MexicoReporter.com pays a visit to a Lucha Libre school in Mexico city, where the next generation of fighters are learning the art of the Lucha

Mexican Youngsters Wrestle with Fame

This is Ringo Mendoza, the Lucha Libre fighter and Maestro interviewed by NewCorrespondent.com some weeks ago. The photo is courtesy of Luz Montero.

See here for the interview.

First it was Leono (the Lion), Metalico and Tigre Blanco (the White Tiger) up against Loco Max (Crazy Max), ArkAngel and Doctor X. Then Blue Panther, Heavy Metal and El Sagrado (the Scared) had it out with Hijo de Lizmark (son of Lizmark), Averno and Mephisto. All insults form the crowd involved a combination of the fighters’ mothers and female prostitutes and the array of ostentatious Lycra outfits was jaw-dropping.It’s a regular Tuesday night at the Lucha Libre in downtown Mexico City’s Arena Coliseo, where for the price of an expensive pint of beer in London you can watch the country’s favourite Lucha Trios fight it out, Mexico-style.

As I prepare my equipment next to me, a man straps the mask of Metalico, his favourite fighter, to the head of his two year old daughter. He then jumps up out of his seat and holds her aloft towards the fighters preparing to do battle in the ring. She, in turn, extends her middle finger on his command and raises her arm. Priceless.

We HAD to speak to him, and he was only too happy to talk. Apologies for the poor quality of the photographs – there’s not much light in underground parking lots.

Click here for the roar of the Lucha Crowd and here for a sense of what it’s like.

Ringo Mendoza RG
NewCorrespondent: NC

RM: My name is Genaro Jacobo Contreras, but in the world of the spectacular Lucha Libre, for 39 years of professional fighting and 8 years of amateur fighting, I’ve always used the name Ringo Mendoza – here in Mexico, as well as Japan, Spain, and France. I’ve always been Ringo Mendoza.

NC: How many championships have you won?

RM: I started by winning a Middleweight championship in the West of the country, afterwards I returned to go to Guadalajara and I won the next stage up, but not quite the heavyweight. After four or five years I went up a category and won the worldwide middleweight championship, the world championship for the next stage up, and after that the world doubles championship, the national trio championship and the world championship for the NWA [US tournament], and the world championship of the Lucha Libre Council. In total, I’ve been fighting in world championships for 28 years.

NC: How many times have you shaved the heads of other fighters? [when a fighter wins in the Lucha Libra, he takes the ‘caballera’ of his opponent, meaning he shaves the head of the man he has beaten]

RM: In 39 years of fighting I’ve done it more than 80 times.

NC: And how many masks have you taken? [It is also common for the winner to damask his opponent if he is victorious].

RM: Masks? Only one, from the Texas Ranger, which I got here in Arena Mexico. After I won it from the Texas Ranger the Dog Aguayo [another fighter] was annoyed with me and he and I faced each other in a fight, and here in the Arena Mexico I shaved the head of Dog Aguayo.

NC: What are your most important victories?

RM: The Dog Aguayo, El Faraon, Sangre Chicana, Tony Salazar, Rubi Rubalcaba, el Angel Blanco (padre), Fabuloso Blondie, El Scorpio, Masacre, MS 1, Los Misioneros de la Muerte.

NC: What do you think of the lucha libre now compared to ten years ago?

RM: The Lucha has to be made up of set moves and responses, the techniques – if you make a move he makes another. The Lucha is never going to stop being so, if you watch the films of the Greeks, in these films you can see clearly how they use moves of the fight, what’s more is they use a lot of oil on the body so they can’t get a hold of each other.

Actually, the Lucha has changed a lot because there are many jumps now, they fight in the air, everything is going to evolve but the true Lucha Libre will never be lost – the moves and the responding moves.

NC: Why did you want to be a fighter when you were young?

RM: I didn’t want to be a fighter but my parents separated when I was five or six years old, and so I had to sell newspapers, load baskets, sell pens and ice-cream, shine shoes. During this time I met my teacher, Diablo Velazco – the teacher of the Mil Mascaras (thousand masks), de Alfonso Dantes, de Franco Colombo, del Faraon, del Solitario, del Satanico, de Alberto Munoz, de Atlantis, and many fighters from the school in Guadalajara. He passed on his teachings to me and I inherited all of his knowledge – all the movements and responses.

I’m not angry with the new fighters that do a lot of acrobatics – at the moment that’s the fashion. When that passes they’ll come to feel that – at the moment they can do those jumps but eventually they’ll hurt themselves and then they can’t do it – because of that the fighters don’t last as long as me – I’ve been a professional for 39 years.

NC: Can you show us the scars that you have on your head?

RM: Yes of course – these are bites from other fighters.

The Arena Mexico in Mexico City’s Colonial Centro was buzzing as people clambered over each other to gain tickets to the la Lucha por el Campeonato Mundial de Parejas – the global championship for doubles. This was a revenge fight – the week before had seen the infamous Dr. Wagner and Ultimo Guerrero defeat el Mistico y el Negro Casas. Now all were back for more.

In the capable hands of locals, we negotiated the steps of the city’s impressive arena that teamed with men, women and children, touts selling front row seats, and vendors pimping a million variations of the famous Lucha Libre masks (‘mascara’). The boiling crowd was illuminated by the harsh neon lights outside the stadium, and the aroma from stalls selling everything edible from tacos to hotdogs mixed with the smell of bodies crowded together, cigarette smoke, beer and the familiar traffic emissions of Ciudad de Mexico.

Men and women queued in separate lines, squashed together front to back, to await the thorough search from stadium security that resulted in the confiscation of your correspondent’s equipment, foiling my ambitious under-cover reporting project. Next time.

We bounded up the bare stone steps to the vast interior of the arena which is also known as the cathedral of Lucha Libre given its 70-year plus history. The massive, dimly lit space was packed to its full capacity of 16,500 people. The thunder of the crowd reached my ears and vibrated in my chest before we reached the end of the stairs, fuelling the adrenalin rush one gets as the best music gigs or at those dangerous moments in life. The tension in the air was palpable. Huge groups of excited young men belted out the staple, four-syllable staccato whistle at every opportunity that echoed around the stadium the entire evening. Translated, it basically means: ‘Fuck your Mother’. Welcome to Mexico.

Our plastic seats in the stalls were behind a metal fence, designed to stop zealous fans from lobbing paper beer cups and popcorn cartons down onto the audience below. The view of the fighting ring was regularly obscured by fervent fans, standing up to scream or whistle down into the arena below.

Lucha Libre is the perfect combination of real fighting skills and exuberant showmanship, at the core of which lies the phenomenal Mexican sense of humor which refuses to take life too seriously. Dressed in the famous lycra leotards which stretch from the crotch up over their shoulders the Luchadores threw themselves and each other around the ring in practiced, melodramatic moves that had the audience screaming and rolling in the aisles.

La Lucha’s biggest fans are Mexico’s working poor, known here as the ‘popular classes’, and entire families with tiny children were out in force, many of them sporting T-Shirts brandishing images of their favourite fighters. “Wagner! Wagner! Wagner!” chanted my side of the crowd, as all 98kg, 1.7 metres of Dr. Wagner threw his opponent clear out of the ring and onto the laps of the seated audience below. The crowd went wild for that – the more outrageous the moves the better, and more triumphant the fighter’s sequential glory dance.

When the fighters were actually inside the ring rather than cavorting on its edges, the Lucha appeared a combination of dancing and wrestling, the participants bouncing themselves against the ropes to gain momentum before launching themselves into their opponents with awesome gusto.

The fight was over quickly, not allowing the audience anytime for complacency. El Mistico and Negras Casas swept to victory to avenge their defeat earlier in the week, and my hosts – some of which had Dr Wagner emblazoned across their backs and fronts – left disappointed, shouting conversations at each other as they cursed the victims and gestured wildly with their hands.

It was a whole other wrestling match to get outside of the arena and reclaim my confiscated equipment. Vendors selling posters of the victors in their trademark masks competed with taxi drivers keen to make the most of the thousands of fans spilling out of the stadium into the warm Mexican evening.

At least the nature of La Lucha means its stars generally live to see another day, and there’s always an opportunity for a rematch.