Nothing but the soles of your boots can touch the ground. One fall and you lose. There is no time limit. Wrestling is outside on the dirt, grass, and rocks. There is no grabbing of legs in this style. There’s no age and no weight limit. Your techniques need to work on anyone of any size. This is quite unforgiving and forces the wrestlers to be extremely good tacticians, have very good counters, and - compared to other styles of Bökh and Shuai Jiao - very very good sweeps and kick outs.

In the Qing dynasty the Manchu elite of the empire took on wrestling, drawing mostly from Uvur Mongol Bokh. In the Manchu language they often called this Buku (stemming from the word Bokh). By the late 1800s, Hui and Han Chinese people were learning this art and making it their own. This has since become Chinese Wrestling / Shuai Jiao. Today Shuai Jiao is one of China’s great fight sports and ethnic Mongols maintain a heavy presence in it.

Yes, there are 5 main styles. Two of these have the most visibility. In China’s Inner Mongolia region, the primary style is Janggat Mongol Bokh (Jangga is the necklace of ribbons worn by champions) which is known for its leather wrestling jackets. It’s also called Uvur Mongol Bokh, Uvur Mongol meaning southern Mongol, referring to China’s Inner Mongolian region. Khalkha Bokh is the primary style of the country of Mongolia where most of the people there are Khalkha Mongols. These two styles are similar but have different jackets (zodog / jodag), different pants, and the Khalkha Bokh style allows the grabbing of legs and both hands and the soles of the feet can touch the ground (without losing) where in Janggat Bokh only the soles of the feet can touch.