I wasn’t sure where to post this story so I’ve posted it here as it’s mostly about wrestling. It sort of follows on from my earlier stories “An unexpected honour” and “The love the lasts a lifetime”. I’ve had some feedback suggesting people would like to read stories involving younger fighters and with more back story. My response has been to start writing a series of stories based around how some of my characters began their fighting careers. These stories include details of a few fights but mention many more. As always, let me know if a particular encounter tempts you and I’ll do my best to write it up in full. Anyway, here’s the first one, my story – I hope you enjoy it.
I love it here. I’ve lived here all my life so I can’t imagine living anywhere else. I love the sea and the fresh air. I love the sunsets and the sound of the waves breaking on the shore. Most of all I love that sense of living on the edge of the world.
It was a Friday afternoon in early May 1987, I’d recently turned 25. Summer had come early and it was warm and sunny. I’d got off work early and headed for a secluded little cove that my sisters and I always considered “our place” to enjoy the solitude and a quiet swim.
As usual, the place was deserted, so I quickly stripped off and dived into the cool refreshing water. I’d been swimming for about 10 minutes and was treading water, staring out to sea watching a ship slip slowly over the horizon, lost in my own thoughts when suddenly I heard a woman’s voice behind me:
“Hello, do you mind if I join you?”
I spun round in panic. How long had she been there? Did she know I was naked? Who was she? What was she doing in my special place?
I looked up. Standing on the edge of the dunes was a shapely woman wearing a sarong, large sunglasses and a wide brimmed straw hat. She obviously saw my surprise and quickly apologised:
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. I wasn’t expecting to find anyone here. It’s usually deserted. I didn’t think anyone else knew about it.”
“Neither did I,” I replied: “I’ve been coming here with my sisters all my life and you’re the first stranger I’ve ever seen.”
She chuckled: “It sounds like we’ve been missing each other then, I’ve been coming here for years as well. I’m Jay by the way.”
“Pleased to meet you, I’m Ellen, feel free to join me – just be aware I’m naked.”
“I know, I’ve been watching you.”
She stepped down onto the beach, kicked off her sandals, took of her sunglasses and hat and put them down. I looked at her, her hair was blonde, wavy rather than curly, and stopped short of her shoulders. She smiled and dropped her sarong. She was naked and had an attractive figure. She was, perhaps a few years older than me and a little slimmer – ‘fit’ would be a good description. She slipped into the water and swam out past me. She was a strong swimmer and a natural in the water. She called me to join her and, for a while, we swam together.
After swimming we lay on the beach and talked for a while. I learned that she was 29, almost 30, and a junior solicitor in a local law practice. Also, that, like me, she had several sisters and had lived here most of her life. After an hour or so we got dressed and went our separate ways. I liked her and hoped I’d see her again but I was surprised how quickly that happened.
The next day was just as hot and I returned to the beach for another swim. I’d just finished drying myself and was about to pull on my knickers on when a familiar figure appeared on the top of the dune.
“Hello again.” She said as she walked down onto the beach, dropping her tote, throwing down her hat and sun glasses and slipping out of her summer dress before plunging naked into the water.
I watched her swim out again; confident, strong strokes and decided I was in no hurry to leave. I settled back on the sand to top up my tan. After 20 minutes or so in the water she came up on the beach and lay down beside me. We chatted again for a while before I left her on the beach and headed off to meet my sisters for dinner.
The heatwave continued for a third day and, once again, I headed straight from the office to the beach. This time she was there when I arrived, lying on her front on a towel wearing nothing but her straw hat, a book propped up in front of her. It looked like she’d been there a while. She looked up at me and smiled a greeting:
“Hello you.”
By way of explanation, she added: “My client cancelled our meeting so I had a free afternoon. No point wasting it on a day like this. Could you do me a favour and put some cream on my back?”
She nodded in the direction of a bottle of sunscreen sticking out of her tote. I knelt beside her, opened the bottle and squeezed some of the contents on my hands.
“We really should stop meeting like this.” I joked as I began massaging her shoulders and rubbing the cream into her back.
She was silent for a moment. Then she pushed herself up on one elbow and turned to look up at me. Her expression was serious as she admitted: “Ellen, I have a confession to make. I’ve been stalking you.”
“What? Why?”
“I wanted to ask you something.”
“Go on.” A sudden thought crossed my mind. Was she a lesbian? Was she about to ask me to have sex with her? I tried not to stare at the naked breast dangling by her raised arm. I wasn’t that way inclined but she was pretty hot, I wasn’t sure if I could say no if she asked. What she actually said surprised me even more.
“You’re an attractive, shapely woman – have you ever thought about wrestling?”
“What?!” I was shocked for a moment.
“Wrestling? Fighting other women? For money.”
My initial shock turned to curiosity and I urged her to go on. She explained that she was involved in a female fighting club based in a gym down in the old harbour area of the city. She said that the fighting was serious and took place in private but the fights were filmed and copies sold, with the fighters sharing the profits. She also mentioned they fought nude and that she thought I had the looks and build to be a good wrestler.
My immediate reaction was ‘no way’ but the more she spoke the more I warmed to the idea. She was a pretty classy lady and I felt sure that anything she was involved in was unlikely to be sordid. The idea of getting to grips with another woman to work out my aggression was quite appealing. It was certainly better than taking it out on my boyfriends.
Cutting a long story short, two weeks later I was at Roberson’s gym on a Friday evening to try girl-on-girl wrestling for the first time. There were four girls trying out that day for two places with the club and they paired us up, the winner of each match would be offered a place with the club. They needed one fighter immediately to replace a girl who had just left. The other ‘successful candidate’ would have to wait for the next person to leave before taking their place. My opponent was a tall red-headed woman, willowy by my standards but with large breasts, who went by the name of Lesley.
Although the fighters at the club at this time generally fought naked, for reasons weren’t clear to me our trial matches were fought topless but wearing bikini bottoms. Mine were turquoise blue, Lesley wore green briefs.
The fights would be held using standard club rules of the time, which were best of five falls or a knockout over ten three-minute rounds. Before they let us loose in the ring, we were given a detailed briefing of the rules and regulations of the fights and then four regular fighters: Claire, Sian, Christine and Leah gave two exhibition matches to show us how we should behave in the ring.
Then it was our turn. In those days I had a much better figure than I do today. I was 5’7” and probably 36B-25-38 and around 135lbs (the club didn’t bother with stats so much back then). My breasts were smaller than they are now and stood proud without and need of support. I was happy with my overall appearance when I took my gown off in the ring. Lesley was taller but slimmer than me, with large breasts probably 5’ 10”, 36D-24-36 and about 130lbs. She looked to be more than a handful to me.
At the sound of the bell, we came out and circled each other cautiously before finally coming together in locking up. We struggled to dominate each other for a few moments and then she took me to the mat. We wrestled on the on the canvas. Initially I didn’t think she was any more experienced than me but somehow, she seemed to be able to dominate and hold me down while I was struggling to break free from her grasp all time. After a minute or two we came back to our feet and engaged in some more physical stuff. At one point she grabbed my arm and spun me and I ran backwards into a post. My first experience of a posting a wrestling match, it hurt and I collapsed to my knees. Moments later the bell rang for the end of the first round I was grateful for the break.
Between rounds Leah, my second, gave me a pep talk; encouraging me and advising me on strategy for coming round. When the bell went for the second round, I felt a lot more confident than I had in the first. I came out quickly to lock up with Lesley but it seemed she’d had a similar pep talk from her second and was equally fired up.
We came together and I managed to toss her over my hip and onto the mat. She quickly rolled over and came to her feet. I grabbed her and pulled off the same trick a second time. Once again, she got to feet. Then it was my turn to be flipped and flipped again before once again she grabbed my arm and spun me. This time I crashed into the ropes. As I bounced back, she stuck her arm and caught my neck. Knocking me flat on my back, clotheslined the first time.
Rolling over onto my hands and knees and scrambling up I saw her standing before me. I lunged at her calves, flipping her onto her back. Keeping hold of her legs I stood up and quickly rolled her over onto her front, copying a move I’d seen Leah pull off in her exhibition match against Clare. Lesley was trapped in a Boston crab. Pulling back on the redhead’s legs I quickly elicited a submission from her - one nil to me.
Leah was full of praise in the break but it was clear that Lesley’s rapid submission had been strategic. My hold may have given me the first fall but it done little damage and when we came out for the third round, she dominated all the way. I hardly got a look in and it suddenly dawned on me that she had a lot more experience than me. (Many years later I discovered that her elder sister had fought at the club and gone on to become a professional wrestler – Lesley may not have fought seriously before but she had been her sister’s sparring partner so she’d had a few lessons more than me.)
After two minutes of, quite literally, tossing me around, Lesley took me to the mat and wrapped me up in a ball with my knees against my face and my shoulders on the canvas. Jay counted to 3, the bell rang and that was that – pinned. It was the first time I was ever pinned in a wrestling match and the first time I’d conceded a fall.
I didn’t fare any better in round four. Although I started well (at least I thought so) she soon got the better of me again, trapping me in a grapevine. With her big tits pushed hard in my face, cutting off my air supply, and her legs spreading mine wide I had no option but to frantically tap my surrender. Two-one to Lesley and things weren’t looking good for me.
Coming out for round five I was determined to get even but I soon found myself on the receiving end again. It wasn’t completely one way traffic but she was dominating. I was outclassed and, try as I might, she kept getting the upper hand. Not only was she more experienced than me but she clearly wanted this gig and she was using me to show off her skills to Jay and the others. She’d already shown she could pin and submit me. In this round she showed of her power moves and her nasty side, taking me to the mat time and again. In the last minute of the round, she stepped up the pace, delivering a series of throws and slams that knocked the wind out of me and left me completely dazed with Jay counting over me.
As I came to my feet for probably the eight or tenth time in the round Lesley grabbed me by the arm and spun me into a corner post. I slammed back first into the turnbuckles and slumped, arms over the top rope, completely exposed. Lesley closed on me and delivered a series of knee lifts to my fanny, each one eliciting a scream or a groan. As I slumped further in the corner, unable to defend myself. After four or five knee lifts, she bent down and grabbed my calves and pulled me out of the corner. I dropped heavily onto my back on the ring floor. She kept hold of my legs and I expected her to turn me over and lock on a Boston crab.
If she had done so that would have been it – game over and an ignominious 3-1 defeat for me. Instead, she decided to make me suffer. She repeatedly stomped on my poor pussy. I was in agony screaming for her to stop but it wasn’t a submission hold so there was nothing I could do about it. Luckily for me a few seconds later the bell rang. She released my legs and I lay on the canvas clutching myself.
Leah was quickly in the ring and at my side. She helped me to my feet back to my corner where she sat me on a stool and positioned a bucket between my legs. Tears streaming down my face I was in agony still clutching my poor pussy. Leah reached for an ice pack, moved my hands away, pulled the front of my panties down and applied the ice to my aching womanhood.
“Oh God!” I cried as the shock of the ice on my pussy had its inevitably impact on my bladder.
“Quick! Pull your knickers down!” said Leah. But I wasn’t fast enough and a stream of wee spurted forth, soaking my briefs and dripping into the bucket that Leah had position between my legs.
“Oh dear.” Said my second, “Let me help you with that.”
She pulled down my pants, rubbed me down with a towel and placed the ice pack firmly back on my aching pussy. The clock was ticking and it was almost time to start round six. I couldn’t fight in soaking knickers so I stepped out of them and Leah threw them into the bucket as Jay called “seconds out”. Then she left me. I got to my feet and the bell went for the start of the round.
It was make or break time for me. I was determined I wasn’t going to be Lesley’s bitch. I was naked and I was furious with her for her unwarranted attack on my womanhood. I have to admit that at that moment I completely lost it. I flew at her across the ring, driving her back into her own corner and paying her back with multiple knee lifts to the pussy. Then I hurled her across the ring and into the far corner post. As she hit the turnbuckle I charged in after her and body checked her as she rebounded. She slumped back against the corner post and I repeat the whole process again…and again. More knee lifts to the pussy followed and then I grabbed her arm and tossed her to the mat. I kept hold of her arm and tossed her again and again. I was out of control. I had no regard for the rules. I was just beating Lesley up. But Jay wasn’t trying to stop me so it must have been legal.
After two minutes or so my anger was spent. One final throw and she lay in a heap in her own corner while I slumped in mine gasping for breath. Jay started counting over her but Lesley made no attempt to get up. She was finished. As the count reached 8 she looked up at Jay and shook her head. Jay kept counting to 10. The bell sounded and Leah cried out “Well done, Ellen” as the small group applauded politely. For a moment I couldn’t take it in but then I began to realise I’d won, by a knockout!
It would be a long time before I saw Lesley again but I was hooked on fighting and eagerly accepted Jay’s offer to join CLAWS (the Civil Ladies Amateur Wrestling Society).
In those days, as now, the league was a ladder which consisted of eight rungs occupied by ‘active’ fighters who moved up and down the ladder based on their results. Four successive defeats would see a girl ‘deselected’ and replaced by an ‘inactive’ fighter, of which there were usually two. When I joined the club, they were down to just the eight fighters; Christine, Clare, Cassy, Leah, Jane, Sammy, Sylvia and Sian; and Jane was injured - hence the recruiting drive. My knockout victory over Lesley meant I joined the league immediately. Gilly, the winner of the other try out, became the substitute and the girl she beat by three falls to two, Pauline, also joined a couple of years later.
My first official fight at the club was against woman who became a close friend of mine over the years although I never fought her again until relatively recently. Cassy Langford had been with the club for about seven years and had been champion on more than one occasion but as a recently qualified doctor at the age of 27 she was finding it difficult to fit in fighting with her other duties. A recent bid for the title had ended in a devastating defeat at the hands of blonde Sylvia and since then she lost again. Facing me, she was ranked lowest of the league fighters. My first fight was a close-run thing but, in the end, I won by three falls to two in the seventh round. It was to be Cassy‘s last league fight. Having lost three matches in a row she decided to retire and concentrate more on her work. Although she never fought in the league again, she continued to support the club, offering her medical skills and training a number of very successful fighters. She didn’t compete again for another 28 years.
Two more victories followed my win over Cassy, the first over Sylvia and the second over Leah, and by the end of the year I was the undefeated contender for the title against Sian. Sian proved to be a different type of opponent to my two previous ones. The fight was much more sexual with a lot more invasion of my private parts. I’d never really been fingered by a woman before and it came as a bit of a shock. Sian was clearly driven by the sexuality of fighting as well as the desire to win the match. It was a very close-run thing but I paid her back like for like and eventually, in the 7th round, she orgasmed and was counted out. After just four fights I became a new champion.
My first title defence was also my first defeat. I went down 3-1 to Christine, a woman a few weeks younger than me who would become my nemesis throughout my league and senior wrestling career. Sian also lost her match and dropped to fifth in the rankings. My next fight was against Clare another girl I would get to fight regularly over the coming years but one that I was much more compatible with, despite our size disparity. I managed to defeat her 3-1 and got another shot at the title. Christine retained the title beating Leah while further down the pack Sian lost again and slipped to 7th place in the rankings
On the evening of my second title challenge the club was rocked by the surprise departure of Sian, allegedly over a dispute about the use of sex as a weapon in the club’s fights. New girl Mandy, who Sian had bought in and was due to face her that night, ended up fighting Jay. The 30-year-old club president came out of retirement and stepped in for one match. Poor Jay hadn’t fought in five years and was almost 10 years older and probably 15 pounds lighter than Mandy – she didn’t stand a chance. The young northern blonde soundly defeated the veteran champion, knocking her out in the fifth round, and Jay did not return to the ring again for a number of years.
A year after my first league match I won my fight with Christine and became champion again. I successfully defended my title twice, against Clare and Leah, while young Mandy climbed up the rankings. Then, in the last match of 1988, I got to face her for the first and only time at the club. She was a brutal opponent. I didn’t stand a chance. I went two falls behind before she knocked me out in the fifth round.
Although my title dreams were over for the time being, it was only my second defeat in ten fights and I felt confident I could do better against her in a rematch. In January 1989 I beat Sammy to get another shot at the title.
Sammy was a muscular, large breasted girl, originally from Senegal (today she would be described as BAME, back then we called her ‘coloured’), with dark, dusky skin, an afro hairstyle and one of the best breast smoothers I’ve ever been on the receiving end of.
It was a tough fight and I really thought I’d earned my rematch with Mandy but, much to my disappointment, after beating Christine, she left the club to join a new club Sian had set up with some friends in Manchester. This club, the NBFC (Naked Bitches Fighting Club) was a very private affair with the emphasis on fighting for pleasure. To begin with they didn’t even film their fights, let alone sell the videos. At the end of the year a couple of the other girls, Jane and Sylvia, who travelled down from the midlands to fight at CLAWS also left to join the NBFC.
Although I lost to Christine, I won my next match and was back challenging for the title in July, by which time Sammy had beaten Christine and was champion. It was another close match against the powerful African but, again, I won through to score my fifth title win.
Something I should mention here is that although we fought nude and finger fucking and other stimulation as a distraction was not uncommon, the three-minute rounds meant it was hard for a fighter to make her opponent climax during a match. Hard, but not impossible.
Before she left, I had my one and only fight with Jane, the girl I’d replaced when I’d first joined the club. Jane was the youngest of the ‘original 8’ CLAWS fighters and the last one still fighting at the club. She had spent most of her league years in the mid-order and for the past few years been dogged by the knee injury that had taken her out when I joined.
Of the 14 sessions we’d had since I joined, she’d only fought in 6 of them so it was a bit of a surprise to find her challenging me for the title. It was even more of a shock when, in a highly sexually charged fight, she left me orgasming and unable to beat the count – the only time that ever happened to me in my league years.
Jane defended her title against Leah and then left to join Mandy and Sylvia at the NBFC, leaving the title vacant and the club with just seven active fighters. Once again, the NBFC had deprived me of the chance of a rematch. As it turned out Clare’s loss to Christine had been her fourth successive loss and, under club rules, she would have been replaced anyway. Instead, we carried on with six active fighters and Clare was forced it sit it out until a new girl joined us.
As the new decade dawned, the remaining fighters agreed fight topless rather than completely naked, with the emphasis on wrestling rather than sex, much as it had been for the first half of the 1980s. An advantage of this was that we were able to sell our fight videos to a wider audience, particularly in the US where censorship had prevented the sales on nude fights.
In January 1990 Pauline fought Leah for the title vacated by Jane and I fought Sammy for a third time. This time she made her tits count and knocked me out with a breast smoother. It would be another 20 years before anyone beat me like that again.
Wearing clothing, albeit very little, brought new challenges – not least what to wear. I don’t think anyone had a uniform as such but several of us had our favourite outfits. Christine favoured a pair of bikini bottoms with wide blue and silver diagonal stripes. Clare, ever the simple girl, went with white cotton midis but occasionally wore black ones. My personal favourite was a pair of very mini blue briefs with a narrow orange waist band which covered the essentials but usually left the top of my bum crack on display. Apart from my first fight against Lesley I’d never fought with knickers on before. Fortunately, it didn’t bother me (although I hate fighting with a bra) and it was nice not to have your sex invaded so often.
For the next couple of years, I continued to fight regularly and generally stayed in the top 4 or 5 fighters, winning the title on three more occasions but, each time, failing to successfully defend it. At the same time, we began periodic tag team matches. Over 5 years I fought 20 tag matches. Initially I partnered with Pauline but, after she left the club in 1991, I partnered with Clare. I’m proud to say I made a good tag partner and Clare and I won and defended the title many times.
At the start of 1991 things changed dramatically when John and Maggie Robertson sold their gym to Gabi Marshall, an Anglo German health club entrepreneur. Gabi had big plans for both the gym and the club. It turned out that she was a fighter, although she preferred boxing to wrestling, and had chosen the Robertson’s place partly because of CLAWS. At the time there were only two girls interested in boxing at the club, Leah and Jenny, but Gabi quickly found a new fighter, 23-year-old Suzi, and between them they formed a mini league of boxers.
The whole area was undergoing redevelopment and Gabi took the opportunity to build a completely new health club and corporate headquarters on land next to the old building that housed Robertson’s gym. Throughout ‘91 and ‘92 we watched in awe as Gabi’s castle rose next to the old warehouse. A sleek three-story rectangular building, clad in glass and shining metal.
As construction approached completion, Gabi gave us a guided tour of her new HQ and we were stunned by the fighting facilities she’d had incorporated into the building. On the second floor above the gym, hidden in the core of the building, was a two-story high auditorium housing a full-size ring and seating for up to 100 people, all concealed by the offices, changing rooms and workout rooms that surrounded it on the outer faces of the building. One nice touch was the ‘chill out’ area a room between the red and blue corner dressing rooms, with a picture window looking out at the ring, where fighters could relax and watch other girls’ matches. It was amazing. It was clear that Gabi considered CLAWS not just a bit of fun but an integral, if somewhat secret, part of her business strategy and she lavished a lot on the club.
At the start of 1992 Jay chose to come out of retirement and join the wrestling league again. At 34 she became the oldest active fighter since Mary had retired in 1980, but it didn’t stay that way for long. With the new building complete and just weeks before her 36th birthday, Gabi also decided to join the wrestling league. Both of the older women were surprisingly successful, taking a retaining the title. I fought them both and lost on every occasion.
Shortly before I turned 30, in March ’92, we fought in the new building for the first time. I scored my eighth and final title win, taking the title from Christine. Two months later I lost the title to Suzi who, in turn, lost it to Jay in July. I won the right to challenge Jay again in September by beating Gilly in July but failed to regain the title and lost again in November to Gabi, dropping to 5th place.
In March ’93 I faced Jay for a second time. By then she had lost the title to Gabi. It was a hard-fought match but, once again, she defeated me – this time by reversing my almost winning pin. After the match she announced her immediate retirement, leaving me to take on Gabi for the title. My attempt to take the title was unsuccessful. I continued to fight in the league for another three years and faced Gabi twice more.
My final encounter with Gabi in the league happened in May 1996. Once again, I had a shot at the title and once again Gabi beat me. It was probably the most one-sided fight I was ever in. From the opening bell she treated me like a rag doll. I submitted in the first and second rounds before being knocked out two minutes into the third round. I felt so bad after the match that I decided to retire from the league. I had fought 54 singles matches and 20 tag matches. After nine enjoyable years and at the still tender age of 34 I felt my fighting career was over. If only I’d known I’d still be fighting 25 years later.
Two months later when, she turned 40, Gabi decided do the same thing after taking a beating at the hands of Christine. Her last league match went into extra time until, in the 11th round, Christine succeeded in knocking her out. Although she lost the wrestling title Gabi did retire as the boxing champion.
After they retired, Gabi and Jay – and later Clare, Christine and Suzi – continued to fight occasional exhibition fights. Most famously Gabi and Jay fought a 5-match challenge including wrestling, boxing, tag wrestling, mud wrestling and catfighting, which Gabi won three-two.
They often asked me to join them but, although I still worked out a Marshall’s and attended the league events as a spectator, I declined their offers. For the next 12 years I didn’t fight at all until one day I got a call from a lady called Janet Somerville, who made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.
