Ad Santel

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Ad Santel, born Adolph Ernst, was a practitioner of catch wrestling. Santel claimed he was paid by Frank Gotch to purposely injure the knee of Georg Hackenschmidt during a training session, in order to insure that Hackenschmidt wasn't 100% for his rematch against Gotch. Ad Santel fought one of the early clash-of-the-styles matches in modern martial arts history against Tokugoro Ito, a 5th degree black belt in Judo from Japan, who claimed to be the world Judo champion. Santel defeated Ito when a slamming takedown rendered the judoka unable to continue the point and proclaimed himself the world Judo champion. Ito returned the favor in their next match, however, defeating Santel by submission.

Ad Santel fought Judokas from the Kodokan from 1914-1921. The judokas he fought included 4th degree black belt Daisuke Sakai and 5th degree black belt Reijiro Nagata, all of whom Santel defeated. Ad Santel also drew with 5th degree black belt Hikoo Shoji. The challenge matches stopped after Santel gave up on the claim of being the world Judo champion in 1921 in order to pursue a career in full time professional wrestling. The impact of these performances on Japan was immense. The Japanese were fascinated by the submissions taught in catch wrestling. Japanese fighters travelled to Europe in order to either participate in various tournaments or to learn catch wrestling at European schools such as Billy Riley's Snake Pit in Wigan, UK.

Santel lost his World Heavyweight Championship to Gobar Goho in 1922 in San Francisco.