Dubliner Becky Lynch will continue her remarkable journey in the world of professional wrestling this weekend when she stars at WrestleMania.
The Baldoyle native has become one of the biggest names within World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) since her 2014 debut. That rise will continue when she walks out in front of 90,000 people in the SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles.
"WrestleMania is our biggest event of the year. It's like our Super Bowl," Lynch told Katie Hannon in an in-depth interview for Upfront: The Podcast.
With an expected TV audience in the "millions", WrestleMania 39 is set to be the biggest event in WWE’s history.
Wrestling came into Lynch’s life early, initially through her brother Richy.
"I had an older brother so he's really the person that I attribute all of this to because he'd be watching it. I would walk past the TV and then I’d get sucked in. That's really where my love for it started."
That fandom soon turned into something more when a wrestling school, run by fellow star Finn Balor, opened in Bray.
"I'd already decided that I wanted to get on the straight and narrow and start working out and being healthy. But I was a little alternative kid. Doing something conventional wasn't up my alley. I was an angsty kid so (I wanted) something I could take my aggression out in."
"As soon as I started it was, 'this is what it's like to have a passion’".
That passion eventually led to the WWE via stints in the UK, Canada and Japan.
Lynch’s name has become synonymous with the WrestleMania brand ever since she became the first woman in the company’s history to compete in and win the main event of its flagship show in 2019.
The Limerick-born grappler, real name Rebecca Quin, topped that card alongside former UFC champion Ronda Rousey and Charlotte Flair, daughter of legendary wrestler Ric Flair.
"In 35 years, it had never been done before. I've been able to change the way that people view women in sports entertainment and in wrestling."
Lynch, who has six million Instagram followers, is widely credited as having been key to changing perceptions of women in the historically male-dominated industry.
In the past, women in professional wrestling were often expected to compete in wet t-shirt contests or mud wrestling matches.
That has since changed thanks to what has been dubbed ‘The Women’s Revolution.’
"That's all gone, and we're just seen as wrestlers, as characters, as storytellers and as athletes in our own right. There was a group of us that they called the ‘Four Horsewomen of NXT.’ And we all just wanted to be the best and we wanted to change the game. And that level of competition just drove us."
WrestleMania takes place over two nights in LA this weekend. Lynch is set to perform in a six-person match alongside WWE Hall of Fame inductees Lita and Trish Stratus.
"It’s just very surreal. Lita is the woman who inspired me to do what I'm doing and now we're going to go in as tag team champions of the world. I did all right for a girl from Baldoyle."
All episodes of 'Upfront: The Podcast' can be found here, or wherever you get your podcasts.
