HEADLOCKS INSTEAD OF HEADACHE POWDERS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 5, Issue 119, 3 October 1941, Page 8

HEADLOCKS INSTEAD OF HEADACHE POWDERS

Wrestler Who Studied To Be A Chemist

OE CORBETT chews gum incessantly and wears checked suits and says "Yeah" and "TI guess," and most people take him for an American. He’s a Canadian, however, and proud of it, and says that the misapprehension must be due to the fact that he went to college in Boston and has done most of his wrestling in the US. He took pharmacy at college, and but for the fact that he found wrestling a pleasant occupation and a profitable one as well, he might now be wearing a white

coat dispensing headache powders for bilious Americans. He first started wrestling at the age of 14. Even then he was big and well developed, weighing close to 170 pounds, which were distributed so as to give him a chunky, rectangular look. After a year or two, wrestling began to distribute his weight to better advantage, taking a few pounds from one place and adding it to another. Joe is still chunky, but his weight is now where it should be. "Dynamic Tension " For much of his early muscular development, Joe gives credit not so much to gymnasium work as to a system of what is technically known as "dynamic tension," the discovery of Earl Liederman of New York, a physical culturist who claims the title of "best built man in the world." When the first principles have been learned, dynamic tension requires no elaborate weights or elastic cables. It is simply a matter of assisting one set of muscles to develop another. Even to-day, if he is travelling hard and unable to get regular gymnasium training, Joe keeps himself fit with the aid of dynamic tension. Joe turned professional about eight years ago. His first few matches can make or mar a young wrestler, according to Joe. If the fans like his style and he

turns on a_ good, lively exhibition it doesn’t much matter whether he wins or losses, They'll come back for more." Joe was lucky. He had a run of wins right from the start, and in addition the fans seemed to like him. Most of his wrestling was done round New York, Chicago, Kansas City, Boston, Colorado, and Florida. In busy seasons he can remember wrestling as many as six times a week, with an average of three matches a week all the year round. Naturally a wrestler doesn’t have to do much additional gymnasium training when the pace is as hot as this. His ring work keeps him fit, and it is principally a matter of looking after his general health and not getting stale. "1 Use ‘Em All" Joe Corbett is an outstanding example of a wrestler who refuses to specialise in any one hold. Not so very long ago, every second wrestler had a special little hold of his own which was popularly supposed to be sudden death to an unwary opponent. There was Chief Little Wolf with his Indian deathlock, Joe Savoldi with his flying dropkick, and, of course, "Lofty" Blomfield with his octopus clamp. But Joe cocks a scornful eyebrow at such eccentricities, "Any special holds? Guess I use ’em all. Tackles, dropkicks, jolts, cradle holds, anything at all. Plenty of action is my motto."

One thing Joe found slightly disconcerting at first was the change over to wrestling in rounds. Before coming to Australia and New Zealand, he had been used to the old style of working right through until a fall was obtained. This necessitates some prodigious feats of en-durance-Walter Miller, a famous oldtime champion, now looking after the promoting side in New Zealand, remembers wrestling for 8 hours 40 minutes without a break-but it also had the effect of slowing up the wrestling. The system of wrestling in rounds is all to the good, once you get used to it, says Joe. It makes for much brighter and certainly more enterprising wrestling. Conquest of Trachoma New Zealand fans may remember the days when a high proportion of visiting wrestlers seemed to be suffering from the dread trachoma, the dust born disease (originally brought from Japan) which sent a wrestler slowly blind and caused him excruciating agony. Well, medical science has apparently conquered trachoma. Touching wood, Joe Corbett is happy to state that he has never had it, and, he says, few wrestlers suffer from it nowadays. Trachoma seems to have taken the long count at the hands of sulfanilamide-another victory to chalk up to the credit of this magical group of drugs.