Shamrock split his time between Pancrase and the UFC over the next four years, and he became both the first ever Pancrase Openweight champion and the first UFC Superfight champion.Īfter pushing his MMA record to 23-5-2 in December 1996, Shamrock moved his focus over to the then-WWF, where he made his TV debut in February 1997. After winning his first fight, he lost via submission to Royce Gracie in the semifinals. 12, 1993, just four days after winning his third pro fight in Japan, Shamrock competed in UFC 1 in Denver in the first of its one-night-only tournaments. What many fans don't know is that before he began his professional MMA career with Pancrase in Japan in 1993, Shamrock trained to become a professional wrestler and performed throughout the early '90s in the United States and Japan. Though Dan Severn made the crossover at a similar time, Shamrock was the first UFC fighter that most pro wrestling fans became familiar with in the 1990s. He's a two-time NWA world heavyweight champion and NWA Hall of Famer, and Severn also spent a year-and-a-half stretch with the WWE in the late 1990s. In a parallel of his UFC Hall of Fame career, Severn also put together a fairly illustrious pro wrestling career. Severn last performed for the company in September 2002 at UFC 27, but he continued to fight all over the world for the next 17 years his professional record now sits at a staggering 101-19-7. He would eventually lose a unification fight for the first UFC heavyweight championship to Mark Coleman in 1997. Severn won the UFC 5 tournament, but he lost the first ever UFC Superfight championship bout against Ken Shamrock, in a time when there were no weight classes.Īfter winning the UFC's Ultimate Ultimate 1995 tournament, Severn won a split decision over Shamrock to win the title. At UFC 4, when the format was a single-elimination one-night tournament, Severn lost in the finals to Royce Gracie after a single continuous round that lasted over 15 minutes. After a collegiate wrestling career that saw Severn become a three-time All-American at Arizona State, Severn eventually found his way to professional fighting and the UFC in December 1994. No matter the format of the fight, be it Greco-Roman or freestyle wrestling, judo, jiu-jitsu or almost anything else, Severn was willing to throw down with anyone who crossed his path. The elaborate masks and fast, high-flying action of lucha libre wrestling is wildly popular in Mexico, and the independent circuit gives the country’s less fortunate a chance to share in the excitement.īrazilian-born photographer Alexandre Meneghini has spent some time in the poor neighborhoods of Mexico City documenting the spectacle of Mexican street wrestling.Zuffa LLC/Getty Images Jeff Hutchens/Getty Images In parts of Mexico City where abject poverty is frighteningly common, traveling caravans of independent street wrestlers known as luchadores bring their distinctive style of pro wrestling to the people. As the popularity of professional wrestling continues to skyrocket in the United States and all over the world, the admission prices for big events like tonight’s WWE Raw World Tour at the Peoria Civic Center get further out of reach for those living on a tight budget.
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