WWE Hall of Famer Rob Van Dam recently shared the full story of how he ended up training the legendary Ultimate Warrior for his final comeback match in 2008. The one-day session was a unique experience that RVD was able to capture for his RVD TV series.
A Surprising Request
On his 1 of a Kind podcast, RVD explained that the training session came about through a mutual friend, Andrew Wright, who was filming a documentary with Warrior at the time. Warrior, who had been out of the ring for a decade, was preparing for a match against Orlando Jordan in Spain and wanted RVD’s help.
A Day of Training and Filming
The training day consisted mostly of RVD putting Warrior through his signature stretching routine. It also produced the famous video where RVD did a spot-on Ultimate Warrior impression right in front of the legend himself.
“He told me that Ultimate Warrior was interested in working out with me. He wanted me to train him. He’s, he’s, he’s not been in the ring in 10 years, and he’s got a match coming up in, I think it was Spain, with Orlando Jordan… I was like, ‘Well, yeah, you know, Mike, that’d be awesome. I got conditions. I want to be able to film it, you know. And I’ll make episode for RVD TV that would be huge, you know. And It’d be an honor, everything.’ And he agreed to it… I picked him up from the airport. LAX picked him up, and we went to… the school, and we worked out, you know, I put him through my stretch, which really, you know, that takes a long time. After an hour of stretching, nobody wanted to do anything… he ran the ropes a few times. You know, there wasn’t much of me actually training him by example… But he wanted me to bump a few times for him, whatever it was, it wasn’t really extensive. And that is where I shot the video, where I got the Sharpies. Yeah. He knew what I was gonna do. I was like, ‘Here, just come in and interrupt me, and I’m just gonna do you.’ You know, ‘what are you gonna say?’ ‘I don’t know. Whatever comes to me.'”
The match against Orlando Jordan in Spain was The Ultimate Warrior’s final match. He passed away in 2014, just days after his induction into the WWE Hall of Fame.
If you use any portion of the quotes from this article please credit 1 of a Kind with Rob Van Dam with a h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription.
