The Rules of Turkish Oil Wrestling!

Oil Wrestling, or Yağlı Güreş in Turkish, is the national sport of Turkey and is one of the oldest sports in the world. It’s contested between two oil covered wrestlers known as pehlivan, and takes place on a square grass field that has no standard size. The object of the game is to force your opponent to expose their belly towards the sky, making them fall over onto their side, or to lift your opponent from the ground and carry them for a number of steps. If you manage to do any of these things, the referee will stop the contest immediately and you win the match.

Even though this looks kind of strange, there’s a very good reason for it. Before a contest begins, wrestlers will be covered from head to toe in olive oil. This is for several reasons. The main reason is to make it incredibly difficult for your opponent to grab anything. It seems counter-intuitive, but it levels the playing field massively. Size and strength are only useful if you can actually grab onto your opponent, so the olive oil removes that advantage. Wrestlers must rely on speed and technique in order to win this contest. This ensures that wrestlers of different weight can wrestle each other fairly. The second reason is that it has cultural and spiritual meaning. And rather conveniently, also it acts a mosquito repellent.

Wrestlers must wear heavy water buffalo leather pants, known as a kisbet, which weigh 13 kgs each and must also be oiled to prevent your opponent from grabbing them. Once the referee tells you to go, the match begins. You are allowed to push your opponent, grapple your opponent, trip them up throw them to the floor or lift your opponent completely from the ground. The idea is getting your opponent to expose their belly towards the sky, or force them to fall backwards onto their side. The main way this happens is to pin their shoulder blades to the floor. This is similar to a pin in modern wrestling and this would win you the contest immediately. But in general, doing anything to have them fall backwards onto their back or forcibly onto their side counts.

It only has to happen for a split second, so understandably, wrestlers are incredibly cagey about protecting their torso. The other way to win is if you manage to pick up your opponent and walk for 3 or 5 paces, depending on the tournament. This shows physical superiority and once this happens, the referee will stop the contest and award you the win. Believe it or not, putting your hand down your opponent’s pants is perfectly legal … and it’s actually encouraged! Remember, grabbing onto your oiled-up opponent is difficult, so wrestlers find any way to hold onto their opponent to exert force on them. And putting your arm down your opponent’s kisbet to grab the inside leg, or use the waistband of the kisbet is a good way to do that.

There are various techniques that you can employ with your hand down their trousers that can leverage your opponent’s body out of position. There are also things you cannot do. You cannot strike your opponent, poke them in any sensitive area, verbally abuse your opponent or the referee, and if your kisbet comes off during a bout, you are disqualified immediately. Prior to 1975, matches had no time limit, which means that contests could last hours, or even days. But in modern times, there’s a 30-minute time limit, with big tournaments having a 40-minute time limit.

If there is no clear winner after normal time, the match may go to extra time where scores are recorded, or indefinite time where an outright winner must be declared. Extra time is an extra period of anywhere between 10 and 15 minutes where the wrestlers’ techniques are given a score by judges. If no wrestler wins outright, the highest points score at the end of this period wins. Indefinite time has no time limit, and colored bands are tied to the wrestlers’ ankles. They carry on wrestling until one of them wins the contest, or if one of them pulls a colored band off their opponent. The first wrestler to do this win.

Whilst the Rules of Turkish Oil Wrestling are easy to understand, there’s a few other things you’ll need to know before playing or watching Turkish Oil Wrestling. For example: Peşrev Before each bout begins, wrestler warm up in a ritual called Peşrev. Without going into too much detail, the process, which looks a little like a dance involves walking several paces to and from your opponent, bowing down on their left knee to put their right arms on the floor, touching their knee lips and forehead, before shouting at themselves for encouragement. Oiling it’s advantageous to have plenty of oil on you.

Not only do wrestlers oil themselves, especially down their trousers. But other wrestlers and random people armed with pitchers full of olive oil will help you out with that. Wrestlers reserve the right to add more oil during the contest, and pause the bout if they need to wipe it from their face, but only at the discretion of their opponent. Music During bouts, creates atmosphere during bouts and is usually played by up to 20 drummers and 20 fluitists.

Çazgır; The referee in a Turkish Oil Wrestling match is known as the Çazgır. He is usually dressed in white with blue trousers. Their job is part master of ceremonies, part referee. He is responsible for leading prayers, introducing the wrestlers to the crowd, ensuring that bouts are fought fairly and for announcing the winner by holding their arm in the air after a contest. Forfeit. If a wrestler cannot continue due to injury or tiredness, they can announce that they don’t wish to continue to the referee and their opponent. At this point, the referee stops the contest immediately and the opponent is declared the winner.

Kırkpınar; Turkish Oil Wrestling matches usually take place in tournaments throughout the year. The most prestigious of which is the Kırkpınar, which happens each year at the beginning of July in the city of Edirne. This is the oldest sporting contest in the world and has been contested continuously since at least 1346. It’s a three-day contest with roughly 1,000 wrestlers competing in an elimination style format. If you lose, you are eliminated from the tournament. This carries on until there are two wrestlers left, who contest the final. The last one standing earns the title of “Başpehlivan”, the ‘Champion of Turkey’, $100,000 cash in prize money, and is presented with a gold belt which they can keep for a year until the next tournament. If you win the gold belt three years in a row, you get to keep it permanently and are forever immortalized as one of the best oil wrestlers in the history of the world. Though it might seem strange to anyone who hasn’t seen it, Turkish Oil Wrestling is a fascinating sport full of history, culture.