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Not familiar with the "Michigan" I'm afraid; but we had funny names for a lot of things. Image doesn't go for me, but if it's that basic of a move, it's the half nelson. Has to be.


Some of my favorite shirts are still largely spandex. But I can't find them in stores any more... :(

My favorite shock and awe move to instill fear was a double leg takedown where you just chop at their knees and ram your head into their chests. It was almost as good as the high flyer at instilling eye-blinking confusion in your opponent as to why they are suddenly on the ground with you on top of them.

...You know, I suppose I should try to drag my poor thread back onto some sort of art-ish topic. Shame I don't have anything to post up that I've drawn in the past year yet. I guess I could do the one where I first accidentally managed the female form...
--Hrm--
Or the concept art for Verilidaine as she appeared in the asides, maybe...

draw that^

What? That's insane. The head and arm is nothing like the half', and much better to boot. The picture I gave isn't the basic of a move, it is the move. In its entirety. I just can't comprehend how you weren't taught it. It's arguably the least risky and most successful hold down. I can't grasp it. You have just mind[blank]ed me... Ow.

I always sucked at offensive moves, though I kept my favourite of a botched high-crotch to a knee tap (I actually managed to put a friends knee out for a day with that; oops). We were always taught not to 'ram your head into their chests' because it is... well, illegal, first of all; you can't technically headbutt people, and also it increases your risk of injury and the chance that they'll flip you right on over; then you're up a point, and they're on top of you and in a good position.

Art in an art thread?! Blasphemy! Such a thing shall never transpire!

Hmmm... It was legal for me. Anyway, there's a special technique to your head placement so you don't go flying like that. It works wonders really.

Never really got to use the Double leg as Much as I would have liked. I mean really, some of the guys I wrestled were heavy. A single usualy worked better.

Odd that it's legal for you, but head placement doesn't work so well when the other person has about 60% of their weight invested in leg muscle; you're gonna keep going. Best thing is to put your shoulder on their sternum and drive it into the mat about three or four feet behind them.
Lucky you, I was the heaviest on my team the last two years and it sucks 'cause you don't get good strength training. I was stunned when one of the guys (a veritable featherweight) remarked "Wow, we've got a heavy team this year." Actually I wasn't really stunned; I mustered up the most indignant "No" I could, seeing as I was a good... oh, six or seven kilos heavier than the next person down, and he was a few heavier than the next. Needless to say, when I felt like trying, I crushed them, though half the time I started in a sitting position to make it more fair.

We sprawl to fast for the shoulder to get to the stenum. Oh God I remember the drills.

The Head butt isn't actually anything big, but rather a shock. The intent is to startle them so they take their weight off their leg, presumably to throw you. From there you pick it into a single.

I'm nbot doing it justice though. I promise you that it worked though. Scouts honor.

When I said "Image doesn't go" I meant it -- I get a 404 when I try to see the picture. I don't know what your picture is of because I can't see it. I simply don't know what move you're talking about.


It was legal when I wrestled, though that may not be the case any longer. If you did the move properly, you just had to fall on them -- they'd go down while you're still standing. I broke my nose in practice to a headbutt -- I think we were doing double legs and his head came up as I sprawled and caught me. I know why they're not generally legal things. This was something you had to be pretty careful with.

I had suspected that might be what you meant... How 'bout this? Or this?
If they're any good at all, your head being anywhere but in their side should be their advantage. The head in a double-leg is essentially a third arm and is pretty much necessary against somebody who can sprawl properly. If you have your shoulders away from their body, it means you're weakening your shot and giving them a good position for counter-attack. Plus not having the head at the side pretty much limits you to the drive; probably the weakest of the double leg finishes (other than none). With the head in the side you can finish with a trip, a crank, and what we knew as a 'knee-pound double' which was used by an Olympic gold-medalist a lot (pretty sure he was Canadian too, but not 100%). I honestly don't know about the headbutt thing, but I've never seen anyone really do it and get away with it.

Okay, what you've got there is indeed what I'd call a headlock or at least really close. The second picture is illegal here -- a ref'd call it a headlock without the arm because the hands are touching. The first one isn't as strong as a full headlock with just the grip on the opponent's arm. I'd personally call that a very weak pin, but I got very good at weasling out of those things. You have no hip control, and not enough weight on their chest to keep them from wriggling around. If you cinch it up real tight and keep walking to their head, you can get the pin, but it's certainly not a sure bet. I've both gotten out of it and been pinned by it, but I'd gotten free a lot more often.

Obviously, there's at least as much difference between Canadian high school wrestling and American high school wrestling as there is between high school and college wrestling here.

The takedown I described is a surprise move. It only works when they aren't expecting it, and it's certainly not something that you'd do very often. You have to do it fast and hard, or you won't throw them off balance. Effectively, you're driving through your opponent. I think I actually did it in a match only once ever. In a match, I tended to go for the single leg ankle-pick.

I actually searched for the judo technique instead (scarf hold down), so I'm not surprised that the second one was illegal in wrestling and the first one would be weak in wrestling (it's judo, though; he can grab the gi); I honestly didn't give them more than a quick glance. I'm not saying that it's 100%, but a good wrestler who knows what they're doing would probably have a success rate of somewhere between 80 and 90% with it. The pin certainly isn't the strongest possible, but pretty much any other technique carries a greater risk of being scored on yourself, which is the greatest appeal of it; if he gets out of it (which shouldn't happen), you're not in any danger, and you're actually more likely to gain the advantage back afterward.

If you think it's a weak pin, then either you're an excellent weasel (like I am), or you've never had someone who was good at it do it to you. If you get it tight and circle the head, which is drilled into our heads constantly, then hip control is irrelevant because you only need to pin their shoulders. You'd be surprised how much weight a proficient wrestler can put on you with it. There is a reason it's also one of the first hold downs taught in judo; it works, and it works well. If you hook your knee with the hand behind their head, you can immobilize their upper body with surprisingly little weight actually on them. Trust me on this one; it's probably one of the most-used hold downs in wrestling, and it is for a reason.

As far as I know, the only difference between Canadian Highschool wrestling and Olympic wrestling is that we don't get five-point throws, and we almost never use the 'referee's position' (you know, the one that looks really gay) (actually, I don't know if they use it in the Olympics much either).

As to the takedown, perhaps I can't see it as effective because I'm not quick, so I would fail miserably at it (this is why my most-used takedown starts with a failed move). Love the fireman's, but I suck at it 'cause I'm slow. I'm an opportunist, though, and never have I missed the fireman's and not had the knee just begging to be tapped.

Now bow before my infinite wisdom and kiss my non-existent boots, cretin.
Just kidding; at this point my terrible memory is kicking in and I'm pretty much BSing this all. And it's 3AM, I'm sleep-depraved. No, not a typo; I become depraved when I haven't slept.

:P More depraved than usual? That's almost scary.

Here in the 'States, you see a lot of referee's position. The second and third periods usually begin in it. We're pretty close to folkstyle, as I understand it, which is pretty different from the style used in the Olympics. I complain that the headlock is a comparatively weak pin because I'm pretty good at moving on the mat and against most opponents, I could hook their legs with mine, and no ref would give them the pin when I'm half on top. If I could then work my head free, I'm in control for the reversal. You've got to be quick to crank that on hard. I think it works better on the big guys than it does on the little ones like I was. I did have a guy in my conference who was built like a tank. He could crank a headlock on so tight that you couldn't breathe. So yeah, I've had it done well to me. It's just less common. We had a number of coaches (it's hard to keep wrestling coaches for a school as small as mine, especially when the school isn't particularly supportive of the sport), and none of them were supportive of us using the headlock. It's just not considered nearly as useful a move here, I suppose.

-- And of course, that's it --
I think Olympic and Collegiate level wrestling is more Greco-Roman, with more of a focus on throws (which are almost all illegal in Folkstyle), and very little on the mat wrestling (which is more of the focus in Folkstyle). Because of this, the pins are much faster. In Folkstyle, you have to hold both shoulders to the mat for five counts, IIRC, though you score points for even one shoulder. Now, if I remember the matches I saw at the collegiate level (never did wrestle in college...I wasn't good enough in high school to really want to), the pins happened much faster. I seem to remember it just requiring both shoulders on the mat at the same time, but I don't recall for sure. If it's easier to get the pin in the style you use there in Canada, then the headlock's a very good move for it. It's hard to stick people with it in Folkstyle, but in a different style of wrestling, I can see why it'd be the bread-and-butter.

I see the H&A (go abbreviations) in pretty much every weight class except the really tiny ones (like, less than a hundred pounds, but I honestly get sick watching tiny little Skeletors going at it like spider monkeys, so I don't see much of them in the first place. It doesn't work well on some body-types, like the ones with no neck at all, but it's still probably (one of) the most common technique I've seen.

We've had the fortune, I guess, of a great coach who'd been wrestling since his time in high school, and another who was equally experienced (and could drive a bus to boot). And they didn't go easy on us either. By the end of my last year we were up to two, hour-long fitness practices a week and four (sometimes five) mat sessions a week, about 2 1/2 hours long each. The more hardcore among us (not me; I'm not hardcore) went to another two mat sessions in the week for a couple hours each. One of them even managed national champion for her second year (in grades nine and ten, so I expect her to go to the Olympics or something eventually).

And now I don't know where I'm going with this. A consistent and devoted coach is a great thing to have. Buh... Braaaaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnssss~

Like I said in my edit, I'm guessing it's just a matter of the difference of styles between the wrestling here and there.


I so very much want to take this out of context. :P

Though...considering how androgynous your character is...

Mmm...Perhaps that's the right gag for you. We'll see what I can come up with.

Didn't catch the edit. Up here (and in the Olympics) it's a one-second pin. You get two points for exposing their back, +1 if you keep them exposed for 5 seconds, but if you touch both of their shoulders to the mat, or the centre of their back if they're tucking their shoulders, for a count of one, it's a pin.

It used to be first to ten points wound win a round, but this was before I even started, so I got the rule where you win the round if you're up by six or more points and you're not in the process of pinning them (or vice versa) (if you are, they let you continue because a pin wins the match entirely, though some wrestlers just get up if they've already won a round to save their strength). Honestly, I don't think I'd like American wrestling much. Judo is better anyways; arm-locks and chokes for the win.

As to my androgyny; my fur-code should explain matters a little more clearly (see sig').

Also, that constant editing is very sneaky. I get why you do it, and I'm actually glad you do, but... I have no clue what I'm trying to say.

This is why I loathe sleeping. That was a wonderful conversation, and I wasn't able to watch it in real time! Such a loss.

Judo is cool, but I find I have more talent with wrestling.

And that is quite a torrent of letters in your sig Sable.