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Hanoi (AFP) – Confronted with a machete, the fighter leaps and locks his legs across the different man’s neck, bringing him crashing right down to a cacophony of cheers.
That is vovinam, Vietnam’s acrobatic martial artwork with roots courting again to the nation’s battle for independence, and it’s exhibiting on the SEA Video games for the primary time since 2013.
Proponents are skilled to make use of not solely their fingers and legs to grapple a rival to the bottom, but additionally fend off assailants armed with blades.
Brief for “Vo Viet Nam” (actually “Vietnamese Martial Arts”) it was impressed by nationalists who sought an finish to the nation’s French colonial rule.
Created within the Nineteen Thirties, it borrows from components of Chinese language kung fu and different Asian types however was crafted to go well with the Vietnamese of the time.
“Up to now, the Vietnamese folks have been small,” SEA Video games silver medallist Tran The Thuong informed AFP exterior a packed gymnasium close to the capital Hanoi the place the artists, women and men, grappled in matches.
“(It was comprised of) the most effective components of different martial arts and mixed to suit the Vietnamese.”
Selling nationalist undertones, vovinam went on a rocky street. It was first suppressed by the French earlier than being banned by each the South Vietnamese and the later communist authorities.
However masters of it endured, and it was allowed as soon as extra in its house nation, earlier than spreading to greater than 70 nations internationally.
First launched on the SEA Video games in 2011, the game had a second exhibiting in 2013 in Myanmar however was absent for a number of years earlier than returning to the ring in Hanoi.
Flying strikes, punches, kicks
On Saturday, over a thousand followers crowded a gymnasium corridor about 40km (25 miles) north of central Hanoi to look at seven nations contest for a few of the Video games’ 15 vovinam gold medals.
Earlier than the spectators, proponents in blue uniforms with colored belts tied across the waist confronted one another as they fought for factors.
Occasions within the sport both happen round a one-on-one struggle the place combatants battle for factors, or in a choreographed present the place two or extra proponents exhibit their abilities.
In a single show involving a machete, Thuong and a companion disarmed one another utilizing flying strikes, punches, kicks and grappling manuevers.
“The talents of groups at this SEA Video games are very excessive. The athletes from different international locations have acquired this martial artwork very effectively,” he mentioned, after judges awarded him the silver and the gold to Cambodia.
“Even Vietnam misplaced in opposition to them. It is not simply the Vietnamese which might be good in vovinam.”
A small however steadily rising supporter base, it has greater than 2.5 million practitioners immediately everywhere in the world, based on state-owned Vietnam Information Company.
With a presence on the SEA Video games and with its personal world championships, its leaders need to develop the game’s horizons previous its present area of interest, Vietnam’s vovinam workforce head coach Nguyen Hong Qui mentioned.
“Vovinam thus far has been developed in additional than 70 international locations on this planet and there are regional and world tournaments,” he mentioned.
“We’re wanting ahead to develop vovinam additional so as to put it into the Olympics.”
© 2022 AFP
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