Sambo (martial art)

 ( Culture Of The Soviet Union ) 

The pioneers of sambo were Viktor Spiridonov and Vasili Oshchepkov. Both were trained military men with access to frequent state-sponsored travel opportunities where they were able to experience various local wrestling styles and add new techniques to their arsenal. Oshchepkov even spent several years living in Japan and training in judo under its founder Kano Jigoro. Oshchepkov died in prison as a result of the Great Purge after being accused of being a Japanese spy, and judo was banned in the USSR for decades until the 1964 Olympics, where sambists won four bronze medals.

Both men were trained military officers with backgrounds in several styles of combat wrestling that were prevalent in different regions of the Russian Empire (later the Soviet Union) and abroad. Combining these styles together, the popular international style of catch-as-catch can wrestling (known as "free wrestling" in Russian at the time) and Japanese judo wrestling, their respective styles gradually morphed into a new style of wrestling that was more suitable for the Soviet military's hand-to-hand combat needs.

Compared to Oshchepkov's system of "free wrestling" in Russia, Spiridonov's style was softer, less brutal, and less strength-dependent, which was in large part was due to the injuries Spiridonov sustained during World War I. Виктор Афанасьевич Спиридонов (Viktor Spiridonov) – biography at peoples.ru (in Russian).

Anatoly Kharlampiev, a student of Vasili Oshchepkov, is also considered a founder of sambo. On 16th of November 1938, it was recognized as an official sport when the USSR All-Union Sports Committee issued resolution no. 633.

Sambo is an international style of amateur wrestling recognized by the FILA (now UWW) Congress in 1966.

Competitors wear jackets as in sport sambo, but also hand protection and sometimes shin protection and headgear.

The first FIAS World Combat Sambo Championships were held in 2001. The World Combat Sambo Federation, based in Russia, also sanctions international combat sambo events. Combat sambo is designed to tackle certain tasks. The effectiveness of this martial art is determined by its structure, namely by three components: boxing, sambo, and adapters. Adapters of combat sambo were developed by the academician G. S. Popov. The task of adapters is to ensure the safe transition from middle distance to close one, as well as the consistent usage of sambo and boxing techniques. The given configuration provides the fusion of two martial arts into a single system.

Women participated in combat sambo for the first time in an official tournament in the Paris Grand Prix 2015. The first recognized instance of women competing in an international combat Sambo tournament was in the 2022 Asian and Oceania Sambo Championships. In 2022, Australia and New Zealand competed for the first time in the Asian sambo championship.

Each technique was carefully dissected and considered for its merits, and if found acceptable in unarmed combat, refined to reach sambo's ultimate goal: to stop an armed or unarmed adversary in the least time possible. Thus, many techniques from jujutsu, judo, and other martial systems joined with the indigenous fighting styles to form the sambo repertoire. When the techniques were perfected, they were woven into sambo applications for personal self-defence, police, crowd control, border guards, secret police, bodyguards, psychiatric hospital staff, military, and .

Spiridonov was a Veteran of World War I and one of the first wrestling and self-defence instructors hired for Dynamo. His background included free wrestling (i.e. catch wrestling), Graeco-Roman wrestling, many Kurash, and Japanese jujutsu. As a combative investigator for Dynamo, he travelled to Mongolia and China to observe their native fighting styles.

In 1923, Oschepkov and Spiridinov collaborated (independently) with a team of other experts on a grant from the Soviet government to improve the Red Army's hand-to-hand combat system. Spiridonov had envisioned integrating the most practical aspects of the world's fighting systems into one comprehensive style that could adapt to any threat. Oschepkov had observed Kano Jigoro's distillation of tenjin shin'yō-ryū, kitō-ryū and fusen-ryū jujutsu into judo, and he had developed the insight required to evaluate and integrate combative techniques into a new system. Their developments were supplemented by Anatoly Kharlampiyev and I. V. Vasiliev who also travelled the globe to study the native fighting arts of the world. Ten years in the making, their catalogue of techniques was instrumental in formulating the early framework of the art to be eventually referred to as sambo.

Kharlampiyev is often called the "father of sambo". This may be more legend than fact, since he only had the longevity and political connections to remain with the art while the new system was named "sambo". However, Kharlampiyev's political manoeuvring is single-handedly responsible for the USSR Committee of Sport's accepting sambo as the official combat sport of the Soviet Union in 1938 – decidedly the "birth" of sambo. So, more accurately, Kharlampiyev could be considered the father of "sport" sambo.

Spiridonov was the first to begin referring to the new system with a name similar to 'sambo'. He eventually developed a softer style called samoz that could be used by smaller, weaker practitioners or even wounded soldiers and . Spiridonov's inspiration to develop samoz stemmed from his World War I bayonet injury, which greatly restricted his left arm and thus his ability to practise wrestling. Refined versions of sambo are still used today or fused with specific sambo applications to meet the needs of Russian commandos.

The first World Cup was contested in 1969. Don Curtis, a member of the U.S. Olympic Wrestling Committee, had predicted in 1975, that the Russians would introduce sambo wrestling in the 1980 Olympics programme in Moscow. In 1975 the first United States National Sambo Championships were held in Mesa, Arizona, in 1977. It was contested along with G.R. and Freestyle at the first Pan American Wrestling Championships in Mexico City, and included in the schedule of the upcoming 1983 U.S. Olympic Festival National Sports Festival Schedule By The Associated Press COLORADO (UPI). Results from Saturday's events at the fifth National Sports Festival and the 1983 Pan American Games (the 1983 Pan American event in Caracas became the first and subsequently the last edition of sambo at the Pan American Games.) In 1979 the National AAU Sambo Committee established several annual awards to honour outstanding persons in the sport of sambo wrestling. SOMBO NEWS, AAU News, 1979, p. 8. By the 1980s it has been included to Pan American Games, National Sports Festival and AAU Junior Olympics programme. National Sombo Group Being Formed, Black Belt, January 1985, vol. 23, no. 1, p. 116.

But as a result of political complications of the 1980 Olympic boycott which arose after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, sambo was at first reduced to a demonstration sport at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, Soviet Union. But later, because of the sport's strong association with the Soviet Union, it was removed from demonstration sport status. It is true that youth sambo was demonstrated in the Games' opening ceremonies; however, sambo was never formally recognized as a demonstration sport. This common error in history books is noted in several sources including From SAMOZ to SAMBO by Anatoly Makovetskii and Lukashev's History of Hand-to-Hand Combat in the First Half of the 20th Century: Founders and Authors. Sambo a demo sport in 1980 Olympics? (Worldwide Grappling Forums) Furthermore, the official documents of the 1980 Olympic Organizing Committee do not mention sambo as a participating sport in the Games. Games of the XXIII Olympiad (Volume 3 – Participants and Results) (640 pages) Nevertheless, Jerry Matsumoto, Head of the U.S. Sambo Association, saw in 1990 sambo becoming an Olympic sport, at least at the demonstration level, within the next eight years. Part judo, part wrestling, Sombo has CV resident captivated By Phillip Brents, The Star-News, Chula Vista, California, August 31- Sept 1, 1991, Page D4.

Also similar to the wrestling ranking system used in Russia, a competitive rating system is used (rather than the belt colour ranking system used in judo and gendai jujutsu). Various sport organizations distribute these ranks for high levels of competition achievement or in some cases coaching merits. People who have earned these ranks are known as 'Masters of Sport.' Institutions that grant a sambo 'Master of Sport' in Russia include FIAS, FKE, and the International Combat Sambo Federation. Other nations have governing bodies that award 'Masters of Sport' as well, including the American Sambo Association in the United States.