Through The Ropes' Jack Williams interviewed British Wrestling SENSATION! The Lion Kid!
JW: I'd like to personally welcome you to Through The Ropes Lion Kid, Please introduce yourself to the readers. LK: "Thank you, I’m happy to be on Through The Ropes. I am the Lion Kid, a masked high flying pro wrestler based in the south of England."
JW: Which style/s of pro wrestling are your favourite to watch and to actually work? LK: "My favourite to style watch is high flying. When watching wrestling I tend to prefer the shorter more fast paced matches. My favourite style to work is easily technical/mat wrestling. Although on shows I rarely get the chance to show off my chain wrestling ability as my character is primarily a high flyer. But when at training I could happily spend 2 or 3 hours going hold for hold on the mat."
JW: Where do you hope to be or do in the next decade in wrestling? LK: "I've never looked that far ahead; I find it’s more productive to concentrate on short term goals. November last year I set my latest short term goal. This is to become a full time wrestler, to be able to make a living solely through wrestling, to be able to provide for my family, and do well enough that my wife can quit her job. Since then I’ve been working very hard to make this a reality and we recently took a big step toward achieving that goal. In December and January things were picking up, and by the end of February we were in a position where my wrestling was able to afford my wife going down to only working part time hours. I feel incredibly blessed that wrestling has put me in a position where I can spend so much time with my wife and son. I’m so grateful; I know how lucky I am. But this was a half way step, and although right now I’m not sure how realistic it is. My aim now is to achieve the full goal by the end to the year."
JW: What is your proudest moment in your wrestling career? LK: "I can’t narrow it down so going to name a few. Wrestling in Japan has to be one. One of my biggest dreams in wrestling was to wrestle in Japan. So it was a huge honour to get the opportunity to do a tour in Japan for Dragon Gate and to also train at their dojo. But if I had to boil down my 3 month experience in Japan to one proud moment it would have to be a Japanese debut match. It was far from my best match in Japan, I felt I learnt alot working with the DG talent, so I improved throughout the tour. But it was the first, and a realisation of a dream coming true.
Another proud moment, wasn’t necessary a moment. But working in France for Wrestle Stars was amazing. I’d leave home Saturday morning, travel to France, do their shows Saturday & Sunday night in front of two to three thousand fans, and travel home Monday morning. I did that almost every weekend in 2011, it was the first time I got a taste of what it would be like to be a full time professional wrestler.
A recent proud moment for me was winning the XWA British Heavyweight title. I got my start in wrestling as a student at the FWA Academy, I trained there for 6 years. We ran Academy shows and had an Academy championship. But the biggest goal we all shared was making it onto the FWA main shows, and the top prize in the FWA was the FWA British Heavyweight championship. Now the FWA has long since stopped running, but I feel the XWA are the spiritual successors of what they once were. So winning the XWA championship, knowing the legacy of that title within the FWA and given my roots being at the FWA Academy. It felt very special to me, like I was achieving a goal I had at 15 years old."
JW: Who would be your ultimate fantasy opponent? Dead or alive? LK: "That’s tough, I think I could name names all day. I already mentioned how much I love mat wrestling, so obviously I’m a huge fan of the World of Sport days of British Wrestling. The old school British light-weight wrestling is some of my favourite to watch. To trade holds with Steve Grey would be very cool, he was so quick and smooth. He’s long since retired now, but I would have loved the opportunity to go a few rounds with him. But, to name a wrestler that’s still active, therefore could still potentially happen. I have to mention Chris Jericho, he was my favourite wrestler as I child, so getting a match with him now would be a surreal experience."
JW: Is there a move that you genuinely dread or fear more than others? LK: "I think it comes down to my opponent more than the actual move. If I trust who I am in the ring with, and I trust they can perform their moves safely, I’m not worried. Still, when planning a match, if someone suggests something I’m not 100% confident and comfortable doing, I won’t do it. I expect them to respect that, as I would if the shoe was on the other foot. No matter how good any one move is, it’s not worth risking a serious injury over. Wrestling is already dangerous enough, and in my experience, when you’re nervous about doing something, that’s when it’s more likely to go wrong."
JW: Which wrestling products do you watch? and any recommendations for us? LK: "When at home I don't watch a great deal of wrestling, I don't have alot of free time to do so. I tend to just watch the odd match that I hear was really good or has been recommended to me. Most of the wrestling I watch is live on the shows I’m on. I find the live experience alot more enjoyable than watching a match on a screen.
Also, these days as I’m usually on later in the show I will watch a couple of earlier matches to see how the crowd are reacting, what they are reacting to, I look at what’s going on in other matches so I can give the audience something different from what they’ve already seen, and to check out the other talent that I may be working with in the near future."
JW: What other ambitions do you have in life besides wrestling? LK: "When I am not wrestling I like to spend as much time with my wife and son as possible."
JW: How do you go about your matches, Do you plan ahead with your opponent or wing it in the ring? LK: "How much I like to plan depends on alot of things. Some including, how experienced my opponent is, if and how much we have worked together before, the promotion I’m working with / what the booker has asked from the match, the type of audience I’m performing for, and where my match is on the card. There are some other factors I consider, but they are the main ones and depending on them I plan anything between 0 – 80% of a match.
I regards to “how” I go about planning my matches. The most important thing I think about is our characters. When I’m working with someone I’ve never seen or met before, before we start planning the match and first thing I will ask them is what their character is. Once I know that, I can think about how our characters would play off / interact with each other and that opens up ideas for the kind of story we can tell."
JW: Who is the most famous wrestler you have ever competed with? LK: "The most famous wrestler I have competed against is probably Daniel Bryan. I fought against him for WXW in Germany in 2010. This was a part of a 3 man round robin tournament. I really enjoyed working with Daniel, even back then, as I’m sure many others will agree, I considered him one of the best wrestlers in the world. I was really excited for the match. I don’t remember a great deal specifically about the match now. But I do have one very vivid memory. It was after one exchange, there was a little separation and I thought to myself, “wow, as good as everyone knows Daniel is, you cannot appreciate just how good he is until you’ve been in the ring with him.”
Actually, thinking about it now, the 3rd man in that round robin tournament was TJ Perkins, who has had alot of success in WWE this last year or so after winning the Cruiser weight classic. Other than that, maybe Sami Zayn, I worked him way back in, I want to say 2009? Either way it was before either of us were wrestling as our current characters. We had a really fun match, I felt we had good chemistry and I enjoyed working him. Hopefully I get another chance to work with him again in the future."
JW: Do you have a preference in either playing a heel or a face? LK: "Well, let me put it this way. In my career to date, I’ve wrestled somewhere between 800 – 1000 matches. And I have worked heel less than 10 times. Don’t get me wrong, the times I have worked heel I’ve had the time of my life. At these times I think to myself, “I don’t get to play heel often, so now I’ve got the chance I’m going to have as much fun with it as I can.” I knew they were only one off matches, which means I had the freedom to be as over the top I wanted. So I did, and I made alot of fond memories in the process. But as for my character now, Lion Kid, I can’t imagine him ever being a heel."
JW: Do you ever intend on wrestling without the mask down the line or is the mask staying for the long run? LK: "At this time I have no intention of working without my mask. I’ve worked very hard to build the brand of the Lion Kid and to create a character that has mass appeal and marketing potential. That being said, if for example I get a deal with a big company in the future and they want to re-brand me, I’m open minded to the idea."
JW: Who was your favourite wrestler growing up? LK: "I’ve already mentioned Chris Jericho. So to not repeat myself I’ll talk about my second favourite, and that was Tajiri. Throughout my youth I did alot of martial arts and I was always the smallest in all my classes. So when I turned on Smack Down and I saw this little guy throwing kicks, taking on bigger opponents and having great matches. I saw someone I could look up to."
JW: Where can the readers find The Lion Kid and where can promoters book you? LK: "Fans can follow me on social media @lionkiduk and promoters can email me at lionkiduk@yahoo.co.uk"
JW: Would you like to plug any future dates or projects? LK: "This month, April, I have South Coast on 15th, UPW on 22nd, BLW on 23rd & WWL on 29th. All my merchandise in available at LionKid.com. Also, I would like to give a quick shout out to my main sponsor WrestlingStore.co.uk."
JW: And finally, Is there anything else you would like to say? LK: "I would like to take this chance to give a big thank you to all the fans who continue to support both myself and the British wrestling scene. And as always, RAWRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Closing note;
I'd like to personally thank The Lion Kid and his wife Lioness Penny for taking time out of their busy schedules for this interview. Once again, I present to you The Lion Kid!
