Judo Gene LeBell

Gene LeBell, regarded as America’s first martial arts sensation before parlaying his athleticism into a career as a professional wrestler, actor and stuntman, has died at the age of 89, his family confirmed.

LeBell, who had been in declining health for the past eight months, died in his sleep at home in Sherman Oaks, with his loving wife of years, Midge, by his side on Tuesday, Aug. 9, 2022.

“He was larger than life, and he was so kind. If you said you liked his shirt, he would take it off and give it to you,” Midge LeBell said. “I am devastated. It’s very difficult. I have been with him for so many years. I don’t know how you go on without him. I am so used to him being there. He’s not hurting anymore. He was a wonderful man and was so good to so many. There is nothing bad you can really say about him. He was a good person, so I am sure he is doing well where he is at now. I am sure he is happy now. I want to thank everybody in the world who has said such wonderful things about him and all the prayers that were said for him. I am thanking them for both he and I.”

Midge and Gene were married twice. The second time, they said their vows on a motorcycle as Gene performed a wheelie with Midge holding on, followed close behind by the minister on a four-wheeler. The couple wore matching red, white, and blue wedding attire and Midge wore flowers in her helmet.

“Judo Gene” LeBell was revered for his strength and tenacity and often referred to as “the toughest man alive.” Beneath the rugged demeanor, the “Godfather of Grappling” was also known for his warmth and generosity. For years, he taught martial arts in Southern California.

Born Ivan Gene LeBell on Oct. 9, 1932, in Los Angeles, LeBell grew up at the famed Olympic Auditorium, where his mother, Aileen Eaton, was a boxing and wrestling promoter from 1942 to 1980. Eaton was the first woman inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

“Fighters practically raised the young LeBell at the Main Street Gym where he started going at 7 years old,” Midge LeBell said. He once sparred with legendary boxer Sugar Ray Robinson as a teenager. He also trained with wrestlers Lou Thesz, and Karl Gotch while growing up.

It’s no wonder LeBell flocked to combat sports and martial arts.

In 1954 and ’55, LeBell won the AAU National Judo Championships heavyweight and overall divisions. He then embarked on his professional wrestling career, implementing his years of judo and catch wrestling and helping popularize the holds and submission attempts that remain in the sports entertainment industry to this day.

LeBell famously wore a pink gi and would invite anybody to take a turn on the mat with him if they had anything to say about it. The pink uniform originated from a trip to Japan where a pair of red socks, or shorts, made their way into the laundry, turning his white uniform to pink. With only one uniform, he wore it and beat the competition. The newspaper the following day had a story saying the American radish wins. LeBell thought it was because he had red hair before someone told him it was because of his pink attire. He wore the pink gi from then on.

LeBell was a pioneer in the sport of MMA before there was MMA. One of the first martial artists to train in wrestling, judo, boxing, karate, and other combat arts, he blended the techniques into an efficient fighting style. In 1963, in Salt Lake City, LeBell took on boxer Milo Savage the fifth-ranked light heavyweight boxer in the world. Kenpo Master Ed Parker asked LeBell to take on the fighter after a challenge was issued stating that a boxer could easily beat any martial artist. LeBell wore a gi for the fight, and Savage had his body greased to make it difficult for LeBell to grab him. LeBell was victorious, choking out the boxer in the fourth round, sparking a riot in the auditorium.

Highly decorated in judo and jiu-jitsu, LeBell also began teaching grappling to notable names: Bruce Lee, Chuck Norris, Benny “the Jet” Urquidez, Roddy Piper, Bill “Superfoot” Wallace, Gokor Chivichyan, Steve McQueen, George Reeves, Robert Duvall, John Saxon and many more.

LeBell’s top student, Gokor Chivichyan, started training with him at the age of 16 and now runs the Hayastan MMA Academy in North Hollywood. “I look at Gene as my second father. He had a big heart. He was a good man. We are going to miss him a lot,” Chivichyan said of his teacher.

In 2006, LeBell even welcomed an unsuspecting Daily News reporter to the Hayastan Academy for a lesson that went about as you would think when LeBell started it with his common non-serious threat: “Alright, you bums! Let’s get working, or I’ll burn your houses down.”

In the 1960s, LeBell began acting and doing stunts, including in three movies with Elvis Presley. On the set of “The Green Hornet,” LeBell struck up a friendship with martial arts icon Bruce Lee, and they began cross-training, with LeBell showing Lee his pain-inflicting holds, locks and throws, and Lee demonstrating his lightning-quick kicks and strikes. Lee and LeBell had a rocky start to their friendship after LeBell hoisted Lee on his back in a fireman’s carry without Lee’s cooperation. Eventually, LeBell put Lee down, and the pair became friends.

LeBell’s students included AnnMaria De Mars, the first American to ever win a gold medal at the World Judo Championships in 1984, and De Mars’ daughter, Ronda Rousey, who became the first American woman to earn an Olympic medal in judo by winning bronze at the 2008 Beijing Olympics before embarking on her illustrious MMA career.

“Very, very few people believed in me at the very beginning of my MMA career, you could literally count them on one hand. He was one of the people trying to convince my mom to let me do it, but he was also privately trying to convince me not to do it. He totally supported me, he was telling my mom to let me do it, and he was telling me, ‘I’ve won every R-E-A-L fight and never made a penny and lost every R-E-E-L fight and I am comfortably retired, think about that kid.’ He said he would help me out with this MMA stuff, but he was always trying to get me stunt jobs and to meet the right people in the stunt works so I would have somewhere to go after fighting. He not only tried to help me get into fighting, but he also helped me think about life afterward before anybody would even entertain the thought. He was already trying to get me out and convince me that I am more than just a fighter and capable of so much more,” Rousey said of her longtime friend and mentor, LeBell.

Rousey’s husband, Travis Browne, a former top-ranked UFC heavyweight fighter, met LeBell before meeting his future wife. LeBell gave Browne one of the coveted patches that he always had on hand to make a fan smile. Browne put a patch featuring Rousey and Lebell in his gym bag, and there it remained for five years before he met, fell in love with and married Rousey. “Uncle Gene let him (Browne) know all about me before we met. He put me over to my future husband before we ever met,” Rousey said.

LeBell also helped Rousey secure her nickname “Rowdy” from his former black belt student Rowdy Roddy Piper. “He told Rowdy Piper that he would stretch him if he didn’t let me use it,” Rousey said with a chuckle as she recounted the story.

As Rousey rose to prominence in the UFC as the first woman on its roster and its first female champion, LeBell was always in her corner, often seen with a stopwatch to record her first-round finishes. She has a tattoo of her winning fight times on her right wrist down her forearm. “I got a tattoo of how many seconds it took me to win all my (MMA) matches. My first match, the official time, and his time differed by two seconds, and I was like (expletive) the official time, Gene’s time is what matters, so I tattooed his time.” Rousey and mother De Mars gifted LeBell a new stopwatch for his 80th birthday in 2012.

In a story in the L.A. Daily News in 2011 on Rousey’s breakout potential in the sport, nearly a year and a half before she made her UFC debut, LeBell offered his assessment of his pupil.

“She gets in that ring, and she owns it mentally,” said LeBell, then 78, who couldn’t resist touching upon his pro wrestling background and growling to describe Rousey colorfully. “She says, ‘This is my house. This is my bedroom, my kitchen, my garage and my front room,’ LeBell continued.

“She’s gonna annihilate you. She’s gonna mutilate you. She’s gonna assassinate you.”

In the end, LeBell had appeared in more than 1,000 films, shows and commercials. His roles went from such television series as “Mission: Impossible,” “I Spy,” “The Wild Wild West,” “Baretta,” “Married … with Children,” and “Baywatch” to feature films “Raging Bull,” “Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins” and “Ed Wood.” One of his last appearances was in “Men In Black II” in 2002. LeBell was presented with the Taurus Lifetime Achievement Award on May 13, 2017 for his outstanding contribution to the world of action feature films. The Taurus World Stunt Awards are held yearly to honor stunt performers in movies.

It has been said that Brad Pitt’s character of stuntman Cliff Booth in the 2019 Quentin Tarantino film “Once Upon a Time in… Hollywood,” which included a memorable sequence with Lee, was an homage to LeBell.

LeBell was also at the center of one of the most highly anticipated fights of the 1970s. The “War of the Worlds” pitted heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali, against Japanese professional wrestling star Antonio Inoki on June 26, 1976, in Tokyo, with LeBell working as the referee. Watched by more than a billion people worldwide, the fight ended in a draw, with LeBell’s score (71-71) determining the outcome after one judge scored it for Ali and the other for Inoki.

Into his 80s, LeBell was still working as a Nevada and California Athletic Commission MMA judge, scoring fights ringside with his ever-present bag of candy, which he always shared, tucked inside a larger bag resting at his feet.

Tributes came from around the world following the announcement of his passing, including on Twitter from Chuck Norris, Triple H, Titus Welliver and others.

LeBell is survived by his wife, children, and grandchildren.

***

One day in 1966, stuntman Gene LeBell was called to the set of the television series “The Green Hornet” to deal with Bruce Lee, the future martial arts superstar, who played Kato, the crime-fighting Hornet’s sidekick. Lee, it seems, was hurting the other stuntmen.

The stunt coordinator asked LeBell — a former national judo champion and professional wrestler — to teach Lee a lesson, perhaps with a headlock.

LeBell would later recall in many interviews that he went further: He picked Lee up, slung him over his back and ran around the set as Lee shouted, “Put me down or I’ll kill you!” When LeBell relented, he was surprised that Lee didn’t attack him. Instead they came to appreciate their different skill sets, and LeBell became one of Lee’s favorite stuntmen.

They also trained together, with LeBell’s expertise as a grappler meeting Lee’s fist-flashing kung fu brilliance.

LeBell never became as famous as Lee, who died in 1973, but into his early 80s — when he played, among other roles, a corpse falling from a coffin in an episode of the TV series “Castle” — he remained busy as one of Hollywood’s most soughtafter stuntmen. At 20, he was walloped by John Wayne in “Big Jim McLain.”

Nine years later, he was kicked by Elvis Presley in “Blue Hawaii.”

And he was knocked around a few times by James Caan.

“Every star in Hollywood has beaten me up,” LeBell told AARP magazine in 2015. “The more you get hit in the nose, the richer you are. The man who enjoys his work never goes to work. So I’ve had a lot of fun doing stunts.”

LeBell died Aug. 9 at his home in the Sherman Oaks neighborhood of Los Angeles. He was 89. His death was announced by Kellie Cunningham, his trustee and business manager, who did not specify the cause.

Ivan Gene LeBell was born Oct. 9, 1932, in Los Angeles. His mother, Aileen (Goldstein) LeBell, promoted boxing and wrestling matches at the Olympic Auditorium in downtown Los Angeles; his father, Maurice, was an osteopath and diet doctor who died after being paralyzed in a swimming accident in 1941. His mother later married Cal Eaton, with whom she promoted fights.

LeBell started to learn to fight at 7, when his mother sent him to the Los Angeles Athletic Club.

“I went up to Ed ‘Strangler’ Lewis and said, ‘I want to be a wrestler,’” LeBell was quoted as saying by the Slam Wrestling website in 2005. Lewis, he recalled, asked him: “Do you want to roll? Do you want to do Greco-Roman? Do you want to do freestyle? Or do you want to grapple?”

“What’s grappling?” Le-Bell asked.

“That’s a combination of everything,” Lewis said. “You can hit ‘em, eye-gouge ‘em.”

He was sold. He started learning judo at 12 (although his mother told The Los Angeles Times in 1955 that he had been inspired a little later, in high school, when he was beaten up by a smaller teenager who knew judo), and by 1954 his proficiency had grown to an elite level: He won both the heavyweight class and the overall title in that year’s national American Amateur Union championships. He successfully defended his title the next year at the Olympic Auditorium, in front of his mother.

Realizing that judo was no way to make a living, he shifted to professional wrestling later in 1955.

LeBell never became a big name in the ring or even a great wrestler, either under his own name or in a mask as “the Hangman.” But he gained notice in his role as an enforcer, in which he compelled other wrestlers to stick to the script, even when they didn’t want to.

His work as a stuntman began in earnest in the 1960s and continued on TV series such as “Route 66,” “I Spy,” “The Incredible Hulk” and “The Fall Guy,” in which Lee Majors starred as a film stuntman. He also appeared in movies such as “Planet of the Apes” (1968), “The Towering Inferno” (1974) and the Steven Seagal crime drama “Out for Justice” (1991).

LeBell had a long list of acting credits as well, mostly in bit parts. He often played referees and sometimes a thug, a henchman, a bartender or, as in “Raging Bull” (1990), a ring announcer.

LeBell also worked over the years with many wrestlers, including Rowdy Roddy Piper and Ronda Rousey, and trained with Chuck Norris, the martial artist and actor.

More recently director Quentin Tarantino used Le-Bell’s initial encounter with Lee on the set of “The Green Hornet” as the basis for a scene in his 2019 film, “Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood,” in which Brad Pitt, as a stuntman, threw the Lee character into a car.

LeBell is survived by his wife, Eleanor (Martindale) LeBell, who is known as Midge and whom he married twice and divorced once; his son, David; his daughter, Monica Pandis; his stepson, Danny Martindale; his stepdaughter, Stacey Martindale; and four grandchildren. His brother, Mike, a wrestling promoter, died in 2009. His first marriage ended with his wife’s death; he also married and divorced two other women.

[New York Times]

***

Gene LeBell, the colorful judo champion, wrestler and stuntman who trained Bruce Lee, fought Elvis Presley and John Wayne in the movies and was an inspiration for Brad Pitt’s character in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, has died. He was 89.

LeBell died in his sleep early Tuesday morning at his home in Sherman Oaks, his trustee and business manager, Kellie Cunningham, told The Hollywood Reporter.

Affectionately known as the “Godfather of Grappling” and “Judo” Gene LeBell, he was a two-time AAU national judo champion early in his career. Later, he taught his masterful submission techniques to Lee, Chuck Norris, pro wrestler “Rowdy” Roddy Piper, MMA fighter Ronda Rousey and many, many others.

With his legendary strong handshake, red hair, weathered face and battered nose, LeBell was universally admired by fighters and wrestlers around the world.

By his own admission, “every star in Hollywood beat me up” when he was a stuntman and actor. Wayne punched him square in the face in Big Jim McLain (1952), Presley karate-kicked him between the eyes in Blue Hawaii (1961), Gene Hackman went toe-to-toe with him in Loose Cannon (1990), and Burt Reynolds kicked him where it hurts in Hard Time (1998).

Even Steve Martin roughed him up and threw him into a swimming pool in The Jerk (1979).

“The more you get hit in the nose, the richer you are,” LeBell liked to say.

On ABC’s The Green Hornet, he met Lee for the first time and forged a friendship with the Hong Kong martial arts star despite a rocky introduction.

During taping, it was reported that Lee was beating up on the stuntmen, prompting stunt coordinator Bennie Dobbins to bring in LeBell to help set the actor straight by “putting him in a headlock or something.”

In his 2005 autobiography The Godfather of Grappling, LeBell remembered grabbing Lee, who then “started making all those noises that he became famous for … but he didn’t try to counter me, so I think he was more surprised than anything else.”

He then hoisted Lee over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry and ran around the set as Lee shouted, “Put me down or I’ll kill you.”

To LeBell, the altercation revealed that Lee’s repertoire was without submission maneuvers, armbars and takedowns. “He came to my school and worked out for over a year, privately,” LeBell said, “and I went and worked out with him at his school.

“I taught him judo and wrestling and … finishing holds that he later worked into some movies. And he showed me a lot of his kicks and striking.”

In The Way of the Dragon (1972), Lee polished off Norris with a chokehold, and in Enter the Dragon (1973), he employed an armbar finish to submit Sammo Hung.

When Quentin Tarantino made Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019), he used LeBell as an influence for the character of stunt double Cliff Booth (Oscar winner Pitt) and adapted the LeBell/Lee confrontation into a much-debated fight scene between Booth and Lee (Mike Moh in the movie).

Booth also had an accusation of murder hovering over his head, which might have been a veiled reference to LeBell being charged in the murder of private investigator Robert Duke Hall in 1976. LeBell was acquitted of that charge, and his conviction as an accessory to the crime was later overturned.

Ivan Gene LeBell was born in Los Angeles on Oct. 9, 1932. His mother, Aileen Eaton, promoted fights at the Olympic Auditorium and was the first woman inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

LeBell moved to Japan to study judo and won U.S. titles in the 1950s before segueing to pro wrestling, learning the art of catch wrestling (a grappling style) from Ed “Strangler” Lewis, Lou Thesz and Karl Gotch.

From 1962-82, he ran the Los Angeles territory of the National Wrestling Alliance with his brother Mike.

The combat sport pioneer participated in what some credit as the first televised sanctioned mixed martial arts match on Dec. 2, 1963, in Salt Lake City when he took on light heavyweight boxer Milo Savage.

The impetus for the bout came from an article written in Rogue magazine by Jim Beck.

Under the headline “The Judo Bums,” Beck wrote that “judo … is a complete fraud … Every judo man I’ve ever met was a braggart and a show-off … Any boxer can beat a judo man.” Beck put up $1,000 to prove it.

LeBell said he was chosen by his peers because “you’re the most sadistic bastard we know,” and was put up against Beck’s choice of opponent — Savage.At a TV interview the day before the bout, LeBell choked out the interviewer, then screamed into the camera, “Come to the arena tomorrow night and watch me annihilate, mutilate and assassinate your local hero because one martial artist can beat any 10 boxers.”

The bout lasted four rounds and ended when LeBell submitted Savage to a rear naked chokehold. The crowd threw debris and chairs into the ring, and Savage had to be revived by LeBell’s cornermen.

“It sounds like I’m blowing my own horn, and I don’t mean to — I represented all the martial arts. I never said I was doing only judo or karate or kenpo,” he said. “I never said one art is better than the others. They’re all good. You should learn everything. You’re not a complete martial artist unless you do everything.”

He was rewarded when he fought Elvis in Blue Hawaii. The King was so happy with his work, he gave him a $100 bill. “I didn’t have any money then,” he said. “I used to eat every other day. So, I went out and I had the biggest fillet mignon and even tipped the waiter.”

He also did stunts for Presley’s Paradise, Hawaiian Style five years later.

While serving as the stunt coordinator on The Munsters, he appeared on a 1964 episode as grappler Tarzan McGirk in a bout against “The Masked Marvel” (Fred Gwynne’s Herman Munster in disguise).

As a stuntman across five decades on the small screen, LeBell popped up in everything from Gomer Pyle: USMC, Mission: Impossible, Ironside, Batman and The Beverly Hillbillies in the 1960s to The Six Million Dollar Man and Starsky & Hutch in the 1970s, Taxi, The Fall Guy and Married … With Children in the 1980s and even Reno 911! in the 2000s.

On the big screen, he did stunts, often uncredited, for the original Planet of the Apes movies, the 1974 disaster films Earthquake and The Towering Inferno and the Naked Gun flicks, plus King Kong (1976), Airplane! (1980), Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins (1985), RoboCop (1987), Total Recall (1990), Independence Day (1996), Bruce Almighty (2003) and Smoking Aces (2006).

In  Raging Bull (1980), he had a speaking role as the ring announcer for one of Jake LaMotta’s (Robert De Niro) fights. Four years earlier, he was in another ring, as the referee in the wacky Muhammad Ali vs. wrestler Antonio Inoki match in Tokyo.

Legend has it that as stunt coordinator on Steven Seagal’s Out of Justice (1991), LeBell was involved in an on-set altercation with the actor and allegedly choked him out.

LeBell never denied the incident, though Seagal did.

In Bloodfist IV: Die Trying (1992), he attempted to stop legendary kickboxer Don Wilson from hot-wiring his car and, naturally, finished up battered and bruised in a pile of garbage cans.

He trained mixed martial artist and WWE wrestler Rousey and her mother, judo champion AnnMaria De Mars.

“Ronda is the best woman I have ever been associated with, as far as fighting goes,” he said in 2018. “So, when you see Ronda, tell her Gene sent you, that Uncle Gene sent you. But don’t get her mad. Don’t get her mad.”

He authored more than 12 books, including Gene LeBell’s Grappling World — The Encyclopaedia of Finishing Holds, Gene LeBell’s Handbook of Judo, Pro-Wrestling Finishing Holds and The Grappling Club Master, and filmed his techniques for instructional videos.

Survivors include his wife, Eleanor (he called her “Midge”); children Monica and David; stepchildren Danny and Stacey; and grandchildren Daniel, Tyler and Nicholas.

As for his work as a stunt double, LeBell revealed he loved that work because “they don’t even look at you, talk to you, but then you go and turn a car over, set yourself on fire and all of a sudden, the star comes up and says, ‘Hey, that’s great,’ and then you’re buds.”

Kurt Thomas

Kurt Thomas, who became the first American to win a world championship event in men’s gymnastics when he captured gold in the floor exercise at Strasbourg, France, in 1978, died on Friday. He was 64.

Thomas’s wife, Rebecca, who owned and operated a gymnastics center with her husband in Frisco, Texas, near Dallas, confirmed the death, telling International Gymnast magazine that he had a stroke on May 24.

Thomas followed up his breakthrough at the 1978 championships by winning five world championship individual medals in 1979, including gold in the floor exercise once more and in the horizontal bar, at Fort Worth. He finished sixth in the all-around standings, based on his totals in the six individual events and his individual triumphs.

He joined with Bart Conner as trailblazing figures among American men in a sport in which women had garnered most of the attention and in which China, France, Japan and the Soviet Union had dominated men’s international gymnastics.

Thomas was known for his daring and innovative moves in what came to be called the “Thomas Flair” on the pommel horse and the “Thomas Salto” in the floor exercise. In the “Flair,” he flew into a series of wide-swinging leg moves in which he would kick his feet high into the air. The “Salto” involved a dangerous backward move in a tucked position.

But he never won an Olympic medal. He had yet to reach his prime when he competed at the 1976 Games. And though was a favorite at the 1980 Olympics in Moscow, he didn’t get a chance to compete: The American team boycotted the Games in retaliation for the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan.

Thomas took part in professional gymnastics shows and worked as a TV commentator at gymnastics events later in the 1980s, when the Olympics were still limited to amateurs. He tried a comeback, at 36, when the Olympic ban on professionals had been lifted, but he was unable to get past the United States trials for the 1992 Games.

Conner, who won the gold medal on the parallel bars at the 1979 world championships and at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, wrote on Twitter that “Kurt was a fierce rival, who went on to become a cherished friend.”

Kurt Bilteaux Thomas was born in Miami on March 29, 1956. His father, who managed a meat company, died when he was 7, and he and his siblings were raised by their mother, Ellie, a secretary.

“I wanted to be a doctor and then a policeman, and then a pro basketball player or football,” he told The New York Times in 1979.

But at 14 he watched the Miami‐Dade Junior College gymnastics team at a practice and was impressed. “I saw this guy swinging on a high bar, and I just thought it was kind of a neat sport,” he said.

Thomas played on a newly formed gymnastics team at his high school and won a scholarship to Indiana State University in Terre Haute.

He was a multiple N.C.A.A. champion, winning the parallel bars and all-around in 1977, and parallel bars, horizontal bar and the all-around in 1979. He helped take the men’s gymnastics team to the 1977 national collegiate championship and ranked behind only Larry Bird, the future basketball Hall of Famer, as a campus celebrity.

Thomas received the Sullivan Award as the nation’s leading amateur athlete in 1979 and was inducted into the International Gymnastics Hall of Fame in 2003.

In addition to his wife, Rebecca (Jones) Thomas, his survivors include their children, Hunter and Kassidy, as well as a son, Kurt, from a previous marriage.

In the run-up to the 1980 Moscow Games, television was raising Thomas’s profile.

In April 1979, he made an appearance on Dick Cavett’s TV show, in which he provided instruction to Cavett, who had been a gymnast in his high school days.

The previous month in New York City, before a packed house and an estimated 35 million television viewers, Thomas won all‐around honors at the American Cup games in Madison Square Garden for the second year in a row despite a sore thumb, which he had injured in his final collegiate home meet the week before.

After the Garden event, where several Americans made it to the finals, Thomas said: “We’ll be heard of in Moscow, you can bet on that. It’s time for the world to look out for American gymnasts. We’ve arrived.”

But the Moscow Games went on without the United States, and what could have been his greatest international triumph was not to be.

***

The champion gymnast stepped away from competition in 1980 for other pursuits. Thomas worked as a commentator for ABC Sports during the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles. He also starred in the 1985 film Gymkata, in which he portrayed Jonathan Cabot.

In this action film, Thomas had to infiltrate the fictional country of Parmistan in order to compete in "The Game," an endurance race with obstacles. However, his character faced terrorist attacks and had to respond with "Gymkata," a mix of gymnastics and karate. He ultimately took part in The Game and defeated the villainous Zamir.

Teshya Alo

It’s always fun each summer to follow up on how some of our previously featured athletes are doing. Many athletes head off to tournaments and championships on the Mainland or around the world.

Case in point, the amazing Teshya Alo of Liliha, whom we have showcased several times in this column (2012 and 2013) as she’s continued to grow and succeed. The 16-year-old wrestling sensation, who is already a two-time state high school champion from Kamehameha, did it again this summer. She won her third straight national title at the ASICS/Vaughn Junior & Cadet National Championships this past week in Fargo, N.D. Alo also was named the Outstanding Wrestler of an event that bills itself as the largest wrestling tournament in the world. She also earned a spot on the ASICS Girls High School All-American Wrestling First Team for the second year in a row.

If that’s not enough, earlier in the month, Alo won a world championship title halfway around the world — in Spina, Slovakia — thus becoming the first wrestler from Hawaii to win a Cadet world championship, as well as the first wrestler from the United States to win in the 56 kilogram weight bracket. The U.S national coach, Erin Tomeo, was very impressed, as Alo finished undefeated in a bracket that is noted for being the largest — and arguably the toughest — field in the tournament.

“We are all proud and very excited for our world champion, Teshya Alo. She showed a lot of heart and determination,” the coach says.

Alo will be a junior at Kamehameha in the fall and previously has stated her goal of eventually becoming an Olympic athlete. She appears well on her way. And, as mentioned in an earlier column, Alo is also the subject of a feature documentary film done by Honolulu filmmaker Kimberlee Bassford, titled A Winning Girl, that is expected to premiere this fall at Hawaii International Film Festival.

*** [4/5/16]

Clarissa Chun and Teshya Alo are 16 years apart, but the paths that bring them to the U.S. Olympic Wrestling Trials speak to a spirit and determination that is as remarkable as it is shared.

The 34-year-old Chun, a two-time Olympian from Roosevelt High, and Alo, an 18-year-old Kamehameha Schools senior chasing her first Olympiad, represent the disparate ends of the spectrum at the University of Iowa this weekend, where the U.S. team is to be selected for this summer’s games in Rio de Janeiro.

jiu jitsu in Hawaii

Romolo Barros, who founded the Hawaii Triple Crown of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, believes jiu-jitsu has made him a better person.

He was born and raised in Brazil, but didn’t learn jiujitsu until he was a senior in high school living in California with his older brother Robson (who also is a black belt), and their roommate was Rorion Gracie, creator of the hugely successful Ultimate Fighting Championship.

“Learning jiu-jitsu improves your overall life in every way – to be a better husband, a better father, a better human being and a complete fighter,” explains Barros. “You will become more secure with yourself. You will learn how to defend yourself, but in the process of getting there, you also will learn a lot more than just how to be a better fighter.

“The essence of Gracie jiu-jitsu is leverage – using the least amount of force for the maximum results. Whatever position you fall into, you just have to find the leverage there, and you’ll be fine. So Brazilian jiu-jitsu is for everyone: big, small, weak, strong, young or old.”

In addition to jiu-jitsu, Barros also loves to surf, and he moved to Hawaii 30 years ago for the waves, as well as the beauty of the Islands and the aloha spirit.

Shortly after, Relson Gracie (Rorion’s brother), also moved to Hawaii and started teaching his family’s style of self-defense here. Barros started training with Relson, and together they shared a passion for promoting jiu jitsu in Hawaii. “Relson was the first to put on jiu-jitsu events here, but then he stopped and I felt there was a need to continue it,” says Barros. “It’s about the opportunity to showcase the talent in Hawaii through friendly competition, So, I created Hawaii Triple Crown of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.”

Barros, who is a fifth-degree black belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu, owns and operates Brazilian Freestyle Jiu-Jitsu/Gracie Elite Team, as well as the Brazilian Freestyle Jiu-Jitsu Association.

“Although I originally learned jiu-jitsu from Rorion, I got my black belt from Rickson Gracie, who continues to be my mentor and close friend,” adds Barros. “And Rolls Gracie also was a great friend, instructor and inspiration. I got my first belt, a blue belt, from him and Rorion. Rolls passed away very young, but left a legacy for all of us, just like Grand Master Helio Gracie did.”

“One of the greatest things about jiu-jitsu is it makes you a more humble person,” adds Barros. “I see it all the time in class. You also become more confident, and you develop physical and mental skills. It’s one of the best workouts you can have.

“From when I moved to Hawaii, jiu-jitsu really has grown a lot. There used to be only one school, Relson’s school, and then mine. Now, I can’t really tell you how many there are, but there’s got to be hundreds.”

Barros continues to teach and train jiu-jitsu, as well as surf, swim and lift weights. He also follows the Gracie diet, which is based on a proper combination of foods.

Bruce Lee and Wong Jack Man (and Peter Ralston)

I found this article on Bruce Lee's encounter with Wong Jack Man interesting.

Who knows what really happened?  But I see there's a entire book written about the event (and an upcoming movie?)

***

From the article, one of Wong Jack Man's students was Peter Ralston, whose book I bought years ago. Ralston has apparently transcended martial arts, but has a youtube channel.

*** [7/20/14]

OK, how about his fight with Lau Dai-Chuen?

aikido anniversary

This year marks Seichi Tabata's 60th anniversary of teaching shin shin toitsu aikido in Hawaii. Tabata, 87, is the last original student of ki aikido founder Koichi Tohei to still actively teach the Japanese martial art here.

This year is also the 60th anniversary of Tohei's introduction of ki aikido to Hawaii and the U.S. mainland in 1953.

"Shin shin" in Japanese refers to the duality of the mind and body. "Toitsu" means "to bind or unify." So "shin shin toitsu aikido" could be translated as "aikido to realize the original oneness of body and mind."

Tohei's teachings also stress being at peace with the "ki" (similar to the Chinese "chi") — or flow — of the universe, so they are also often referred to as "ki aikido."

"Ki is very difficult to master," explained Tabata, a former Wai­alae Iki resident who now lives in a Hawaii Kai retirement community. "There's nothing visible to attach to; it's all emotional. But it's very important for everyday living. When I was doing sales for the Household DeVille discount retail chain on Keeaumoku Street in the '70s, they would send me for aikido training in Japan two or three times a year because they could see how aikido would help in selling and how it was a ‘plus.' It involves a lot of positive thinking, a lot of creativity, and it benefits others as well as yourself. And it's nonaggressive.

"Using aikido principles, I can compete with anyone in sales, and, in fact, I was a top salesman wherever I went."

After spending about 20 years with Household De­Ville, where he rose to become company president, Tabata sold life insurance for 15 years. He retired in 2006.

Born in Lahaina, Tabata was sickly as a child, so his father enrolled him in judo classes when he was 5 years old to strengthen him. Tabata pursued judo until he was 18, when he joined the Army during World War II, becoming a motor pool staff sergeant. Three years later, Tabata returned home to Maui from Japan with a new bride, Emiko, who would be his loyal and hardworking wife for 64 years. (She died four years ago. Tabata now has four children, eight grandchildren and two great-grandsons.)

To help out his parents and their family of six boys and three girls, Tabata continued to work at the family grocery store on Lahainaluna Road after the war and started to teach judo classes on the side.

When Tohei was invited to Maui to teach his method of ki aikido in 1953, Tabata started gradually to adopt the ki principles and then to teach them to his own students in lieu of judo.

Tabata moved to Oahu a few years later to open his own dojo in Honolulu.

"For all my classes since the very beginning, I've never charged for my time," he said. "All my instructors have never gotten paid either. If the students pay any dues, all the money goes back to the dojo to pay for the dojo's expenses.

"I could make a lot of money at what I teach, but I want to return it to the community, to help people out."

Internationally, the ki aikido movement has blossomed to numerous schools in 24 countries, including the U.S., Japan, Brazil, Singapore, Great Britain, Russia and Australia.

The founder's son and president of the Ki Society headquarters in Japan, Shinichi Tohei, will be a special guest at the Honolulu Ki Society's celebration of the 60th anniversary of ki aikido in Hawaii this weekend. There will also be workshops that the public may observe to celebrate Tabata's 60 years of teaching thousands of students in ki aikido in the islands.

"I still teach at the dojo every Saturday, though of course I don't move as well as I used to," he said. "And I've had so many students, I can't remember them all. Recently, a man in his 60s came up to me and introduced himself. … he told me I had taught him judo in Lahaina when he was 12 years old!"

Bruce Lee, the father of MMA?

More than a quarter century before the UFC, the late martial artist and film star Bruce Lee described in great detail what ultimately would become the sport of mixed martial arts.

The UFC was founded in 1993, partly in an effort to determine which fighting style is best. But as Lee had pointed out years before, it is a mixture of styles, not simply one, that is the most effective fighting form.

"The best fighter is not a boxer, karate or judo man," Lee once said. "The best fighter is someone who can adapt to any style. He kicks too good for a boxer, throws too good for a karate man, and punches too good for a judo man."

Nearly 40 years after his untimely death at 32 in 1973, Lee's fighting philosophies are on display in cages around the world. Fighters who were born many years after his death idolize him nonetheless and credit him with shaping them as athletes.

UFC president Dana White calls Lee the father of modern MMA. While there are others who deserve to be in that conversation, there is no question Lee's impact upon the sport is still being felt.

The UFC will host its first card on Chinese soil on Nov. 10 at UFC on Fuel 6 in Macao, a gaming mecca near Hong Kong where Lee grew up.

To honor Lee, White had an image of the martial arts icon included on the official promotional poster for the event.

"It's pretty amazing when you look back at 'Enter the Dragon,' " said Lee's daughter, Shannon. "There he is in the opening sequence in the shorts and the fingerless gloves, ending it in an arm bar. It's almost as if he knew what was coming. But that all sprung from his belief about what it meant to be a complete fighter. He really believed fully that in order to be a complete fighter, you had to have many different things in your arsenal and be able to defend against and attack in whatever situation may present itself."

Grandmaster Cho

At Grandmaster Cho's tae kwon do studio, approximately 300 elementary school students from East Oahu just began taking classes. They have come for the six-week President's Fitness Challenge Program, an initiative strongly supported by Michelle Obama. Children must be active one hour per day, five days out of the week for six out of eight weeks. Upon completion of the program, participants receive a Presidential Active Lifestyle Award. The fitness sessions at the studio focus on flexibility, strength, endurance, speed and coordination.

Although the fitness program is separate from formal tae kwon do and jujitsu classes taught at the studio, students are exposed to the core values of traditional martial arts as taught by the grandmaster. "Most important is that you learn to respect yourself, your parents and your teachers. You must master the art of respect for your life's journey." Key principles also include modesty, courtesy, integrity, self-control and perseverance. Students learn never to initiate violence and to work toward the creation of harmony among all people.

The grandmaster just turned 71 and has trained daily for 61 years. He is a ninth-degree black belt and has won world championships. Even today he teaches virtually every class. Despite arduous training and high expectations for his students, he has a soft, gentle side that warms the children's hearts and keeps them coming back.

According to the grandmaster, one must be true to the principles of the art to be optimally successful in physical training. Once children begin to excel in the studio, most often they also bring home top grades from school. To encourage scholarship, the grandmaster keeps a poster with math tables on the front mirror, and at the back wall he proudly posts the report cards his students bring him.

Over time the journey of tae kwon do builds confidence together with a strong mind and body. As the grandmaster's students mature into teenagers and earn their black belts, they feel themselves prepared for higher education and professional success.

Falling for Aikido

Viewed from the outside, aikido looks more like a graceful dance than an effective way to disarm an attacker. In truth, it’s both. Favoring precise body movements over strength or carefully placed blows, the fairly recent martial art uses various joint locks and throws to redirect the motion of the attacker to either control the opponent or to ward off another attack.

Of course, this is a very simplified description of a martial art form that can have literally thousands of movement combinations.

By design, aikido training is a cooperative effort where both the nage (thrower) and the uke (attacker) move in harmony with one another to maximize the learning of both participants. As with other martial arts that emphasize throws, learning to fall is of utmost importance. It is often said, somewhat jokingly, that aikido is the art of falling down.

Aikido was developed by Morihei Ueshiba in the 1920s-30s. Born to a well-placed family in 1883 in the Wakayama Prefecture, about 30 miles south of Osaka, Ueshiba was weak as a child and spent most of his time reading about Buddhist heroes while hearing stories of his famous samurai forebears. Ueshiba improved his health as a young man through the practice of juijitsu and later came to study with Onisaburo Deguchi, a spiritual leader who taught a pacifist view of human interaction. Ueshiba came to believe that people could gain universal understanding and achieve world peace through the study of martial arts.

Or, at least, through one martial art, aikido, which translates to “The Way of Harmony.”