Lionesses of Wrestling - From The Ground Up

Blake Trask · May 7, 2020

It was November 27th 2019, and I was having a bad day.

“YOU CONDESCENDING W**KER!”

If the message had been a letter, I’d have ripped it in half. As it stood, the only reason I hadn’t punched my laptop was that I wouldn’t see another one again for a year if I broke it.

I read the email again, as if poring over it for the umpteenth time would change what was staring back from my screen.

“Dear Ms. Ward,

Thank you for your application and video. Unfortunately, the National School of Wrestling is not accepting female in-ring talent at this time. Should you wish to apply for a role as a valet, kindly resubmit your application using the ‘non-wrestling personnel’ form, available on our website.

We also urge you to avoid emulating our performers without first receiving proper training. Our athletes are experienced professionals, and we do not wish to see our loyal fans hurt by attempting to copy their moves at home or at school.

Kind regards,

Colin Chalke

National School of Wrestling.”

“HOW THE F**K AM I SUPPOSED TO GET PROPER TRAINING YOU PR**K!? THERE’S NO F**KING SCENE—”

“Ellen! Are you shouting at one of your games again? Watch your language!”

Oops. I bit off my first angry response, took a deep breath, and then slammed the delete key.

“Sorry mum,” I called through my door.

“What have we said about that temper of yours?”

“Yeah mum. Sorry mum.”

I stared down at my laptop. The anger wasn’t gone, still burning within me. I wasn’t going to take this lying down.

I pulled the email back out of the deleted folder, pinned it, then grabbed my phone and messaged the group chat.

There had to be something. Had to be.

—

The four of us had assembled in our usual haunt: the massive caravan at the bottom of Rajni’s garden that her parents always insisted they were going to take to the Dales this year and then lo and behold something else came up. Just as well, really, since we’d basically repurposed it into our own little hideout, complete with TV screen and playstation.

We’d barely stepped inside when I broke the news.

“Sal and me didn’t get it.”

Abbi, the baby sister of the group, made a sympathetic noise.

Rajni followed suit. “That’s right bollocks.”

Sally, my best friend, leaned on a countertop and shook her head, a deep scowl on her face. “We weren’t like, asking for them to make a division for us, just to train. You’d think they’d consider it. Extra money and all.”

I snorted. “Like they need money. I’m just wound up that they don’t care about women’s wrestling when they’re supposed to be this like, revolutionary, modern company. What’re we supposed to do, go to frigging Germany to train? Ring of Fire doesn’t even train girls and Samurai trained Viper! THIS IS SUCH ABSOLUTE BULLS**T!”

Everyone was staring at me. I was conscious I’d started yelling again. My blood was boiling, but I held back the urge to punch something. One of the cabinets still had a hole in it from the last time I lost my rag.

“Sorry. I just—me and Sal worked really hard on that application. We made a story, we did promos, we wrestled some alright matches, and then they’re like, no thanks but wanna be a valet? It’s such a joke.”

“Well, what next?” said Abbi quietly.

What next. Hell of a question.

Sally and me had really poured our all into those videos. The production had been as good as we could possibly make it, we’d tried to sell the story of the rivalry, we’d wrestled and done—we’d done okay! I’d watched worse for sure. Even if we hit the independent scene—and calling it a scene was like calling a duck pond the Atlantic ocean—then what? EWA took notice? Maybe? Neither of us had the money to travel outside the country to wrestle. We’d be looking at years, minimum, to even hit the first rung.

I wasn’t willing to accept that.

If there was no scene in England, then...

“That ring we rented…” I started slowly.

“What about it?” asked Sal.

“If I put down another two hundred quid I could probably buy it.”

“Yeah, and?” Rajni drawled. “Can buy a lot of things with two hundred quid.”

“Then I’d own a ring.”

Abbi looked at me askance. “Ellen…”

“A ring, four wrestlers…”

“Four—” realisation started to dawn on Rajni’s face. “Oh for f**k’s sake.”

“And the youth centre down Gloucester Street…” I met Sally’s eyes, she grinned.

“...You’re serious,” said Abbi.

“Sounds like a fed to me.”

Rajni threw up her hands. “You’re bloody impossible when you get like this.”

I already had my phone out to text the ring guy. “What do you reckon? You in?”

Sally nodded instantly. “Hundred percent.”

A tiny smile appeared on Abbi’s face. “It’s the least I can do.”

“This isn’t like rolling around in the garden or slamming each other on trampolines!” Rajni protested, then looked between each of us and heaved a huge sigh. “...But I can tell you don’t really care. Whatever, I’m in, blud.”

Sally gave an ironic cheer. Abbi beamed and clapped.

Looking at my friends, the fire inside me burned ever brighter. With their help, I could accomplish anything.

Let’s do this, Britwres.

Blake Trask · May 7, 2020

Premise: British Cverse women's promotion, 0/0/0/0

There's no UK scene. Four friends come together to create one.

Created characters abound. All four of the fabulous starting roster have rookie level skills and next to no experience. We'll see how well this goes.

User character is angry teenager Ellen Ward and she is the owner of what passes for a company when you're an angry teenaged wrestling fan.

tryker2710 · May 7, 2020

I'm extremely in

Historian · May 7, 2020

Great start, Blake! I will definitely be following along -- as building up the British female wrestling scene is a goal of mine is a project as well, so I'm very interested to see what you do here.

Blake Trask · May 8, 2020

I'm extremely in

Cheers! Glad to have you aboard.

Great start, Blake! I will definitely be following along -- as building up the British female wrestling scene is a goal of mine is a project as well, so I'm very interested to see what you do here.

I saw your other diary start up and I was like 'oh no! Historian got there first!'

Big Roguey · May 8, 2020

I am in for this ride.

Regis · May 8, 2020

Sounds good, dude.

Jomosensual · May 8, 2020

This looks awesome

DeathZone2 · May 8, 2020

I am in for this.

foolinc · May 8, 2020

Looks like a promising idea. Love to see where this goes.

Astil · May 8, 2020

Love this idea!

Remianen · May 8, 2020

Okay, you got me! This sounds awesome. I thought about doing a similar save but more along the lines of Jonathan Vargas.

D-Lyrium · May 8, 2020

I read the whole backstory in Skins-style Bristolian accents, am I doing it right?

Haha, nice start. Looking forward to seeing where this goes.

lieon02 · May 8, 2020

Looks like it's going to be good.Can't wait to see how it goes.

Blake Trask · May 9, 2020

Cheers y'all, hopefully can make it an entertaining read for all of you. <blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="D-Lyrium" data-cite="D-Lyrium" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="49019" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>I read the whole backstory in Skins-style Bristolian accents, am I doing it right? <img alt=":p" data-src="//content.invisioncic.com/g322608/emoticons/tongue.png.ceb643b2956793497cef30b0e944be28.png" src="<___base_url___>/applications/core/interface/js/spacer.png" /> Haha, nice start. Looking forward to seeing where this goes.</div></blockquote> You can't go wrong applying all the British to the general dialogue. Technically they're mostly Londoners. Sally's canonically scouse (it's in her bio, even).

Blake Trask · May 9, 2020

<div style="text-align:center;"><img alt="SHkkCoa.jpg" data-src="https://i.imgur.com/SHkkCoa.jpg" src="<___base_url___>/applications/core/interface/js/spacer.png" /></div>

As it turned out, more than grand statements went into starting a new wrestling promotion. Much, much more. I had to register as a company for one thing, and that had taken forever for someone whose most complex paperwork to date had been renewing my passport—not to mention the hours upon hours of deliberation about what the Ltd would actually be called. Then there were the finances: bills and logistics to work out, fliers to design and distribute, a deal for the venue… it was never ending. My bank account was looking far from healthy, and I found myself inwardly wincing as the numbers crept ever closer to the nought. It was becoming abundantly clear that birthday money and my part time job weren’t going to fund us forever, or even very long. So far as the cash went, we were going to be pouring our money into a hole and crossing our everything that we caught enough attention to start breaking even.

My christmas list was going to be pretty straightforward this year, at least.

There was a knock at my bedroom door. I looked up from my laptop. “Come in.”

Rajni entered the room. “‘Sup, Disaster.”

I frowned at her and unwanted nickname both. “How’d you get in?”

“Viv.”

Making a mental note to tell my sister to maybe tell me when my friends showed up, I swung around to properly face Rajni. “I’m a little busy right now.”

“Mate, you’ve barely seen anyone for like a month.”

“I want us to be good to go in 2020. The fliers are for the first Saturday, remember?”

Rajni shrugged, leaning on the door frame. “Adjust as we go. We’re running weekly. Lots of chances to muck about with things.”

I scowled. “Lots of chances to balls it up, you mean.”

Another shrug, her weapon of choice. “There’s gonna be balls ups, Disaster. Sooner you get it through your head, less painful this whole thing will be.”

“We can’t afford that!”

Rajni’s good-natured expression dropped. “Abbi and me have never even been in a ring. You and Sal haven’t done much more. Mate, go into this expecting perfection and the whole thing will crash and burn in a month.”

I slumped, flopping backward onto my bed. “Right. Right. Fine. I get it.”

“Do you?”

I gave her the finger. She chuckled. “You want to be productive? What are we selling?”

“You mean like, merch?”

“Nah. The product. The style.”

I pushed myself up on my elbows. “Well—” I stopped, realising I didn’t actually know. “Uh…” She smirked. “Oh eff off.”

“That’s not a style of wrestling I ever heard of.”

Letting out a groan, I shook my head. “Me and Sal aren’t agreeing.”

“Lemme guess, she’s being a weeb.”

Startled, I laughed. “If you mean she thinks that leaning into joshi would get us a unique market, yes.”

“Sure, and those four whole joshi fans would keep us afloat for god, three, maybe even four shows.”

I loved Sally to bits, but Rajni was right. A niche product in a niche market wasn’t going to get us anywhere, and to be brutally honest, it wasn’t as if any of us were good enough to properly emulate 5SSW. I wasn’t sure Abbi could even bring herself to hit somebody that hard, and the most technical move in Rajni’s arsenal was a backdrop. Even Sally herself, who literally had 5SSW’s first show on video, didn’t have the experience to pull off that style of wrestling.

“I’m hoping the attraction will just be that it’s a women’s promotion.”

“Novelty? ‘Kay. Won’t work forever though. Eventually novelty isn’t new.”

I looked at her curiously. “This is weirdly focused for you.”

She snorted. “You’re lucky I don’t get offended, blud.”

“I just meant—”

“That dozy Rajni doesn’t think about things? Well, I do blud.” She crossed the room, lackadaisically flinging herself onto the bed alongside me. “But like, fine, just keep it on your radar. ‘Girls do a wrestle’ isn’t that big on its own either. AAA would’ve lasted forever in that case.”

Losing AAA still hurt. I nodded. “So I can count on you to tell me if it’s getting stale?”

“Christ no.”

Well.

Probably asking for that one.

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The Nickman · May 9, 2020

This is a GREAT start so far!

Blake Trask · May 10, 2020

<div style="text-align:center;"><img alt="SHkkCoa.jpg" data-src="https://i.imgur.com/SHkkCoa.jpg" src="<___base_url___>/applications/core/interface/js/spacer.png" /></div>

Okay.

The ring was clean. The seats were out. We had a friend on the door for tickets. The sound system was rigged up. The curtain was set. The microphone was working. We all knew the running order and the finishes. Gloucester Youth Centre was prepped and ready to go.

Almost showtime.

I paced back and forth, back and forth, rehearsing my matches over and over in my mind. I wasn’t nervous—I kept telling myself I wasn’t nervous. I just wanted to make sure things went right. Expectations? Pretty low. Being honest we barely knew what we were doing; this was a whole other dimension to us mucking about when we were younger, body slamming each other on gym mats. The people in the audience were… pretty much just our mates and some curious randos. Didn’t have to be perfect, just like, good enough. Watching (and participating in) all the screw ups in practice had me fixing Rajni’s advice in my head. Perfectionism would give me a brain haemorrhage.

Heck, we were all pulling double duty for this first show, maybe for the foreseeable, depended on how things went and whether everyone’s fitness held up. Four people wasn’t nearly enough to fill up a proper show; but when you had cheap masks and costume props, anything was possible. Still unlikely that we were going to stretch things much past an hour, but otherwise people would feel cheated.

“Ellllliiiiiiie?”

I stopped pacing. “Don’t call me that,” I told my sister, turning around.

Vivienne gave me her best obnoxious little sibling grin. “Calm down. God. You’re so tense.”

“And you’re annoying.”

She giggled. “Sure you don’t need me?”

I rolled my eyes. “For fu—flip’s sake, Viv. No.” The pest had spent the last month plus harassing me to let her wrestle on the show, never mind mum and dad would skewer me if I even thought about letting that happen.

“Ah, so you did find someone else who knows all the finishes to ref for you!”

Oh.

Crap.

Viv’s smile was the stuff of the devil.

Heaving a world—or at least little sister—weary sigh, I fixed her with a stare. “Do you want to referee?”

She tapped her chin with a finger. “Hmmm. I dunno. That didn’t really sound like somebody who reaaaaaally needs their sister’s help because they were daft enough to forget a referee for their wrestling show.”

“Viv. Will you help me with the show?”

“Say please!”

Sister or no, I very nearly lamped her. I was trying not to implode at my own stupidity, I didn’t need Viv taking the piss too. Unfortunately, I couldn’t see another way out of this than giving her what she wanted. Short of rotating the ref between the four of us wrestling, nobody else was going to be viable, and reffing each other’s matches would drop us into a level of amateur I refused to accept.

“Please,” I ground out.

She beamed. “I’ll go get my stripy shirt!” She practically skipped off.

I knuckled my forehead. Now we were ready.

Here went everything.

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Herrbear · May 10, 2020

Can't wait.

Jaded · May 11, 2020

Loving this so far; great start!

Blake Trask · May 11, 2020

<div style="text-align:center;">Lionesses of Wrestling I: Genesis</div>

Saturday, week 1 January 2020

Gloucester Street Youth Centre

Attendance: 40

Not broadcast

Commentary: None

<ul><li>Rajni Smith comes out with the microphone. She banters with the crowd for a bit, needling them a little less than good naturedly, and then announces that she’s going to win the eight woman tournament tonight for the LoW Queen of Pride Trophy. She drawls arrogantly to send on out whichever lucky so-and-so gets to lose to her first, and out comes Cap’n Swann (Ellen Ward in pirate clothes and a head covering bandana with mask). Swann talks about being a wrestling pirate in a long line of wrestling pirates, and she’ll be going home with that trophy as booty. Yarr. - E </li><li>The first match in LoW is—well, look, it’s two mostly-untrained and very inexperienced teenagers attempting to have a wrestling match, how good do you think it’s going to be? Rajni does some rudimentary brawling and hams it up for the crowd, taking control arrogantly. Cap’n Swann battles back with rights and lefts and an almost okay snap suplex, but Rajni cuts off the rally with a well-timed eyepoke and wraps up the win with a second rope legdrop. - F </li><li>Our next first rounder is Abbi Archer versus a black-clad figure announced as Ronin (Sally Farnsworth). The ninja and/or samurai leads the way with okay striking and very decent submission work that looks quite painful. Abbi sells the sympathy pretty well, managing to win the sparse crowd onto her side, slip out of a hold, and rev up with some rope-running and charging attacks. Ronin’s own strikes start going awry and after a wild miss, she gets caught with a leaping cutter and pinned. - F+ </li><li>Ellen Ward is out next, up against Aviator Agarwal (Rajni wearing an aviator hat and goggles). She evades Ellen’s clutches for a couple, stalling and playing to the crowd, getting some ironic ‘weyyyy!’ chants each time she ducks out from an attempted grapple. However, the fun stops as Ellen corners her and unleashes a battering in the corner, working Agarwal over and then dragging her to ring centre for submission attempts. Agarwal goes for the energetic comeback, but Ward kicks her knee out from her on the run, lays in a few more hits, and then smashes her with a Glittering Magician. - F </li><li>Introduced as Sakuyama, Sally now presents herself as a serious joshi-esque competitor, which works pretty well when she’s not talking and revealing how incredibly scouse she is. She’s facing the very generic Masked Damsel (Abbi in a mask, shockingly). After getting flipped around with Japanese flavoured suplexes, Damsel does some dastardly heelish deeds and manages to pull the advantage, but is out-techniqued on the mat and, as she scrambles to keep up, is caught out and hit with a modified Kagawa Driver. - F+ </li><li>Ellen Ward is the next to cut a promo. In a short but intense mission statement, she lays out that it’s always been her dream to become a wrestling star, and that all the others had better get out of her way, or they’ll be run over. She’ll do whatever it takes. - E+ </li><li>Abbi Archer has a fired up response to that, and swiftly demonstrates to Ellen why she’s not about to roll over, peppering her with a hit-and-run strategy and even nailing a very ragged hurricanrana. The nets her a big two count, but as she looks beseechingly towards the ref, Ellen kidney punches her from behind. The cheap shot allows Ward a window back into the match and the wind is out of Archer’s sails from that point on. A desperation cutter attempt is flung off into the buckle and drops her onto her head, and the glittering magician lands. - E- </li><li>The other semi-final has Sakuyama versus Rajni Smith. Rajni attempts the same antics as helped her get a mental advantage in the first round, but finds that Sakuyama isn’t such an easy target for these shenanigans, snatching Rajni into a sleeper the first time she turns her back to mug about. Things get competitive as Rajni reaches for cheap tricks but starts coming up empty and, after hitting a back elbow, scrambles for the legdrop far too quickly, gets dodged, and gets the Kagawa Driver for her troubles. - F </li><li>Sakuyama starts to celebrate, but before she can get too excited, Ellen Ward hits her from behind and beats her down. After laying in the boots, she backs off and while the official is anxious to ensure Sakuyama is okay to compete, she is waved off as Sakuyama rises back up and prepares to fight! - E- </li><li>Ward smells blood in the water and is all over Sakuyama from the opening bell, an unrelenting assault broken up only by intermittent pinfall attempts that, time after time, the resilient Sakuyama manages to kick out from. Infuriated, Ward breaks off from the attack to jaw with a fan, raging at them to shut up and stop cheering. As she returns to the ring, Sakuyama manages to dropkick her off the apron and begins with a shine, the two of them trading moves in something that actually starts resembling a decent wrestling match. On top and riding the momentum, Sakuyama goes for the Kagawa Driver… but struggles to lift Ward, she’s just out of gas, too beaten up to hoist! Ward spins out, short arm lariat, glittering magician! This one’s over! - F+ </li></ul>

SHOW RATING: E-

Regis · May 11, 2020

This is perhaps the closest we will get to an actual backyard wrestling promotion being booked in TEW. Needless to say, I love it.

smw88 · May 11, 2020

Great stuff, if you need any alts do let me know.

Croquemitaine · May 11, 2020

Just one question:

... Where do I get my Aviator Agarwal t-shirt?

Blake Trask · May 11, 2020

This is perhaps the closest we will get to an actual backyard wrestling promotion being booked in TEW. Needless to say, I love it.

Regretfully we're going to have to actually hire some semblance of a roster sooner or later.

But in the mean time this is good fun and glad you're enjoying it.

Great stuff, if you need any alts do let me know.

Cheers, and I appreciate the offer!

Just one question:

... Where do I get my Aviator Agarwal t-shirt?

Probably out of Rajni's mum's car boot tbh.

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