Wrestling has a hold on CNY

Area training facility grooms wrestles, keeps them safe

By: Doug Plagens-NCC News

LIVERPOOL- Today's world of professional wrestling involves the same cartoonish bodies and off-screen controversey it did decades ago. However, today's performers are challenged by higher-risk maneuvers, which are often accompanied by objects like tables, ladders, and folding chairs. Because of this, wrestlers are laying their bodies on the line more than ever, and predetermined outcomes are not nearly enough to ease the pain.



"Wrestling is the most demanding sport I've ever been in," said "Main Event" Jason Axe, a wrestler for the Central New York-based Squared Circle Wrestling, or 2CW as it's affectionately known.

Another 2CW star, "Redneck Gordy Wallace" agreed with Axe, saying that "I don't know what people think, but you fall on concrete, it's concrete. You fall on boards, it's boards," Wallace said.

But where do these performers learn their crafts? Central New York has one training center, which is affiliated with 2CW and located in Liverpool. The head trainer is Derek Martel, a college professor and aeronautical enginner by day, and a wrestler named Zaquary Springate III by night. The training center has been in place for nearly a decade, and despite all the physical risks in wrestling today, Martel says his school has avoided any serious injuries.

"It's technique and it's being safe and we've never really had anyone seriously injured up here because I run a safe school. I teach them how to protect themselves; protect their opponent, and it's really all in technique," Martel said.

But other everyday people participate in the wrestling business as well. Wallace is a retail manager, and Axe is a college student. 2CW star Isys Ephex is a disc jockey. But while normal people can be professional wrestlers, the wrestlers themselves note that it takes a special kind of person to enter the squared circle.

"People might do it because, hey, there's a big paycheck in it. There's not," Wallace said.

Wrestler J.D. Love was a bit more blunt.

"You've got to be pretty messed up [to be a wrestler]," he claimed.

Because wrestlers are no strangers to injury risk. Martel, as if he were shrugging off the injury risk, says it's usually just "bumps, bruises, cuts, slices, gashes...", but Wallace has another story.

"One of my partners in the ring; something happened where he accidently slipped on my leg and snapped the bone right in half," Wallace said.

Ephex once pinched his sciatic nerve in a match, and lost movement in his left leg. However, he was forced to wrestle again the next day.

And the injury risk runs longer than a single match, or a weekend of matches. The pain caused by wrestling can last a lifetime.

"All the nagging injuries start piling up and it just hurts all the time. Your back hurts all the time and your leg hurts a lot," said J.D. Love.

Because, as Isys Ephex notes, "A wrestler goes into a match knowing he's going to get hurt, and it's going to suck the next day, but he's okay with it."

It's all about a dedication to the business and the art. J.D. Love says there is nothing better than wrestling. "It's a rush," Love said. "It's the best play you can have...getting the crowd in your hands."

But because such an injury risk exists, perfection is important in the ring.

"You pretty much have to be perfect to a 'T', because one slip up, and you could really hurt someone," said wrestler Joel Gertner.

But to this day, many people seem to not understand that falling through a table or bleeding from the face cannot be "faked". Wrestlers prefer matches being called "choreographed", not "faked", anyway.

"I'll throw you off the top rope, and you'll land in the ring, and you tell me if it's fake," said Love.

But wrestlers continue to endure the pain, and train to perfect their art. As Isys Ephex said, "The most beautiful things in wrestling hurt, but it's all pain you're taught to deal with."