More than a Match: A story told by Kandy It wasn't the first time Satoko had been present when women fought in the "squared circle," but this time she wouldn't be in the ring. Instead she was here to watch her four protégés make a movie for Rick and his crew. They had developed quite a capability for producing high quality wrestling and boxing videos. Five camera angles, good lighting, and post-production sound and video editing was done digitally. That made it easy to enhance the action. The combatants were even occasionally asked to stage some sequences in slow motion and in post-production it could be sped up to appear as though more violent punches were landing. With the addition of post production 'smacks" and hollow "thuds," the slo-mo blows looked like real on video. The script for this one called for two of her students to fight solo against two women from the Florida group, and the other two to meet in a team match. The format was one that the Florida group had "developed" two years ago (but that's another story). It was called "Wroxing" and combined elements of boxing with wrestling. Each person wears a single 10 oz. boxing glove on the hand of their choice and leaves the other hand free. The rules include no contact above the chest, no punches with the bare hand, and no use of knees, feet or elbows. Winners are determined by pinning their opponent in traditional wrestling style, by submission, or by determination of the referee. A three-minute rounds time limit was also part of today's fighting format. Dee, one of the managers from the Florida group was selected to serve as referee. Satoko's students stood around in groups of two. Chanté and Zena had become friends and stood together, while Yuko and Red had often worked out as a team. Chanté's face reflected a mix of cultures, primarily Porto Rican and Black, while Zena had a classic African American look and style. Chanté was a lively talkative girl, 5'5" with a well- proportioned figure and aerobics class conditioning. Zena was nearly the same, except for a little wider around the hips and thighs. Both could run and jump and bench press half their weight. Yuko was Satoko's little sister. Unlike Satoko, Yuko had a flat chest and had only been working out for the past 4 months. Her friend, known as "Red" for her long red hair, was a more petite figure, with smaller breasts and thinner legs. She was not as flat as Yuko, but she certainly didn't bounce when she ran. Her name highlighted her long red hair and freckly face. She had the quickness and stamina to keep working when the others were fading. She started out being able to muscle Yuko on the mat, but as Yuko began to gain some strength, she and Red became a good match for each other during practice. But Satoko's choice for the first match was Chanté. She had been Satoko's best student so far. The script was pretty basic and only provided an outline for the fight. The girls were encouraged to ad lib around the outline to make it look more spontaneous. The outline for the first round of the first fight was 1) Chanté would get behind her opponent and remove her bikini top. 2) Chanté would use her boxing glove to hit to the back and kidneys. 3) The opponent would escape and grab a leg, then land a punch to the crotch. Chanté would go to her knees and the opponent would step behind. 4) The two would roll around on the mat until Chanté reversed, using her free hand to grab and twist the opponents bare chest. 5) The opponent would gut punch her way out and the round would end. The fact that gloves were used for punches and contact to the face and hair was illegal, made it possible for contestant to be fairly realistic in their combat, as long as they stuck to the script. Rick started cameras and sound rolling. Dee, as referee, entered the ring first in a skimpy yellow bikini and introduced Chanté from Satoko's class. Then she introduced Kelli from the Florida group. Kelli had the looks of a beach bum, tan and well conditioned. She had bleach blonde hair pinned up in a bun and wore a solid black string bikini tied on the side of the tops and bottoms. Kelli was taller than Chanté, but they were about the same chest size. Chanté pulled her orange and white bikini bottoms from her butt before meeting Kelli center ring. After a brief handshake, Dee gave the signal and the two girls came together pushing for position near center ring. Chanté tried to step around behind Kelli, but she avoided. Kelli dove down for a takedown and Chanté fell on top of Kelli, pushing her face down on the mat. Trying to stick to the script, Chanté stepped around and untied Kelli's top and began to punch Kelli in her bare back. Kelli made solid contact but was pulling her punches, particularly when she got down to the kidney area. Kelli brought her free right hand back to cover her right kidney, and dramatize the would-be pain. As Chanté threw a punch with her gloved left hand toward Kelli's unguarded left kidney, Kelli rolled right. The contact was harder than Chanté expected and Kelli arched back in an automatic response. Kelli got to her knees with Chanté still behind her. From behind Chanté threw a punch to Kelli's dangling left breast, hitting it gently from the side. Kelli quickly stood up and turned to face Chanté. The look on her face was one of pain and determination, quite authentic thought Chanté. As Chanté backed away, Kelli charged and successfully grabbed Chanté's left leg. Standing back up with the leg in her free right hand, Kelli followed the script and slammed in a left upper cut between Chanté's legs. But this was no pulled punch and the unexpected pain caused Chanté to round her lips and let out an audible "oh!" Rick smiled as he had one camera angled low enough to capture Kelli's punch all the way and another wide angle to catch Chanté's reaction. Chanté tried to fall to her knees as called for in the script. But Kelli held the left leg tight and pushed Chanté back into the corner. Her back hit the turnbuckle and she expelled a gasp of air, "ugh." Kelli took aim again at her open target and slammed in a second left upper cut before Chanté could get her glove down to cover. Kelli took aim higher and jabbed a left into Chanté's right breast, nearly pushing it out of the bikini top. Chanté's thoughts were now spinning. Was this an acceptable variation of the script? Wouldn't Dee intervene if it was out of hand? Should she retaliate or try to proceed to step #4 of the script, rolling on the mat to get the advantage? She simply could not stand for more punishment here in the corner, so she pushed Kelli back a bit by pushing off from the corner. Then she turned and bent up her left knee toward her butt, bringing Kelli's exposed front up against her back. Kelli dropped her hold on Chanté's left leg and used her free hand to unclasp her bikini top instead. Chanté was surprised and used her free right hand to hold the top on. Kelli stepped right and began to jab her left into Chanté's left kidney, not pulling the punches. Chanté tried to turn and say "Hey, it was just an accident." But as she got to "just" the kidney punch took her breath away. That was it. Chanté abandoned any thoughts of the script, turned and let her top fall to the mat, exposing her round full breasts, nipples erect. At this point Satoko knew it had all gone wrong and moved to Rick to ask him to stop the filming. Chanté charged at Kelli and walked right into a gut punch which doubled her over. With her free hand Kelli grabbed the back of Chanté bikini bottoms. Instinctively Chanté grabbed the front to prevent their removal. But Kelli had the opposite plan. She pulled up hard and the nylon dug in to the tender flesh between Chanté legs. Kelli pulled up until the fabric was in the middle of Chanté's back and a scream was the result. "What the hell are you doing?" Kelli answered silently by grabbing Chanté's legs from behind and pushing her forward so she fell face-first to the mat. Holding the legs, Kelli dragged her back to the center of the ring, scraping her bare breasts against the canvas, abrading the sensitive skin. As soon as Kelli released her legs, Chanté rolled right and brought up her right knee. Kelli did not anticipate the knee and tried to jump on Chanté as she rolled. The result was Kelli's stomach slamming down on Chanté's knee, releasing a grunt. With her free hand Chanté grabbed Kelli's left breast and squeezed as hard as she could, bending the nipple left and right and pulling her down toward her. With her knee still in place, she rolled left and wound up on top of Kelli, knee in her gut. Chanté spun to trap Kelli's arms on the mat with her knees. This left Kelli flat on her back, her face in Chanté's butt. Chanté saw Kelli's exposed midsection and went to work with her glove, first pounding her gut, then stretching lower to hit her bikini line, then pubic mound in retaliation for the first few punches of the round. Chanté actually started to enjoy beating on Kelli's body: seeing her glove dig deep into the stomach as Kelli's knees spontaneously jerked up. She felt herself getting stronger with each punch as she moved back up to pound her just above her bikini. Kelli got one hand free and again grabbed the back of Chanté's bikini bottoms and pulled up. Again the nylon dug up into Chanté's vagina, this time pulling directly across her clitoris. Mark was still ignoring Satoko's protests. The pain caused Chanté to forget her punching and stand up to get away from the torture. Kelli kept a firm grasp of the bottoms as they pulled down Chanté's legs and off. As both girls again stood to face each other, the redness showed on Chanté's chest from her drag across the mat. The cameras zoomed in to look at the newly exposed stripe of black pubic hair below the reddened chest. Kelli showed the effects of Chanté's body work, walking a bit bent over forward. From the cameras' attention Kelli picked her next target. She dove in and her quickness enabled her to emerge again with Chanté's left leg. Pulling up she landed another left upper cut just below the patch of black hair. There was an audible smack of leather against sweaty skin and Chanté grunted. This was getting old, real fast. Chanté covered up with her glove. Kelli dropped the leg and with her free hand grabbed Chanté's left breast and pulled her forward. Chanté tried to resist but was pulled in. Kelli raised her left knee and in banged up into Chanté's already bruised and aching crotch. Satoko was already protesting loudly as Chanté fell to her knees, both hands grasping her groin, in front of Kelli. Kelli took the opportunity slam a devastating left cross into Chanté's sore left breast, pancaking the breast and propelling her back onto the canvas. Satoko was in the ring before Dee could proclaim a winner, a scene Rick thought he could simply shoot later. Kelli dropped her heal into Chanté's gut causing her arms to come up to cover. Before Satoko arrived, Kelli slammed her foot up into Chanté's exposed and aching crotch before sauntering back to her corner, allowing Satoko to assist her student from the ring. Satoko had to decide what to do. As her other students gathered around the beaten collegue, her first priority was to ensure that Chanté was alright and got some ice for her breast and elsewhere. Then she would decide if the contests would continue. If so, there would be a new understanding about how the referee should act, and just how the scripts were to unfold. For his part, Mark was ecstatic. The action shots he had just gotten would be the best ever. And it also showed him that the Wroxing format could actually be done for real! It was safe enough that combatants could engage in a serious fight. He would have to talk to Satoko and his friends from Florida. This could be big!