The Heat or the Humidity?

Kirk Donahue vs Dimitri, Wrestler Spotlight: Kirk Donahue (BG East)

Dimitri is new this year to BGE, but because he knows his way around a wrestling ring, he hit the ground running at the May 2nd Wrestling with Pride in South Florida, outperforming (in my opinion) all the company's regulars except Kirk and Ace Aarons, who fought in the opening event. Dimitri out-heeled just about everybody on the strength of his French accent alone, but his taunts and sadistic opportunism against a game but ill-prepared opponent took the heat over the top.

In a (too) longish prologue, Dimitri reestablishes his role as the stereotypical haughty and difficult Frenchman. Kirk, by contrast, is the regular plainspoken American guy. The rules for winning this contest, as he patiently explains them, are "You need a pin, a submission, and a knockout." Posedowns and tests of strength follow, but proper fighting commences about five or six minutes into the 31-minute video. Kirk dominates the next two and a half minutes with classic pro-wrestling moves, culminating in a three-count pin, the match's first fall.  In retaliation, and in a heartbeat, classic sore loser Dimitri strikes Kirk's neck with his forearm. This is when the match gets tasty.

For the next six minutes, Dimitri systematically puts Donahue through the wringer. Kirk fights back, to be sure, but it's on Dimitri's shift that the action turns all-out mean. The struggle wears and tears on both wrestlers, and the Frenchman evens the scorecard with a pinfall just short of the video's halfway point. I'm an ardent fan of both these men, so their battle both excites and frustrates me - a stimulating combination of emotions for me.

Unsurprisingly (and as hoped for), Kirk and Dimitri tie in the second stage of the contest, too - a fall by submission for each  - in the process escalating the enmity between these two. The final seven minutes is more trial by ordeal than athletic contest, but both players are splendid in their exhaustion, circling each other with clenched bare fists, looking to shorten the trauma as expediently as possible. Both lay waste to themselves in their drive to lay waste to their antagonist in the antepenultimate proof of total unequivocal conquest. The savagery unleashed equals everything I've seen of these two in previous matches.

I could have skipped the first 10 minutes of this event and be none the worse for it. The last 10 minutes are gritty and wonderful - extra-fine work by both talented wrestlers. If I say I find the outcome satisfying, I give nothing away. I lustfully idolize both these men. To say more than that would spoil the fight for readers who haven't watched it yet.

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