Family’s Grip on Sports Spans Generation

Dave Patton already has proven he’s the best arm wrestler around. His brother Ray just might be the second best.

And their mom was placing in regional tournaments when she was 57.

The Pattons have been rolling through the sport for 11 years. Ray has won five world championships and two national titles. But he rarely beats Dave, who is three years older and has won 31 world championships, plus nine in wrist wrestling. Dave was the first person ever to achieve that double.

“He pretty much knows he can’t beat me,” says Dave, an electrical engineer from Centreville, Va. “When we are in tournaments together, we sort of go through the motions. He only wins when I let him.

“One time, in a tournament at Atlanta, he and I were the last two winners in the division. It was a double-elimination and we had to wrestle each other. The loser had to wrestle this other guy in the loser’s bracket for the right to get into the final.

“I knew I could beat the guy in the loser’s bracket easily and Ray would have a hard time. So I let Ray beat me, I went down and beat the guy, and then I beat my brother for the championship.”

Patton currently is training for the Yukon Jack Arm Wrestling Championships, the premier event in the sport, which is worth a total purse of $10,000. The winners get $1,500 -- obviously, you don’t make big money in arm wrestling.

“There’s not a tremendous amount of money in the sport, although what sponsors like Yukon Jack do for it is give the sport some credibility and some visibility,” he said. “If I didn’t enjoy it, I would not do it. But the money is nice. I won’t say it is not important at all. Generally when there is money, there is better competition.

“If there are two tournaments at the same time, I’ll go to the one with the prize money.”

Patton usually wrestles at 160 pounds, although he has competed at various weights in the same event.

“I guess sometimes I go to a tourney and feel I will win and there is no competition,” he admits. “I used to go in and enter all the weight classes and that’s real tough on your arm. You can be wrestling guys who are 250 and 260 pounds.”

He’s had plenty of practice going up against bigger wrestlers.

“In high school, I used to beat all the big football players and coaches and I weighed 140,” he says. “I even beat the guys who bench-pressed 450 pounds.”

The two biggest wins for Patton have come at the 1986 “Over The Top” championships that accompanied the Sylvester Stallone film of the same name and was worth $5,000, and the 1981 wrist wrestling nationals at Petaluma, Calif., made famous by Snoopy.

“When I was a little kid, I started arm wrestling and I saw the wrist wrestling on TV,” he says. “I told my mom I was going to be on that show. I had it set in my mind.

“When I got into it for the first time, it still was shown on ABC Wide World of Sports, and I won it. That was a big thrill.

“The other highlight would be in 1986, when we had the ‘Over The Top’ championships in Las Vegas. The movie didn’t depict arm or wrist wrestling at all, it was a gross misrepresentation. They tried to make it look like professional wrestling.

“Sure, we have a few guys of that type, but most of the people are clean cut. We have a lot of white-collar workers in the sport.

“The typical person thinks about two salt-stained sailors sitting across a bar from each other, with a cigar hanging out of the mouth. It’s just not like that. This is an organized sport, with lots of rules.

“You can’t even use foul language.”