He did the most important thing for armwrestling: he won the media! He knew that without television and newspapers, armwrestling would remain just a bar entertainment and no one would call us athletes.

Dave Devoto was 24 years old in 1956 when his father-in-law suggested one day that they go to Giraldi’s, a local watering hole in Petaluma, California.

To his surprise, the saloon was packed with town folks cheering on their favorites in an arm wrestling tournament.

“It was only for right-handed people and there was only one weight division for all the applicants regardless of their weight,” 

recalls 91-year-old Devoto in an interview with Sports History Weekly.

Another great thing he did for armwrestling was... going to Russia! Thanks to that, thousands of new competitors came to the sport.

He traveled the globe with his entourage of American and Canadian athletes, including making multiple trips to Russia where the U.S. reigned supreme over its rivals.

“We were ahead of the world at that time. Later on, they turned dominant.”

Petaluma, the capital of armwrestling!

The matches began In Gilardi's saloon In Petaluma, CA. in 1952. Bill Soberanes, a young journalist was the founder of the organized sport. He was the Inspiration for the annual Petaluma, then Northern California and then the California armwrestling championship. In 1962 Bill and Dave Devoto got together to form the World's Wristwrestling Championship, Inc. and take it to one of Petaluma's largest auditoriums. The event was tremendously successful and exciting things began to happen.

SNOOPY!

In 1968 Charles Schultz did 11 comic strips where snoopy was coming to Petaluma to win the World's Wristwrestling Championship. Unfortunately In the final strip he was eliminated because the official armwrestling rules stated you must lock your thumbs with the opposing competitor. Snoopy had no thumb. Drats. These comic strips were done in dozens of different languages and distributed through out the world.

In 1969 Dave Devoto contracted with the American Broadcasting Corporation and the World's Wristwrestling Championship began a wonderful l6 year relationship with ABC's Wide World of Sports. Armwrestling came of age.

HIGHEST RATED SHOW

A story in Playboy magazine substantiated the fact that our televised event was the highest rated show in the young history of Wide World of Sports. Most of the competitors in the sport today first became aware of Armwrestling through ABC's productions of the Wide World of Sports World's Wristwrestling Championship. The televised championships ran from 1969 through 1984. We love Wide World of Sports.

In October 1995 the event was filmed by the Learning Channel and shown four times throughout the World. The World's Wristwrestling - Armwrestling Championship is always held the second Saturday in October in Petaluma, California.

On October 12, 1996 the event was filmed by NBC's World News Today and shown throughout the World on October 13, 1996.

On October 14, 2000 the event was filmed by CBS and shown on the 16th on the Bryant Gumbel show.  Part of the event was also shown on the Evening Magazine weeks later.