Spent the day with some great guys and girls practicing classic Pugilism. I’ve got a real interest in all kinds of old martial art, and pugilism is one of the oldest. You could argue it’s more than two and a half thousand years old, as the Pankration was an Olympic sport in 648 BC.
Today’s was a little more modern, the kind of prizefighting practiced by Daniel Mendoza, Mendoza was heavyweight champion of England in 1792-95, despite being only 5’7” and 160lb (pretty much exactly my size)
In those days fights were bare knuckle. You could grapple, trip and throw, as long as you didn’t grasp below the belt. Each round continued till someone touched the ground with anything but their feet, then each fighter returned to their corner, until the referee called them to toe the line, to return to the starting marks scratched on the dirt floor. The round went on, round after round, until one fighter was unable or unwilling to ‘come up to scratch’.
Anyway, to a geek like me, it’s really interesting to work on the techniques and to understand how the lack of gloves and the grappling completely change the stance, guards, and techniques of the noble science.
We got some sparring in at the end, and one of the guys is fair bit bigger and a handy modern boxer, so I was pretty outclassed, but I think I kept my cool and didn’t get walked over, so I’m pretty pleased with myself really.
I’m going to ache tomorrow though!