Orhan Okulu Claims Third Golden Belt at 664th Kırkpınar

Summary

Orhan Okulu reclaimed the title of başpehli­van at the 664^th Kırkpınar olive oil wrestling fes­ti­val by defeat­ing Feyzullah Aktürk in the final after dom­i­nat­ing the match in Edirne. Okulu, who claimed his third Kırkpınar cham­pi­onship, thanked his sup­port­ers and fam­ily in his vic­tory speech, empha­siz­ing the impor­tance of endurance in the tra­di­tional Turkish wrestling com­pe­ti­tion.

Orhan Okulu has defeated Feyzullah Aktürk to reclaim the title of başpehli­van, or chief wrestler, at the 664^th edi­tion of Turkey’s his­toric Kırkpınar olive oil wrestling fes­ti­val.

The 37-year-old Okulu claimed his third Kırkpınar cham­pi­onship, hav­ing pre­vi­ously won in 2015 and 2018, after dom­i­nat­ing the 20-minute final in Edirne, a small city 200 kilo­me­ters west of Istanbul.

Okulu came into the tour­na­ment as an over­whelm­ing favorite, going so far as to tell local media ahead of the event: ​“This year, I’m in the same shape I was when I won the belt. Others may have a weight advan­tage, but at Kırkpınar, endurance is every­thing.”

After sev­eral stops and starts in the open­ing min­utes of the final, with med­ical staff com­ing onto the field to treat Okulu’s lac­er­ated eye­brow twice, the match returned to action with var­i­ous hand-to-hand exchanges.

Overall, the expe­ri­enced Okulu dom­i­nated the final with his offen­sive style of play, com­ing close to catch­ing his 26-year-old oppo­nent in the 16^th minute before knock­ing Aktürk, who main­tained a defen­sive dis­po­si­tion through­out, off his feet and onto his back in the 19^th minute. 

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On his route to the final, Okulu tri­umphed over Seçkin Duman and 2022 cham­pion Cengizhan Şimşek in the first rounds before defeat­ing Erkan Taş in the quar­ter-finals and Enes Doğan in the semi­fi­nals.

Meanwhile, Aktürk defeated three-time cham­pion Ali Gürbüz in the sec­ond round, İsmail Koç in the quar­ter-finals and Ali İhsan Batmaz in the semi-final. In the pre­vi­ous round, İhsan Batmaz caused the upset of the tour­na­ment, defeat­ing two-time defend­ing cham­pion Yusuf Can Zeybek.

“Thank God, we became cham­pi­ons this year as we did in 2015 and 2018,” Okulu said in his vic­tory speech, accord­ing to local media. ​“I beat European cham­pion Feyzullah Aktürk. I thank him. We all played very tough matches.”

“I thank my wife and chil­dren who watched me on TV and sup­ported me, my father who was with me and all the sup­port­ers,” he added. ​“My father started me wrestling, and I present the belt to my father. May the belt bring good luck to all peo­ple of Antalya.”

Overall, more than 3,000 unranked wrestlers com­peted along­side 40 ranked wrestlers, who qual­i­fied directly for the final stage, through­out the three-day event, which con­cluded on July 6^th.

Kırkpınar is widely con­sid­ered to be the world’s longest-run­ning sport­ing event and was added to UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity list in 2010. 

According to leg­end, the wrestling com­pe­ti­tion orig­i­nated in 1357 when a group of 40 Ottoman sol­diers sta­tioned near Edirne began grap­pling to pass the time.

After the rest had fin­ished, the final two con­tin­ued their fight into the night and were found dead the fol­low­ing day.

There was no win­ner that year, but the event has been held each July since then, except when it was can­celed in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pan­demic.

Traditionally, wrestlers of all ages, cul­tural back­grounds, and social classes gather in Edirne, engag­ing in one-on-one matches on the grassy fields until one wrestler suc­cess­fully throws the other onto his back.

Despite a con­tro­ver­sial for­mat change that intro­duced ranked and unranked cat­e­gories, the rules remained the same. Wrestlers are doused in olive oil and wear only a kıspet, short leather pants, while they com­pete.

The match starts with both wrestlers lock­ing hands and keep­ing their heads close together. To win, a wrestler must pin his oppo­nent onto his back or lift him into the air.

The olive oil makes it very dif­fi­cult for the wrestlers to grip each other, forc­ing them to grab the pock­ets of their opponent’s kıspet.

Wrestlers also claim that olive oil helps reduce pain from injuries and accel­er­ates wound heal­ing. An esti­mated two tons of olive oil are used dur­ing the event.

The process of apply­ing the olive oil fol­lows a spe­cific rit­ual. First, oil is applied to the left shoul­der, chest, left arm, and cuff of one wrestler by another wrestler using his left hand.

Next, wrestlers repeat the same motion on the right side of their bod­ies. The final step of the rit­ual involves wrestlers apply­ing oil to each other’s backs.

Olive oil is an essen­tial part of the com­pe­ti­tion, and if a wrestler feels the need to reap­ply oil dur­ing a match, he may request a time­out from the ref­eree and his oppo­nent.

• Milliyet
• Daily Sabah