Mongolian Wrestling Techniques

Mongolian wrestling, known as Bökh is the folk wrestling style of Mongols. Bökh means "durability". It was a military sport intended to provide mainly strength, stamina and skills training to troops. Bokh is the most important of the Mongolian culture's historic "Three Manly Skills", that also include horsemanship and archery.

Genghis Khan considered wrestling to be an important way to keep his army in good physical shape and combat ready. The court of Qing Empire (1646--1911) held regular wrestling events, mainly between ethnic Manchu and Mongol wrestlers. Russian Sambo also has its roots in Mongolian Wrestling. There are several different versions, Mongolian (in the country of Mongolia and in Tuva of Russia), Buryatian (in the Buryatia of Russia) and Southern Mongolian (in northern China).

Since there are no weight classes in the Naadam of Mongolia, a small wrestler can compete against an opponent over twice his size. Smallest wrestlers usually weigh around 70 kg, while the biggest are over 200 kg, the median weight of a competitor at the Naadam is around 115 kg.

Mongolian athletes have won 56 gold medals and 36 athletes became world champions until 2013. Freestyle wrestling has been practised since 1958 in Mongolia.Today 5,000 people (2013) participate in freestyle wrestling programs in Mongolia, and the national team consists of 26 athletes.

Mongolian freestyle wrestlers have won the first and the most Olympic medals of Mongolia. Mongolian wrestlers are using their warrior spirit and fighting skills to conquer the national sport of Japan - sumo wrestling. Starting in 1991, Mongolians began to become especially dominant in sumo, as of 2005, Mongolians composed roughly 5% of all ranked sumo wrestlers, making them more than 60% (37 out of 61) of non-Japanese rikishi in Japan. In a 2009 survey conducted by a Japanese statistical agency, of the four sumo wrestlers named as most famous by Japanese people, three were Mongolian.