Easter (Part 2)

The Show Must Go On!

It felt like a lot had happened, but the reality was we were just half way through the Easter Tour and Monday morning we were up and off doing it all again! I was thankful we had Ligero on the team all week. He was obviously extremely close with Trav himself and we have a lot of memories from the early days. It also meant 5 more days of the International classic that is Russia vs. Mexico!

We started in Mablethorpe. Memories of this show - being late and being sore! Still I think it went down alright and the crowd was a lot fuller and livelier than it has been previously at this venue. The following day we were in Southport, where we had a different style of match as we did 2 out of 3 falls. This was a lot slower pace and had a real main event feel to it, which is quite different to what we usually do on camp shows. That said, it was probably my favourite of the week and was well received.

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday we were at Brean, Camber Sands and Crazy Bear near Nottingham (did I mention I was driving the van the whole time – this blog should be from Caribbean finance to the boyhood dream of being a white van man!). These three were ok but not our best (especially Crazy Bear  - a quirky little restaurant in a holiday park where we got changed in a cupboard and the crowd truly didn’t give a shit!). However, they were still all great fun and it is clear that whatever happens the handshake spot will always be over! Even in Crazy Bear where one kid photographed my crossed fingers as evidence that I was planning on doing something dastardly!

The remainder of that weekend saw a triple threat encounter in Oswaldthistle - Russia vs. USA vs. England – Boris vs. Sebb Strife (yep American now) vs. Terry Isit. I finished off this weekend with good guy Thunder taking on Bully Boy Carter in our first singles encounter all the way down in Felixstowe. I got very good at Rumbles this weekend too. Runner Up and then winner the next night! Go me!

Easter Comedown!

So finished with a grueling tour and back to my non wrestling work, but not long before we had three more shows the following weekend and a superb seminar run by Marty Jones, Johnny Saint, Johnny Kidd and Keith Myett.

We were firstly back in Blackpool Tower as I faced JD Bryant (clear hometown advantage for the former Blackpool Blond!). The crowd was a little down from last time, but still enjoyable. The second show was in Lytham St Annes as I faced off against Ace Matthews for the first time to a much livelier and packed out crowd. The weekend finished with a small Birthday party show with Boris against a babyface Danny Hudson (usually plays Cousin Jake). In something I never would have predicted this was my favourite match of the weekend!

The month of April was then topped off by a fantastic Grapple show in Low Moor Club in Bradford. We had a sell out crowd and a brilliant atmosphere, especially for our Bradford vs. Leeds main event between Liam Lazarus, Mark Rolls, Matt Marsay vs. David Graves, Danny Binks and Benjamin Rock. I faced a familiar face in the Muscle Cat Saxon, but quite a different style of match than we usually do but went down very well too!

And Last Weekend

Last weekend started with a small show in Mexborough where I faced a masked wrestler named Super Porky and then had a six man tag of myself, Bully Boy Carter and Peter Pumpkin vs. Super Porky, Hillbilly Butch Brown and Dancing Danny Duggan (Hudson). The first match we struggled with a bit and the slightly lackluster crowd didn’t help either. However, we did still have a few ‘belly’ chants going as the Porkster did his top rope, no wait middle rope, no wait bottom rope splash!

The 6 man was ridiculous! Dancing Danny Duggan issued a dance off challenge and the match started with everyone doing their signature dance moves (mine being bad out of time dancing followed by the Cossack leg thing). I say everyone, but that’s not actually true. A great deal of respect was lost for ‘Dancing’ Danny as he feigned a knee injury right before and didn’t even do it. Bully Boy Carter certainly upstaged Danny this time round!

The next day it was the debut show of Hereford Wrestling. This was a show put on by Mark Gedge who used to wrestle under the name Domino. A bit of JC trivia for you, Domino and JC started training on the same day and he is one of the first people I ever spoke to in wrestling. Turns out he is a pretty decent promoter, as this was all run very professionally, was a great show and a good house for a debut too. I faced the Belgian Bull for the first time where I was suplexed a lot and Samoan dropped off the top rope, which I actually really enjoyed! Good job done by all.

The weekend finished with a show in Barnsley for Megaslam. The draw wasn’t great, especially for Megaslam who have been absolutely smashing it this year. That said I did enjoy my match as a faced off against Dancing Danny Duggan (who has had a miraculous knee recovery). I did this as Big John Thunder, one half of the Greatest Tag Team in the World – the Motorway Men (please refer to last Summer’s blogs if this is confusing!). The show was finished off with a rumble, which I so nearly won! Big John then went back to his life on the road, driving the motorways in his pick-up helping broken down vehicles and generally being a bit of a bad-ass.

Final Thoughts

So back up to date with the blog right before another week long tour of the UK’s seaside resorts. It certainly has been tough juggling all this wrestling, Grapple and my other work. That said, I am feeling in better shape than I have in a long time and motivation is high to step it up a notch in preparation for the big Summer Tour. 

Thanks for reading!

JCT

Easter (Part 1)

Firstly, my apologies for the lack of updates recently! A poor excuse, but I just have not had the time juggling wrestling, along with my other work! Wrestling has continued to be extremely busy working for Megaslam, along with Grapple continuing to flourish with a recent sell out show in Bradford and now offering an extra training session a week too. 

The month of April was especially hard for the British wrestling community due to the passing of the ‘Shooting Star’ Kris Travis. An awesome wrestler and more importantly a family member and a close friend to a lot of people. Obviously a very tough time for all those who knew him and something I go into a bit more detail about below.

Ugandan Challenge!

All the way back in late March, Grapple had its debut show at our new training facility at Fight Science. A small draw of 80, but considering this was essentially a show in a gym I was pleased. The show itself was decent too. I did double duty as firstly I masked up in a team called Ward 13 in a fun match against Ryden, Shadow Smith and Thomas Andrews. I then faced off against our champion the ‘Ugandan Warrior’ Nsereko as JC Thunder, which seemed to get a very positive reaction from the crowd so job well done on that too. Nsereko is definitely a guy to watch.

Easter Prelude

The weekend before Easter we had two shows. Firstly Boris faced Terry Isit at Rotherham football stadium (erm a conference room in the stadium) followed by a tag match with Cousin Jake against Terry and Bully Boy. The crowd was very much into the two matches and surprisingly a man named Bully Boy can be a huge fan favourite!

Later that weekend we were in Withernsea, a quick persona change and a good guy JC Thunder had a rematch with my Sebb Strife (housemates collide part 2!). I always enjoy wrestling Sebb and both matches have been great. Looking back I remember both these shows very fondly. Both smaller shows, but sometimes that can lead to the most fun type of matches and there was a great atmosphere at both of them!  

The Easter Tour Begins

The Easter Tour started in Bridlington where I faced off against The Muscle Cat Saxon again as a babyface (good guy). As with the day before I really enjoyed this and am fast becoming a lot more comfortable with this position. The only problem was a few fans at this venue were asking me why I’m not Russian anymore! Don’t know what you’re talking about!

The next two shows saw me in mixed tag action. Tuesday in Southport Boris, Cousin Jake and Lizzy Styles faced David Graves, Saxon and Nixon. From memory this was a bit dis-jointed. I enjoyed the start as I wrestled my old nemesis Graves, but then we were a bit all over the place and I managed to smash Dave’s nose up which I felt very guilty about! The next day Styles and Boris faced Ligero and Nixon in Prestatyn. This one went a little better and the hot crowd at the Welsh Pontins was fully behind the team of Ligs and Nix.

Some Tragic News

On the Wednesday morning I received a phone call from Brad Taylor who broke the news that Kris Travis had passed away that morning. Kris was a good friend of mine and we used to be very close in our early days of wrestling. The news cut through me like a knife. I felt a mixture of sadness and guilt that I could have done more for him. Feelings I kept to myself as I ran our next show in Brean. I also had two matches that day, against Saxon and then another tag with Jake against Saxon and Terry. I don’t think they were that good. I can’t really remember now and I didn’t really care as I just wanted to get through it if I’m honest. It was difficult being in this strange little place called Brean with no one that really knew Trav. I compensated by getting very drunk that evening and going to bed at 4am, maybe not the most sensible mid-way through a wrestling tour but that’s how I dealt with it.

Quite rightly everything then became about Trav that weekend and the weeks that followed. The next day we travelled up to Nottingham for a Megaslam show. This was started by a 10 bell tribute with all the wrestlers out by the ring. I wrestled Joseph Conners, which was a good match given the circumstances and it was nice to wrestle against someone who had also been close to Trav. The night was capped off by an excellent main event of Ligero and CJ Banks in memory of their friend. It was a joy to watch. 

After Nottingham we drove all the way to Camber Sands where we arrived at 7am! Drained in every sense, we were told there was no chalet for us! After waiting around for what seemed like forever we were finally able to get a few hours sleep before a midday show, which again I was running. It all seems quite crazy writing this down, but at the time we were just getting on with it and didn’t really think too much about how tired we were or anything.

The next day we were in Pakefield, which I was running too (as well as being on the phone to Grapple who were running up in York). That evening we raced up to Derby where I was against CJ Banks for HOPE wrestling who were doing a show in memory of Trav. It certainly was a fun and entertaining match and I hope one that Trav would have enjoyed. Boris even joined Juice’s life train as we downed vodka’s from the bar as a toast! Great job by HOPE wrestling and Harvey Dale for dedicating this night to Trav. 

This time certainly was difficult for many people. However, I must say how good it was to be around so many other people who knew and loved him. It was also amazing how the whole of British wrestling all came together and paid tribute that weekend and in the following weeks. C4l. RIP Trav!

Final Thoughts

This time was exhausting and emotional! It felt like a lot had happened, but in reality we were only half way through the Easter Tour. The next morning I would be up and off again to a different part of the UK. Check out my blog in a couple of days for part 2!

Thanks for reading!

JCT