Belt wrestling is a form ofwrestling that is one of the oldest historically recordedsports. It involves two belted contestants aiming totake each other over by grappling with a belt.[1] There are hundreds of national belt wrestling styles, but contemporary most widespread and internationally competed areAlysh andKurash, developed by the previously nomadicTurkic peoples ofCentral Asia.United World Wrestling recognized Alysh wrestling as the primary international belt wrestling style. It is regulated globally by the International Federation of Wrestling on Belts Alysh, the sport's governing body. Although the sport has been practiced for millennia, and local championships were held in various places of the world, it was until 2001 whenBayaman Erkinbayev started its international version, and it was called "Alysh". Until 2005, Rif Gaynanov and Bayaman Erkinbayev developed this style together, and then the ways separated. Two different styles appeared named "Alysh" and "Kurash" belt wrestling. Since then, the sport has been included in the2013 Summer Universiade program, recognized by the Asian Olympic Council, and contested at theAsian Games andAsian Indoor Games. The sport's executives struggle to promote it to the level of an officialOlympic sport.
Gilgamesh engages in a form of belt wrestling withEnkidu in theEpic of Gilgamesh written around 2000 BC about aking of Sumer who lived around 2800 to 2600 BC.[2] One of the oldest recorded illustrations of wrestling is abronze statuette, dated to around 2600 BC, found in 1938 at Khafaji, nearBaghdad and now stored in theNational Museum of Iraq.[3][4] ChineseTangshu chronicles also mention belt wrestling inMedieval China circa the 11th century. In the 11th century the scholar and philosopherAvicenna wrote about this type of wrestling.
The first edition of the championships in 2002 saw competition in the openweight, therefore only two events were contested (men and women.) The 2003' championships were subdivided into weight classes, but because of the rules of the host country no women competition was allowed. Since 2003 the prize money totalling several hundred thousand U.S. dollars was contested among participating teams. Since the 2005' edition onwards the championships were contested in freestyle (belts) and classic style (kushaks.) The 2008' edition saw championships contested at an open-air competition area, on sand, in 45 °C (113 °F) air temperature.[6]
Osh, Kyrgyzstan
Russia
Turkmenistan
Tehran, Iran
Istanbul, Turkey
Almaty, Kazakhstan
Lome, Togo
Šiauliai,Lithuania
Tashkent, Uzbekistan
Bialystok,Poland
São Paulo,Brazil
Minsk,Belarus
Tajikistan
Cape Town,South Africa
Buenos Aires,Argentina