King of the Gods

Because of the Olympics I want to get back to the international nature of wrestling and feature one of my favorite wrestlers from Asia -- Zeus (real name Kenshou Obayashi).  In Greek mythology Zeus is the king of the gods, so the name is well chosen here.  Although he's Asian, he's got the body of a Greek god.  And from the pictures here, I'd say Zeus is the king of the Japanese wrestling gods.  The dude's got muscles, and he's not afraid to use them.

Horse Play

Hey guys!  Here's a picture of me hanging out by the pool while I enjoy the great summer weather.  Ha ha!  It's not really me.  Maybe you recognize this dude as Steel from Thunders Arena.  I just caught a preview of a new match TA released of Steel wrestling Tak in a rooftop pool in Vegas (Bear is also there to join the fun).  It brought back memories from when I was a kid hanging out at the pool during the summer with my buddies.  One public pool we went to had a list rules prominently displayed, and rule number one was "NO HORSEPLAY!"  Of course, when you get a group of kids in a pool together, and some of them are wrestlers, there's going to be horse play.  I can still hear the lifeguard yelling at us, "Hey, no horseplay!"  In this match between Steel and Tak, it looks like the rough housing gets a little out of hand, especially for Tak.  Good thing for Steel there's no lifeguard there to yell at them to stop the fun.

Check out Thunders Arena for a preview of the match, and Joe at Ringside has also got some nice commentary and pics to enjoy.

Ivan Kiev

With the Olympics going on, it reminds me of how universal a sport wrestling is.  This post celebrates the international flavor of the sport by going overseas to feature wrestler Ivan Kiev.  He wrestles in Berlin for the German Wrestling Federation.  Although his bio on the GWF website says he was born in Berlin and lists his nationality as German, he carries an obvious Ukrainian persona into the ring, what with the name Ivan Kiev and the blue and yellow tights.  He dishes out some pretty good bodyslams while he's in the ring, too.

At 6'2" and 205 pounds, Kiev is a tall, lanky wrestler.  I'm a fan of taller wrestlers and love to see them bodyslam other dudes.  In fact, I've always wanted to be scooped up and bodyslammed by a real tall wrestler myself.  Kiev is a few inches taller than average, but those extra inches make his slams look more impressive.