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Aspiring Pro Wrestlers Go To Danbury School To Learn The Basics

Frankie Graziano
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WNPR
Chris Moljo sits in a chin lock performed by trainer Randy Lockwood, while Team 3D Academy owner Bubba Ray Dudley makes an observation.

At first, the Team 3D Academy in Danbury, Connecticut, looks like a regular gym with kettlebells, free weights, and benches. But tucked all the way in the back, there’s a 16x16 wrestling ring.

Chris Moljo gets to go in it because he’s been training for more than three months and he’s showing a good grasp of Wrestling 101. So, when we met, he was at work in the ring with another trainee, doing a bit of what’s called chain wrestling — a chin lock here, or a hammer lock there, finding ways to reverse what his opponent does to him.

“I’m going to be 29 years old,” Moljo said. “Age is not in my favor right now. So, it’s either now or never.”

Moljo stands at six feet, two inches tall. He’s about 250 pounds and moves pretty well for his size. He spends his days at P.S. 106 in the Bronx, where he’s an elementary school gym teacher. But at night, he makes the 50-minute drive to the school in Danbury.

 

“I call myself a character,” Moljo said. “I’m a big kid and that’s why I love teaching elementary. I love entertaining people and being that guy.”

 

Team 3D Academy is run by former WWE Superstar Bubba Ray Dudley, a champion 30 times over across the world of pro wrestling. Dudley is still active, working for Ring of Honor -- another national professional wrestling company. When he’s in the ring, his fans beg him to go for his favorite instrument of destruction: a table.

Credit Frankie Graziano / WNPR
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WNPR
Bubba Ray Dudley is the owner of the Team 3D Academy in Danbury. He started the wrestling school in Florida back in 2005 with former in-ring tag-team partner D-Von Dudley.

“If you want to learn how to swing a golf club, you go see Tiger Woods,” Dudley said. “You want to learn how to shoot a basketball? You go see Michael Jordan.”

Dudley’s career started off badly -- he said he paid a guy $2,500 to train him and he was ripped off. Dudley doesn’t want his students to make the same mistake. That’s why he opened his school.

 

“If you’re going to learn how to do something like this,” Dudley said, “you always want to go to people who have been there, done that. And, most important in wrestling, have earned money.”

 

Dudley’s friend Tommy Dreamer is known as the “Innovator of Violence.” Dreamer, who is guest training, also made it to WWE where he was Hardcore Champion. The worst thing a wrestler can do is be out of shape, Dreamer said. He calls it “blowing up.”

 

“Blowing up in the ring is the worst experience in the world,” Dreamer said, “where you can’t breathe, and you know you have to continue wrestling. You have fans who are paying to see you perform. If you can’t breathe, or if you can’t go in that ring, it’s the worst feeling.”

 

Dreamer had a group of about 10 students in a circle near the ring steps, and he gave homework: go watch a match from 1981 between Ted DiBiase and Paul Orndorff in Mid-South Wrestling. Those guys knew the basics, he said.  

 

“If they do everything right in the beginning, you can mold them and teach them,” Dreamer said.

 

The instructors watched as the students practiced holds like wrist locks on the floor. Then the guys pushed sleds, leap-frogged over each other, and did squats in a series of timed workouts.

 

Randy Lockwood has made the rounds on the local pro wrestling circuit as “Platinum Playboy” Randy Shawn. He’s never been a WWE superstar, but he’s a certified personal trainer. And he’s trained Moljo -- the school teacher -- for almost a year now. He said Moljo has potential.

 

“When he comes to practice,” Lockwood said, “he’s so far ahead of everybody else, just in his footwork, his mindset, and his ability. Right now, he’s teetering to try and find that last 50 percent, and when he does -- boom. He’ll have it.”

 

Moljo is looking forward to his first official match. And one day, he wants to be a “WWE Superstar.” But Dudley said he doesn’t approach the business of training with a goal of making WWE stars. He wants them to be in shape to get in the ring. And when they do get in there, they’ve got knowledge and basic moves to pull it off. But it takes patience.

“This is not an immediate wrestling school,” Dudley said. “You’re going to spend a year here and you’re going to learn the right way.”

 

It costs $999 for a one-year membership to the Team 3D Academy. But if this pro wrestling primer was too much, don’t bother applying. The recruiting flier asks for “serious inquiries only.”

 

Frankie Graziano is the host of The Wheelhouse, focusing on how local and national politics impact the people of Connecticut.

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