Rukopashniy boy, the hand-to-hand fighting system that Russia hopes will become widespread in Ecuador | Other Sports | sports

Three Ecuadorians had the opportunity to nourish themselves with concepts about the Russian melee fighting system known as rukopashniy boy during the 2021 Hand-to-Hand Fighting World Cup held in Moscow from November 10 to 14.

Francisco Ortiz, as representative of the tricolor delegation, and the athletes Cristian Herrera and Manuel Quinde, who were eliminated in the first round of the contest (in duels against Russia and Kazakhstan), attended at the invitation of the International Federation of Hand-to- Hand that was managed by the representative and spokesperson for this sport in Latin America, Andrii Trushkov, who is based in Peru.

All the resources were managed by the Federation of Hand-to-Hand which, according to Ortiz, is very interested in having its fighting system develop and become widespread in Ecuador.

The rukopashni boi was created in the 1970s especially for the physical and combat preparation of the troops of the former KGB (Komitet Gosudarstvennoi Bezopasnosti, the State Security Committee of the former Soviet Union) so that they could face off against his enemies, experts in various martial arts.

International Sambo Federation receives the accolade of the IOC in the run-up to the Tokyo 2020 Games

Ortiz, who is also the head of the Ecuadorian Sambo Association, explains that rukopashni boi is a “very military” sport, “like karate”, but this is a “very clean hand-to-hand combat combat system. in which it is sought to score points ”. “Not as aggressive as sambo where head butts are worth it or you can hit the ground.”

And he adds: “It is a sport that seeks to score points by hitting both the head and the torso. You can hit the legs, but they don’t give you points; you can knock down, you can immobilize, you can perform keys, but you have certain limitations on the ground. While performing a hold and both are on the ground, you cannot hit, you cannot knee or elbow. So it is a very clean sport ”.

With a view to the 2022 World Cup in Italy

Ortiz, skilled in sambo and mixed martial arts (MMA) and a rukopashni boi connoisseur for seven years, says that last November was not Ecuador’s first international participation in the Hand-to-Hand contest, since Lenin Guerra competed in the 2016 World Championship in Moscow and in a Pan American Championship that Peru hosted.

With this background and the recent conversation with the Russian sports authorities during the Hand-to-Hand World Cup, Ortiz predicts that next year Ecuador will send a larger delegation to compete in the World Cup in Italy that is going to take place in Milan, since the Russians are very interested in expanding the practice of this discipline in our country.

“The International Federation offered us support through the Russian Embassy in Ecuador with a project called Casa Rusa.”

In the sporting event that was organized by the International Federation of Hand-to-Hand, Ortiz comments that he held dialogues with the president of that entity, Sergey Astakhov.

After that experience, Ortiz plans to start a rukopashni boi development plan in Ecuador in April 2022, led by Andrii Trushkov, with the holding of an international seminar in April and two tournaments, one national and one binational, between June. and July.

Militar instruction

“The rukopashni boi is focused a lot on the military side, it has a reception among the military, a lot of popularity in the military side,” reiterates Francisco Ortiz about this system, and makes it clear that knees and elbows are not valid.

That is why he insists that sambo is a modern martial art, a combat sport and self-defense also developed in the former Soviet Union, and recognized as a national sport.

One of the forms of rukopashni boi is called self-defense.

Ortiz sums it up like this: “They give you a catalog for the tournament, they tell you to look on a certain page and you find the chapter on disarmament with a pistol or knife from the back. Suppose Ecuador and Georgia are facing each other; one grabs the pistol and the other stands on his back. When the signal is given that time is beginning to pass, the guy (one of them) turns, disarms him (the other), tries to immobilize him and move him. There the time stops and you can see the warnings that he has had, if when he put the weapon away he fell, if he had good technique to remove the weapon … “.

Thirty nations participated in the Hand-to-hand World Cup, six of those from Latin America. (D)