...ruffles...

The benefits of sixth form were great, for one we had our own snack bar. The Buttery served burgers made of meat freshly sandblasted off the bone of unidentified animals some time during the previous ten years. It also served Cannonballs, densely packed rice crispy cakes bound with chocolate and some kind of sugary glutinous substance. Mmmm, everyone loved Cannonballs.

The greatest luxury of all was Private Study. PS was an opportunity to catch up on the beastly workload of A' Levels, except everyone used it to nick down the estate for a fag, pop off to the pub for a pint, slip home for sex with their girlfriends, or, if you were me and my friends, go down to the library and make Wrestling posters.

Our wrestling obsession grew into a sixth form phenomena. At first we just found it ironically hilarious, laughing at Randy "The Macho Man" Savage's posing. However, when we weren't allowed to play football in the exclusive sixth form garden because a couple of people had lost cannonballs after they were hit by wayward balls we invented Beach Frisbee, a hybrid of Frisbee, tennis, and the Macho Man's posing. Andrew Noax, the hapless child with the catalogue anorak and the chronic asthma was umpire, he would announce 'The Posedown', when we would drop the Frisbee and pose like the Macho Man... the best posedown won a point for his team.

Beach Frisbee became huge. Me, Wiggaz, Choggaz, Adrian The Woman, The Fat Robs, Pukey Magic Boots, Noax, Glidder, Snoz Starr, Dick Dangle and all the others played every break. Beach Frisbee’s wrestling connections meant people got interested in WWF. Coincidently by winter Snoz Starr's parents got Sky meaning he could video the wrestling every Sunday. We'd pass the tape around but it wasn't long before we couldn't get the tape around everyone who wanted it.

That's when we launched Wrestling Club.

Our interest coincided with the golden age of Wrestling. Things were changing in the WWF, traditionally throughout the season the WWF would tour the trailer trash capitals of America and the big names would, night after night, beat the living shit out of an unknown wrestler in plain trunks. Throughout the year, feuds and grudges would develop between the big names and at the big Pay Per View events, the big names would meet up to settle their brewing beef. Predictably the good guys would beat the bad guys and at the end of each event America's favourite Hulk Hogan would win the world crown. Again.

The three premier events were The Royal Rumble, with its 32 man cage match... one man added every two minutes, last man standing wins. Then there was Summerslam, the mid-season meet up. And finally, the world championships, Wrestlemania.

What happened was in 1989 a wild wrestler with cool make up and tassels tied to his legs and arms emerged. He had a sneering speed metal signature tune, and would enter the arena by sprinting at full pelt, jumping onto the ring apron, grabbing the top rope and shaking it with all his might.

This.

Was.

Ultimate Warrior.

According to Wiggaz' Ultimate Warrior mug, he came from "Parts Unknown", he was wild and I was transfixed. He straddled the chasm between good and bad, a complete opposite to the perennial saccharine World Champion Hogan. A man who would urge his little Hulkamaniacs to "Say their prayers and take their vitamins" before they went to bed. Vomitus Maximus. Ultimate Warrior was a 90's wrestler.

Hulk had been world champion for years. To keep up interest they invented the Intercontinental Title for the tour's second favourite wrestler. The two title holders would never meet because that meant pitching good versus good, and American's can't compute this kind of thing. The Federation couldn't ignore what was happening though. Ultimate Warrior was becoming more popular than Hulk Hogan, how long would it be before they would buckle to public pressure and let The Warrior battle The Hulkster for the title?

When the announcement came that Hogan and Warrior would finally meet at Wrestlemania VI, Wrestling Club was at its peak. It was Regularly attended by 50-60 people every week. We promoted this ultimate match up with a high profile campaign which even had the Head of Sixth form mimicking the Warrior rope shake in assembly. We watched the whole thing live at Snoz Starr's house, the next morning we took the tape into school.

120 people packed out Wrestling club. We knew it was the end because it would never be bettered. But it didn't need to be bettered, the bout took twenty three minutes and fifty four seconds, five times longer any other match on the bill.

It had been the bill of dreams, Demolition, the best tag team in the world had successfully defended their title from the Colossal Connection. Rowdy Roddy Piper, the Scottish Wrestler, and Bad News Brown knocked each other out in a brawl over a beef that had been brewing for an age, Dusty Rhodes, with the beautiful Miss Elizabeth in his corner pinned Macho Man Randy Savage. Except when Miss Elizabeth saw the pain the Macho Man was in she stayed to tend his brow... they married at Summerslam a few months later. I barely remember Ravishing Rick Rude's destruction of Superfly Jimmy Snuka.

Labels: General me