My name is Mr. Ruslan C Pashayev. I am a Professional Ballroom/Dancesport competitor (athlete), coach and choreographer from Columbus, Ohio, United States of America. I was born in 1980 in the City of Baku in Azerbaijan SSR (one of the former Soviet Union’s socialist republics) which currently is an independent country on the Caspian Sea called Azerbaijan Republic.

I started doing ballroom dance sport at the early age of 7 and competing at the age of 9. Throughout most of my childhood, teenage and college years I continued my dance education. When I turned 21 I turned professional and began teaching ballroom dance sport to other people, sharing with them my knowledge. I was engaged in other sports as well such as basketball, football and kickboxing.

I also graduated from the oil and gas academy and have a Master Degree in Petroleum Engineering. Throughout my 12 year long career in the oil industry I worked for such companies as Halliburton (USA) and Baker Hughes (USA) as well as quite a few other internationally famous oil companies.

Since I was 12 I was a big fan of amateur (international Olympic styles) wrestling as well as of pro wrestling (catch wrestling) and especially of the history of that combative sport. In 2005 I started studying wrestling history as a hobby. The main focus of my studies is Western European Catch Hold traditional folk styles of wrestling. In 2019 I published a book about the origin and evolution of Lancashire Catch-as-catch-can wrestling called “The Story of Catch.”

I am an expert-member of the International Traditional Sports Team of the Instytut Rozwoju Sportu i Edukacji (the Institute of Sport Development and Education), Warsaw, Poland (http://www.traditionalsports.org/). My mission is to help the revival of the forgotten wrestling games.

Currently I continue my pro dancing career as well as keep doing my wrestling history studies.