Some guys roll around gently together - grunting and straining as they exchange holds. Most matches start slowly, with both guys on their hands and knees.
Often in my gay wrestling club we wrestle in shirts and shorts.
Though some of the guys are wicked strong, few have formal training. These are submission matches, meaning you’re supposed to wrestle until someone taps out or says the safe-word, which is “Chaka Khan.” (Hey, this is a gay wrestling club.) You get your opponent to tap out by exhausting them with a painful or inescapable hold. The beauty of Olympic Roman-Greco wrestlingĪt the gym, we roll out nine mats connected in a three-by-three square, we do some pair-stretches and warm ups, and then it’s go time. It also said we shouldn’t feel embarrassed if we got an erection because wrestling is intimate and erotic. The group’s invite e-mail indicated it was a friendly recreational group meant purely for the enjoyment of rolling around with other dudes rather than super-competitiveness or skills training. It’s led by a local yoga instructor, and usually 10 to 15 men attend, each of varying skill levels, strength, age and body type, including a few trans men.
The gay wrestling club I joined meets once a month at a local gym that also hosts kickboxing and Jiu-Jitsu classes.
