Fight Like A Guy: ICW Fierce Females promoter Mikey Whiplash
We were in Glasgow at the weekend for the second ICW: Fierce Females show, and we left calling it “the best women’s wrestling card we’ve seen this year” – so a few days after the show and with time to reflect, we thought we’d better get in touch with the promoter/booker of Fierce Females and get up to speed with what’s going on north of the border – so here’s Mikey Whiplash! Mikey’s a longtime veteran of the European wrestling scene as a performer, so we plot the road map which saw him get involved with Insane Championship Wrestling and eventually into promoting women’s wrestling. We talk about a lot of the talent in Scotland, including but not limited to the two main eventers from last weekend’s show, Kay Lee Ray and Viper, discuss possible TV deals in the pipeline, Mikey’s learning curve on international women’s wrestling, and the promoter problems in the last 24 hours before last weekend’s show. You all know about the last minute change of venue? Well, did you know they almost didn’t have a title belt to present to the winner? We also get an inside track on how regularly these shows are likely to be held, the possibility of future international talent and Mikey’s philosophy of what he wants Fierce Females to be. We’ve already told you that the world needs to pay attention to ICW:FF after last weekend – well, here’s the chance to get all the stories. Check it out.
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ICW: Fierce Females – Luke… Who’s Yer Da? results (now updated with photos and thoughts)
After a successful debut show last September, Insane Championship Wrestling‘s all-female off-shoot Fierce Females returns with its second event. Entitled Luke… Who’s Yer Da? (marking the fact that today is Star Wars Day), the card will see the first Fierce Females Champion crowned in the culmination of a tournament which has been running over the last few months on ICW shows across Scotland, though a spanner was thrown into the works a few days ago…
April Davids, who had made it to the semi-finals has been forced to pull out of her match after having an injection into her injured shoulder which means she needs to take some time off to recover. That leaves Viper without an opponent for the evening, and leaves the question hanging about whether a replacement opponent will be found, or if she will advance to the final to face the winner of the other semi between Kay Lee Ray and Rhia O’Reilly.
Elsewhere on the card, Leah Von Dutch – who made her English debut last Saturday at Pro Wrestling: EVE’s Special Edition III show – makes her first appearance in Scotland today, taking on Carmel Jacob. Another woman making her Scottish debut is Crazy Mary Dobson, who is making a flying visit to face Bete Noire.
The Ringbelles team is on hand in Glasgow to bring you results as they happen – click after the jump and find out who’s going to walk away as the first Fierce Females Champion… (more…)
Ringbelles Roundup (19 February 2013) – WSU/BLOW clash, Fierce Females and more
Earlier this month, there was a clash of shows, with no more than 70 minutes drive between the two. In Voorhees, NJ, you had a double-header featuring Women Superstars Uncensored in the afternoon followed by a Combat Zone Wrestling card. Meanwhile, 65 miles away in Metuchen, NJ, there was a Bombshell Ladies Of Wrestling event followed by a show from its parent company Pro Wrestling Syndicate. Critically, the WSU show was better than the (frankly poor) BLOW event, though the latter boasted the larger audience number. For all that anybody knows, it could have been more, but there were hundreds of fans down the I-95 watching another couple of promotions running at approximately the same time. It meant that fans had to choose which show they wanted to see, and was a clash which felt unfortunate. It was very unlikely to happen again.
Or was it…? (more…)
Pro Wrestling: EVE – No Man’s Land 2 results – now updated with thoughts, photos & Nikki Storm interview
Pro Wrestling: EVE returns today for its first show since its Wrestle Fever iPPV with title controversies to be settled, and the build towards introducing a new championship.
Heading the card is Emi Sakura defending the EVE title against former champ Nikki Storm, who won and lost the belt on the iPPV last November, defeating Alpha Female before losing an impromptu defence to Sakura. The Gatoh Move founder was meant to defend the belt against Carmel Jacob yesterday, but due to a schedule change in her flight, she didn’t make it to the Preston City Wrestling card in time. Instead, Jacob – who presumably will get a title shot in the future instead – defeated Kay Lee Ray, who limped away from the match with a broken toe.
Ray was meant to face Blue Nikita, but that match was scrapped after Nikita suffered head and neck trauma in a car accident earlier this week. As a result, she has been slotted into the match between Alpha and Shanna to make it a 3-way.
Also on the card are three quarter final matches in the EVE Tag Team Championship tournament, with The Lovely Peppers (Kirsty Love & Pollyanna Peppers) facing Kasey & Leah Owens, Ama-Reilly (Amazon Ayesha Ray & Rhia O’Reilly) against She-X (Bete Noire & Viper), and the Glamour Gym (Carmel Jacob & Sara-Marie Taylor) meeting April Davids and a mystery partner. The other contest will be the promotion’s second Three Minute Warning match featuring 15 wrestlers in a mix of a Gauntlet Match and a Royal Rumble.
Lee Burton is at the show in Preston, England, and will be updating the results as they happen, so click after the jump and keep hitting refresh for updates. (more…)
Pro Wrestling: EVE – Wrestle Fever results (now updated with thoughts, photos and an interview with Angelina Love)
It has been 19 months since their previous encounter, and tonight, the pair meet again. Pro Wrestling: EVE Champion Alpha Female defends the title against number one contender Nikki Storm, with Storm possessing a psychological advantage in that the only defeat on Alpha’s record in the whole of EVE history was by her hands. It’s the main event of Wrestle Fever – EVE’s second foray into iPPV, and you can watch it by ordering it here.
On what is a bumper card of action, JWP Openweight Champion Emi Sakura puts the title on the line against Kay Lee Ray in the first defence of the belt in the UK, while Sakura’s running buddy in Gatoh Move Kaori Yoneyama teams up with April Davids against Hannah and Holly Blossom, with the winners meeting the victors in another tag match involving Kasey & Leah Owens against Amazon Ayesha Ray & Rhia O’Reilly and a mystery team in a mini tag team tournament.
The other high-profile encounter sees former TNA Knockouts Champion Angelina Love take on the Glamour Gym’s Carmel Jacob – elsewhere, Kirsty Love faces Blue Nikita, Janey Britannico steps into the ring against Shanna, and Erin Angel competes against Scottish newcomer Fiona Fraser.
While you’re keeping up with the results, you can have a read of Nikki’s most recent blog where she discusses Wrestle Fever and our chat with her as part of a recent Women Of Wrestling Podcast, and you can click the jump to see the results as they happen. (more…)
ICW: Fierce Females results – now with thoughts, photos and an interview with Kay Lee Ray
Britain’s third all-female wrestling promotion debuts today, with promises of it offering a different sort of product to the likes of the World Association of Women’s Wrestling and Pro Wrestling: EVE. Insane Championship Wrestling: Fierce Females is hyping an evening of hard-hitting wrestling action, coupled with burlesque dancers (which explains the poster’s similarities to the one for the film Burlesque) and a more edgy atmosphere.
Emanating from The Arches in Glasgow, Scotland, the main event of the debut show is a Last Woman Standing match between longtime rivals Kay Lee Ray and Carmel Jacob. The pair also managed to gain some pretty good exposure for the show this week when they were part of a two-page spread in The Scottish Sun newspaper. Other matches on the card include England’s Lisa Fury (replacing an injured Jenny Sjodin) and April Davids against twins Kasey and Leah Owens from Northern Ireland, Miss Nicola Storm facing the “Technical Supremo” Fiona Fraser, and the “Fighting Irish” Rhia O’Reilly taking on England’s Holly Rocamora.
Ringbelles is on hand to provide live results, and we’re looking to deliver photos and interviews after the show. Click after the jump and keep hitting refresh to see the outcomes as they happen – in the meantime, have a listen to Storm’s Women Of Wrestling Podcast where she discusses Fierce Females, EVE, Glasgow slang and more. (more…)
Pippa L’Vinn presents Uprising – results & report
Up until now, we have not been able to offer results from any show held at Pippa L’Vinn‘s Wrestle Factory in Manchester, England. The main reason is a simple one – the price. Should you walk up to the door to buy a ticket for a show, it would set you back a whopping £45, which is about $70 – and if you booked in advance, it would be £40, which is $64. Cheap, it ain’t. Another reason is the reputation of the Wrestle Factory itself, which isn’t what you would expect. If you need a little bit of insight, click here, go to the “Our Facilities” option at the top and you’ll see what we mean.
However, there are upsides for women to wrestle there. Firstly, L’Vinn is an excellent wrestler in her own right and has a lot to offer both as a performer and trainer. While she seldom wrestles outside of the Factory, the first time I ever saw her compete was against Allison Danger during the SHIMMER founder’s extended tour of the UK in early 2007. Considering this was their first match and had only met that day, the match was excellent, and outshone the rest of the card. Looking beyond the private “mixed” matches, the “scissors match” and the “plastic fantastic” room, L’Vinn is a hell of an athlete, and it is a shame that she doesn’t wrestle outside her own training facility more often – but then, when you’re picking up at least £40 a ticket, why would you?
As for the wrestlers visiting, it is a place to get a great education in British-style grappling and are well-paid for the pro wrestling shows, such as the one held yesterday. Called Uprising, it featured some home-grown names like veteran Shelby Beach, as well as more recognisable European names like the Rhia O’Reilly, Kirsty Love, Viper, Lisa Fury and the Pro Wrestling: EVE Champion Alpha Female. Click after the jump to see the results and thoughts courtesy of attendee Matthew Lappin. (more…)
Ringbelles Roundup (17 July 2012)
I’ve been concerned about the future of Pro Wrestling: EVE, as each show seemed to be becoming a stand-alone production. EVE v Ice Ribbon was a great weekend of action, but didn’t really offer much indication on what would happen next, barring the win streaks of Alpha Female and Nikki Storm. At No Man’s Land in February, there was only one advertised match, which was the title match with Jenny Sjodin defending against Alpha, and that ended inconclusively. Meanwhile in the Queen of the Ring tournament which was set up after the plans to crown new Tag Team Champions fell though, Nikki won, which only reminded us that she was the next contender, and didn’t offer much to speculate about for the next show. Then Alpha won the belt on a non-EVE show, which – while it was the right move – would have been best on the No Man’s Land card. In addition, attendances were less than stellar, which was a shame – doubly so for the EVE v Ice Ribbon shows, which featured some spectacular matches.
However, last Saturday, things slotted into place very nicely. (more…)
Pro Wrestling: EVE – Special Edition results (now updated with thoughts, Nikki Storm comments and photos)
Pro Wrestling: EVE‘s Special Edition show is about to start, with five women’s matches, interspersed with three men’s encounters from promotions across the country such as the Scottish Wrestling Allianceand Lucha Britannia. Earlier today, we looked at the EVE Championship match between Alpha Female and Ayesha Ray, but there are four other women’s contests on the card…
In what’s billed as a European Dream Match, former Champion Jenny Sjodin meets Blue Nikita, while twins take on twins when Hannah and Holly Blossom step into the ring with Leah and Kasey Owens. Rhia O’Reilly fights Kirsty Love to try and retain her slot on the EVE roster following a number of losses in the promotion, and Nikki Storm has her most high-profile match to date when she takes on TNA‘s Winter, Kat Waters.
We are at the Delphi Club in Surrey, England to see it all go down, so click after the jump for results as they happen, and don’t forget to keep hitting refresh. Also, we welcome your thoughts and comments below on the outcomes. (more…)
Pro Wrestling: EVE show taking shape
With three weeks to go until Pro Wrestling: EVE‘s next show, entitled “Special Edition”, the bulk of the card has been laid out – the most recent announcement being the EVE Championship match, which will pit current holder Alpha Female putting the belt on the line against Ayesha Ray, who you may know better as Amazon.
The match will be Alpha’s first defence of the title since winning it from Jenny Sjodin in April in London, following their double count-out draw six weeks previously at No Man’s Land. This match will be Ray’s first match in Eve since the title tournament weekend in April last year, and is winless in the promotion, so the declaration of her being the first challenger for Alpha’s title was a curious one among fans. The question was broached on Twitter as well as the SHIMMER forum as to what led to the decision to have Ayesha take on Alpha over other EVE wrestlers like Erin Angel or Shanna, and the promotion responded: (more…)
In video: Storm warning
Nikki Storm‘s profile has expanded massively over the last two years. Though she had travelled to England from her native Scotland for a number of promotions beforehand, debuting at Pro Wrestling: EVE in October 2010 in a losing effort against Sweet Saraya showed that she can hang with the veterans in Europe, then gave new fans a taste of her heelish ways – a mixture of Jetta and Lacey but with more bile and venom, she was easy to hate. Very easy.
Likewise, many fans got their first taste of fellow Scot Kirsty Love when she showed up at EVE v Ice Ribbon a year later, hoping for a tryout and became one of the surprise hits of the weekend with her goofy antics and adorable demeanour. Personality-wise, Storm and Love are like chalk and chicken-liver pate, so when they meet in the ring, it’s magic.
Our video for this weekend comes from the Scottish Wrestling Alliance less than a month after they wrestled on the EVE v Ice Ribbon Sunday matinee show. By the time they have entered the ring, you know what they’re both like – awesome for people with no previous knowledge. Click after the link, and enjoy. (more…)
WAWW: The Return results, review & photos
It has been four months in the making, but after an absence of more than two years, the World Association of Women’s Wrestling is back.
Appropriately entitled The Return, WAWW’s latest card is headlined with another return – this time of Allison Danger back to the UK after her initial tour of the country in early 2007. As part of her whistlestop tour of the country, Danger arrived yesterday morning, then wrestled in the evening and Herts and Essex Wrestling against Sweet Saraya Knight where she was defeated for the HEW Women’s Title in what was a precursor to tonight’s event, where she faces Saraya again, before making her final appearance of the weekend tomorrow evening at a World Association of Wrestling show before flying back to the US on Monday morning.
Three of the women on tonight’s card – Saraya, daughter Britani and Lucy Clayden – featured on the last pure WAWW card back in May 2008 – the most recent WAWW show before tonight was held in conjunction with WAW in March 2009 – so expect to see a number of debuts from newer talent from Britain and Europe, as well as the regulars of WAW.
Click after the jump for results… (more…)
IN DEFENS: A look at Scotland’s finest
Scotland has given the world a great many things. Whisky, penicillin, the telephone, the television, Sean Connery and deep fried pizza are all up there. Not bad for a country with a tiny population (as of the last Census, it was a shade over 5 million). However, this harsh environment (the average maximum temperature is about 64 degrees Fahrenheit) may be one of the main reasons why it has such tough people, both mentally and physically.
Some of that toughness is making its way into women’s wrestling in Europe. At the last Pro Wrestling: EVE v Ice Ribbon event, close to half of the EVE talent emanated from Scotland. Therefore, it’s worth a quick introduction to the uninitiated as to who some of the names are that you should expect to see more of in the future.
Possibly the hottest prospect of the lot is Nikki Storm, the mouthy 22-year old Glaswegian who we have spoken to on a couple of occasions. Debuting in 2008, the current World Wide Wrestling League Women’s Champion was trained by names including Mikey Whiplash, Johnny Moss, Damian O’Connor and Fergal Devitt, and has warred with the likes or Carmel Jacob and Sara-Marie Taylor in the Scottish Wrestling Alliance, Premier British Wrestling and Scottish School of Wrestling.
South of Hadrian’s Wall, her career has involved Jetta for the most part, either wrestling her at adult-oriented promotion Triple X Wrestling, or being her protege in EVE’s European Empire faction. The two have also tangled north of the border, with the roles reversed from TXW and seeing Storm as the babyface and Jetta in her more recognised heel persona. Having said that, Storm is a fine heel and follows in the footsteps of Coventry’s Loudest by spending a lot of the time arguing with fans, but uses a wider repertoire than her manager/former rival. In addition to Jetta, Storm lists Erin Angel, Lisa Fury and Saraya Knight as being great influences on her. (more…)
EVE v Ice Ribbon: The interviews
As part of the Pro Wrestling: EVE v Ice Ribbon weekend – results and photos of which you can see here and here – the Ringbelles team took some time out from the great wrestling to catch a few words with some of the participants who made a strong impression over the three shows.
The first person we managed to sit down with was April Davids, who granted us a few minutes of her time after the matinee show, where she informed us of the extent of the injury that she suffered in the main event of show 1 on the Saturday night, as well as telling us how long she would be out, what it meant for her to have her friends from Ice Ribbon in the UK, and how much it hurt for her to see someone else wrestle the match that she had booked for her on the matinee show.
We also made a bee-line for one of the biggest unexpected stars of the weekend, Kirsty Love. It was a heck of a weekend for the teenager, who came down not expecting to wrestle and ended up working all three shows and impressing everybody with her enthusiasm, ability to command a crowd and her fun personality. I’m sure we’ll hear more from her in the months and years to come, but for those who have no idea who this new girl on the block is, check out our couple of minute long chat.
Finally, we managed to chase down Nikki Storm, who experienced a career high weekend with three victories (two of them over Ice Ribbon talents Tsukasa Fujimoto and Hikaru Shida) and has gone from strength to strength since we spoke to her about a year ago, which was featured on episode 14 of the Women Of Wrestling Podcast. This time around, she talked to us about the differences between her matches, her thoughts on Kirsty Love, desires to wrestle overseas and the fans’ reaction to her.
Click after the jump for all three interviews. (more…)
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