Like many professional wrestlers, Tyson Dux is itching to get back inside the wrestling ring following what we hope is the worst of the COVID pandemic. However, Dux has kept himself busier than most despite the lack of wrestling, utilizing the down-time from international travel and wrestling events to grow elsewhere, building a successful YouTube channel and his own clothing brand, Hammerlock Apparel, to keep him occupied throughout the pandemic.

Motivation was a theme throughout our recent conversation for Love Wrestling, and as both Dux and I chatted about how various professional wrestlers have used the pandemic as an opportunity to grow, he took the opportunity to give his thoughts on both his own motivations as well as some of his peers who have spent their time wisely over the past eleven months.

The topic began with an offhand comment on my part.

“You can tell who gave a shit to actually workout and stay prepared and maybe get in the ring when they had the opportunity versus the people who really didn’t over the last little bit,” I commented to him in the midst of our chat.

“And that’s great!” Dux replied enthusiastically. “That’s what’s great about social media is if you’re not being inspired or at least driven by like, ‘oh, that guy’s getting ahead of me? No way!’ That’s the great thing about it.”

Dux was quick to use the opportunity to credit a few pro wrestlers that he believes have made the most of a terrible time in the world.

“A lot of people, we get negative on these stupid platforms, unfortunately,” he continued, “but if you take away the good and the positives – like if you see Josh Alexander, Walking Weapon squatting non-stop all the time, or you see [Mike] Bailey doing matches or you see Ethan Page (who) has completely, completely transformed himself over this COVID thing.”

I nodded in agreement as Dux continued.

“And Tyler Colton! Think about Tyler Colton in Winnipeg, who just won a strongman competition. If these guys are in the middle of COVID-type things, and they’re still pressing forward – Tarik, too. I’m going to throw Tarik in there, too, because I watched Tarik finally (get) back to the gym and he’s more jacked and swole than ever. So, that really goes to show that guys that really want to go for it, go for it. The ones that don’t just have excuses why.

”

However, with social media sometimes being as negative as it is, I commented to him, where does he continue to pull consistent motivation from?

“It’s all internal,” Dux replied. “My father was always told me I’ve always had to work harder than anybody else. I’m not athletic by nature, I’m just a studier.

I’m a hard worker, and I’m a studier. I’m a learner. It’s also repetition that I have become who I am. With that said, I press harder now at 42 because of my mind. The first thing that will go is your mind saying ‘ah, just take today off,’ or ‘oh, you’re sore, or your knee hurts, take today off.’ That’s the first sign I know that once I have those thoughts creep into my brain, I go three times as hard. So I’ll be in my gym and for the first time in my whole professional wrestling and my boxing career and all the stuff that I’ve done over my tenure as an adult, I’ve never pushed myself harder to the point where I was almost sick, like puking sick, because that’s the mentality. At this age, if you’re not willing to give it 1,000%, what’s the sense, right?”

““You’re your own deterrent,” he concluded emphatically. “You have the key – you have the keys to the castle, and you get the keys to the kingdom, man, and if you press forward, you can’t deny hard work. You cannot deny it, so just be harder working.

And, if it falls back and you think you failed at it, then it’s time to work harder. It’s real simple. It’s a simple philosophy, but it’s it’s kept me around very, very long time. I’ve been very successful with it.

“I’m like, so happy with even through this rough period of time, it’s been almost like – it’s been rough, but we’ve still been able to do things. We’ve still been able to be more self-motivated and self-driven. So it’s good.”

Please credit Spencer Love/Love Wrestling with any of the above quotes used.

For years, Canadian wrestling fans have wanted to see Tyson Dux earn a spot in one of the world’s biggest wrestling promotions. While he’s frankly earned the opportunity many times over by this point, the former Cruiserweight Classic competitor has yet to take on a full-time role with one of the major companies.

However, as Dux revealed to me in our conversation late last year, there were plans for him to make his All Elite Wrestling debut prior to the onset of the COVID pandemic.

“I’ve always wanted to wrestle out west, and I finally had the chance to just as this COVID went down,” Dux mentioned in the midst of our conversation. “I was supposed to be in Europe, come home from Europe, go to AEW, from AEW go over to Vancouver, from Vancouver, go to Newfoundland, and it was just bouncing back and forth.

But, you know, we’re just gonna have to wait and see.”

Of course, my ears perked up at the mention of All Elite Wrestling. Personally, having heard nothing previously of one of my favourite wrestlers appearing on one of wrestling’s biggest stages, I had to inquire on the point.

“It was supposed to be a thing with [Shawn] Spears when Spears was having people come out and doing tags with him,” Dux replied. “It’s, of course, switched since then, but they wanted me to come down and tag with him, be his partner and run that kind of angle.”

“That’s all gone now but we’ll see what happens. We’ll see him down the line.”

While it was the first time that Spears had been mentioned in our conversation, Dux has been consistent in stating that the Niagara Falls native is his favourite opponent that he’s ever worked with. While no one doubts Spears’ talent, Dux has had the opportunity to wrestle a literal who’s-who of professional wrestling, and I was curious as to what made Spears stand out.

“With Spears, it’s one thing, and this is the hardest thing in professional wrestling to learn,” began Dux. “It’s only when you start in this business that you really get a sense of it, but it’s timing. Shawn is a good, big guy, attractive, athletic, all this stuff, but what sets him apart (more) than anybody else is his sense of timing is perfect.

He knows when to sell, when to fire up, when to go back to the sell, when to change gears, all this stuff where I don’t have to tell him. I don’t have to plan anything, we can just go out there and do it. He’s just got a real natural gift for timing.”

“A lot of guys, I have to pull along” the Canadian icon continued. “Like I either (say) like ‘slow down,’ or I was like ‘pick it up,’ you know what I mean? I never, I have never had to give him one of those calls ever. Like, none of those cues. Whereas like guys on – usually, guys that think they know what they’re doing in this business, you know how it is, they go a long time, but all it is is they just know how to do wrestling moves. They don’t know when to put the wrestling moves and why they’re putting the wrestling moves.”

“Shawn knows how.”

Please credit Spencer Love/Love Wrestling with any of the above quotes used.

For the past three months, Kaci Lennox has been training at the D-Von Dudley Academy in Winter Park, Florida as she prepares for both her currently-scheduled bookings as well as (hopefully!) another future appearance on AEW Dark.

Of course, many professional wrestlers of varying levels of skill have attempted to train before, and even less have done so successfully. Everyone is well-versed in Dudley’s accomplishments inside of the squared circle, but what differentiates him as a trainer?

It was something that Lennox was eager to talk about during our recent chat.

“Training with D-Von is incredible,” began the Baltimore native. “And this is – there’s no like, harsh stuff towards anybody else that I trained with. D-Von just – he drills it into your head. He doesn’t just give out a move or a spot to do and then have you do it. And then, if you – I mean, if you do it, great. If you don’t do it, like, he’s not like that. He literally has you do the spot over and over and over again until it’s crisp and clean and, you know, it’s what it’s supposed to be. He’s like that because he doesn’t want us to go up to WWE or AEW or IMPACT or whatever and have a crappy match.

“His name is like – his name is on us. So that’s why he does it, and honestly, I completely respect it. You wouldn’t want somebody using your name and then being a crappy person. I completely understand it, but I definitely love it.”

“It’s really good to learn from D-Von.”

Though he’s certainly one of the leaders of the academy, Dudley is far from the only individual responsible for the school’s success. As with any training facility, there are a number of people involved that Lennox is quick to credit.

“And then we have Dan Carr, who is the muscular endurance trainer, so he blows us up. But, you know, we need that because sometimes we have to go on and do 20, 30, 40, 60-minute matches, so we need that endurance. I love training with D-Von, and everybody’s so supportive. It’s a really big school, it’s continuing to grow. I believe we have – we have over 20 students right now, like 20 new students. So yeah, I’m excited. I should’ve been there a long time ago!”

While her current training may be going swimmingly, those who have listened to some of Lennox’s earlier interviews may recall that her first attempts to step inside the ring were markedly different. However, while she’s quick to agree that her earlier training was perhaps not well-suited for what she needed out of it, she also points out that’s not necessarily anyone’s fault.

“It sounds like it’s very, very – it’s very different than your first experience training when you were 18 with Gillberg’s Academy, hey?” I asked.

“It is,” she responded emphatically. “I’m also gonna preface this with saying that I’m also a different person. At 18 years old training at Gillbergs, I was just so excited to get the ring and get to training. You know, that was my first actual experience with wrestling. Now, fast-forward 10 years, and it’s like, I know a lot more about the inside of wrestling than I did when I was 18. So comparing those two things, it’s kind of hard sometimes, but we definitely did not do half of the stuff that we do at D-Von’s right now.

So yeah, I should have definitely came here a long time ago!”

Please credit Spencer Love/Love Wrestling with any of the above quotes used.