| I guess you could say that I am currently trying to prepare and to warm up for the upcoming Clash. I am still not where I was 2 years ago, so I'll make sure to take it easy. I'm thinking of just participating in the singles pro tournament. I'd probably avoid submission this year even though this is usually my cup of tea. In any case, most wrestlers will be heavier than I am, so I'm just trying to play safe. On May 5th, I met back with Vicious (id 5128) to catch up after a long absence. We've caught up on time lost and the reasons behind it. Now I know why I need to write this down as fast as I can, because all I remember is that our match was very light, we spoke a lot and we went for sushi afterwards. I think he got the better end of me in that match. This week-end, I had 3 matches, about one per day. We're having a long week-end in Canada because of Victoria day or Patriot's day. I had a rematch with BeastMtl (id 10067). We went light-sub to give and take. Mid-way we did some pillow talk (or ceiling talk) and that's how I realized that deep down, he is a jobber, but not a willing jobber, meaning you have to fight for it. For some reason, I keep forgetting that he loves camels.. or even the sleeper camels. His body is way more flexible than mine and I need to take note that I should camel him on a more regular basis. I ended up doing a full nelson camel which was probably very bad for him, because we stopped shortly afterwards: I might have tore a ligament in his shoulders, it went numb and he had trouble lifting it. No matter how careful you are, these kind of injuries happen frequently in wrestling. I told him to follow up with me on the recovery and it seems it might take a few weeks to fully heal... hopefully. I guess this is why some people tell me that I'm sadistic and I have a history of hurting people. BeastMtl was very nice to calm me down: he wrote something that really shows that he was easy on it: "Accidents happen, it wasnβt intentional and thatβs good enough for me. [...] And frankly Iβd rather my first injury happen from a friend than some stranger anyway." BeastMtl is a guy with a big heart. Please wrestle him... when he recovers from the injury I caused him. I also had another rematch with Phil (id 5843). I also spent time listening to him and get to know him better. He trusts me a lot because he usually is completely defensive, but he is slightly less so when he wrestles me. I tried to get Phil to take pictures, but he wasn't in the mood for it. With Phil, you have to go the extra mile and reach for him to wrestle him because he normally won't reach for you. Then again, I would say that's sort of my behavior as well... so I shouldn't blame him for his own. I learned a lot more about Phil this time around. If there is one thing that we really have in common is that he does like to be sometimes helpless and purposely not defend in a given situation. That shows his inner jobber, despite not wanting to be "jobbered" in a regular match. It looks somewhat contradictory, but it's a lot simpler than it seems. I guess when you build this trust, you can make Phil a happy and willing jobber. My last match this long week-end was with WrestleInMN (id 3305). I hadn't seen him since last September, despite me being so fond of him. He's really the type of guy I would capture and... uh... I'll let you fill in the blanks. You could say I'm ambitious and live dangerously because this guy is a hundred pounds heavier than me, but then again it's not new that I have a thing for bears... plus he wrestles... and he likes nipple play. And when he does this reverse headlock on me, he has this nice big furry pec on my face... I become defenseless and powerless. WrestleInMN didn't make it easy for me. He never did. For some reason, I did not read up on the weaknesses I've noted for him. I'll mark them down again now so that I don't forget: - Forward/backwards grapevine works well - Ankle locks only works if you are low enough - Leg scissors works great... if you can get the great angle which is very difficult. - Arm scissors only temporarily makes him angrier and he can eventually escape very well by bridging. Strange though, because reading back on our first encounter, he did enjoy this arm scissors. I guess things change. I think this time around, we've been more aggressive. Since it's our third time, he didn't hesitate to play dirty by grabbing me down there or twisting my nipples. I ultimately submitted several times because I didn't want to have my nips (or my jewels!) sensitive before the Clash. Yes, I'm a wuss. I did take my revenge by scissoring and locking his leg over and over... I wanted him to cooperate with me for a full nelson body scissors, but WrestleInMN is not someone that just gives you a freebie. You need to deserve it. There was a funny part where I accidentally gave him a headbutt. He held the upper part of his nose and thank goodness he didn't bleed. That kinda stopped the match for a little while. Again, not really bright from my end, but to my defense, it was NOT intentional. I never headbutt my opponents.. except by accident. At point, i ended up doing an animal sound because that's little old me being happy. Call it a very unusual habit. WrestleInMN noticed the noise and he ended up saying: "Okay, Pikachu." Hehehe... He also shared with me this story, which I found amusing: On January 2017, WrestleInMN went to Canada to seek asylum for a day. He went into the Montreal subway, inserted a 20$ bill in the automated ticketing machine when suddenly a drunk homeless person also held on to the 20$ bill. WrestleInMN was pretty grumpy and warned the guy: "Sir, let go. Or I will break your wrist!" The drunk guy started babbling incomprehensible french words. Probably ranting that he needs the money for food. WrestleInMN starts grumbling: "You don't want to mess around with me! Today is Trump's inauguration day AND I AM ONE UNHAPPY AMERICAN!" At this point, the two ladies at the back of the queue were dying of laughter. Fortunately, security guards came in and took the drunk guy away. WrestleInMN did mention that had the drunk guy remained calm and patient, he would probably have gave him a dollar or two dollar coin that the machine would have refunded as change for the subway fare. Now I'm sure I completely butchered his story, but WrestleInMN really has a way to tell things to make them entertaining. I consider WrestleInMN an extrovert: he always has great and funny stuff to share. He spoke fondly of his dog of Akita breed that he had for 12 years. He told me about his career path and his absolute devotion for it. He works so hard and it's nice to see that he enjoys it. Not many people I can talk to enjoy what they are doing on a daily basis. I told him I almost followed a similar path, but diverged away because I was seduced by consumerism and individualism.. and of course, by wrestling, but career and wrestling are not mutually exclusive, I should remember that. We went to see the Aura Montreal light show in the Notre-Dame basilica and I had to admit, I was really really impressed. I mean I'm in Montreal and I didn't even know this thing existed! Afterwards, we hung out at Stash CafΓ© Polish restaurant where I had.. Italian Pierogis... uh I mean, Polish Pierogis. For some reason, I had always though that Pierogis were an Italian dish. WrestleInMn explained to me that he went to this restaurant after the inauguration. As he crossed the border to Canada, he explained to the customs officer that he will spend his hard-earned American money elsewhere. I also found out that WrestleInMN is a real Trekkie fan. How do you find that out? Well simple, all real Trekkie fan hate all the new reboot movies with Chris Pine and J. J. Abrams. They love the original movies and the TV shows. Since the light show was a thing he liked, I suggested him to return in either July or August where we'll be holding our annual fireworks festival. Actually, I should go send him the dates right now. | |||||||||||||||
| Blog ID 191 | |||||||||||||||
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