Joe Hendry recently sat down with Kenny McIntosh from Inside The Ropes. The following was sent to us:
While signed with Ring of Honor in 2020, Joe Hendry was informed of the news that put almost all wrestling on hold until further notice as the world had shut down due to the COVID pandemic. At one point believing his time as a professional wrestler may have come to an end, Hendry started to focus on building himself back up for the eventual return to the ring, which included some inspiration from a former WWE Champion:
“Mark Haskins and I were flying out to wrestle The Briscoes. Me, Mark and Vicky Haskins all got on the plane at Heathrow to Las Vegas. Everything was fine. When we got off the plane, Mark just shouted, ‘The world’s shut down!’ We went to the hotel and I was told that if I didn’t get a flight home there was a very real chance I was going to be stuck in America. My dog was at home, so I had to leave, and that was my Ring of Honor run over. I had just started to build up a bit of steam and that was it done. And then wrestling was taken away from me for two years, no momentum, no leverage, and I had to find a way to get back.”
“I started to accept that wrestling might be over, and I think sometimes you have to let go of a dream to actually achieve it. I feel like I personally and professionally had a couple of rock bottom moments around that time, and I feel like I needed that to build myself back up. I got super into weightlifting programmes, powerlifting and bodybuilding. I bulked up to 265 pounds and I would work out for two hours every day because I bought all the gym equipment. That’s all I was doing, just working out. In the background I was watching old WWF stuff that I’d never seen before.
I was watching the rise of Sycho Sid and I thought this guy kicks ass. I thought I’m just going to be Sid if he was in the modern era, with the Joe Hendry character. I took a little bit of that influence with my moveset, doing more power stuff. That influence in-ring has brought me to where I am today.”
Full story: https://itrwrestling.
