WayMoreSports.com: Wrestling's top diva
She's Canada's queen of World Wrestling Entertainment, and though her signature move is called delivering Stratusfaction, Trish Stratus is nowhere near satisfied — not when the sky remains the limit. She is very much the sum of her passions, and despite her aggressive onscreen persona, there's much more to Stratus than meets the eye.
Born Patricia Anne Stratigias, the 5-foot-4 Richmond Hill native attended York University. Due to a prolonged professors' strike, she left school and made her wrestling debut in March, 2000.
At 27, she's at the top of the wrestling world. Out of the ring, she's a movie buff and enjoys designing furniture for her newly built home.
Q: What's the worst injury you've received from wrestling?
A: Well, the worst one was when I had a bone chip in my ankle. It was bad because I had the surgery to remove it, and it put me into rehab. It was bad because I was off TV for three months, just rehabbing and getting better. But that point in my career was the turning point. Because when I did take that time ... off, with the training and the rehab, I was determined to come back and be better than ever in the ring. Then I came back in October and in November I won the women's title for the first time. Now four years later, it's like the rest is history. It was a bad but good thing.
Q: Have you ever had an accident with your costume?
A: Umm, yeah (laughs). I've had the front portion of my costume slip into places it shouldn't. Does that make sense? It revealed things it shouldn't. I'll let you guys do the math.
Q: Have you ever employed a wrestling move in your personal life?
A: No, thank God (laughs), but I wouldn't hesitate to.
Q: How do you respond to the question: Is wrestling fake?
A I chuckle first. I'm 27 years old, and the way my body feels, no, it's not fake. The chair shots are real. We land for real. I try to maybe educate the person as far as what they're saying. I kind of relate it somewhat to stunt work we're doing out there. It is somewhat choreographed but at the same time we do take the falls, we do take the hits.
Q: What type of music do you listen to?
A: Mostly R 'n' B and hip-hop. Depending on what I'm doing. I like to unwind to R 'n' B at night. My hip-hop keeps me up. When I work out I listen to hip-hop.
Q: Who's your favourite artist?
A: I have a lot of favourite artists. I'm diggin' Lil' Kim. She's one of my favourite artists, and recently she just redid my entrance music, so that was really cool. I come in to Lil' Kim and the words are really cool, they talk about me making it in a man's world and you know her talking about that is very cool. I mean she made it in a man's world as well, the rap industry, so that's pretty cool.
Q: Does it bug you that people think you're a diva?
A: I think the WWE divas have redefined the word diva. There was a perception of what a diva was like, and when we call ourselves divas, we encompass so many different characteristics that aren't diva-like. I mean we are down to earth, we are go-getters, we are athletes and beautiful. I think it's just an interesting mix of characteristics that we have that the former definition of diva didn't have. So I don't mind being called a diva, if it pertains to that definition.
Q: Are you a big hockey fan?
A: Love hockey. Huge hockey fan.
Q: What's your team?
A: The Toronto Maple Leafs, thank you very much. I'm a Tie Domi freak. He reminds me of me as a player. He's got a great combination of basically kicking ass, which I tend to do for a living, but also when the time counts he scores the right goals and he's there for the team.
Q: Did you play hockey?
A: I played field hockey for York University on the varsity team. I played rec league soccer since I was 8 years old till I was like 21 for Richmond Hill, so I'm used to playing sports. I'm a real aggressive player and pretty much my play is really reflected in Tie Domi's play. Which is kind of cool.
Q: We're going to get onto your collections. I hear you collect Barbie dolls.
A: Yeah, I know, I'm a non-girly girl but I collect Barbie dolls. Actually there's a story there. When I graduated from high school, when I got accepted (to university), my mom's friend gave me a full set of Barbie dolls. I always played with Barbies my whole life. It's funny, as much of a tomboy that I was I always loved Barbie. I think it's because of a role-playing thing, you know what I mean? You could let her do whatever the hell she wanted to do at the moment, you know what I mean? So I think that's why I liked it. So she gave me this collection of Barbies, so I just appreciated them for just how beautiful they were and how unique they were.
Q: What's the most you've paid for one?
A: Probably about 300 bucks. The reason, and this is actually a cool story, when I was kid I had a magazine clipping of my favourite Barbie. She was a wedding Barbie and she was wearing this Vera Wang dress. And I said, when I grow up I want to wear this wedding dress. So I pulled out this clipping maybe 10 years later, and it was all yellowed, and I was like now I collect Barbies, I should find her. So I went on E-bay and I found her, and I probably spent about 300 bucks Canadian. She's proudly displayed in my case, and hopefully on my wedding day I will be dressed as, I don't want to say I'll be dressed as Barbie, but it'll be sort of something that I've always looked into doing.
Q: You have a lot of hobbies.
A Yeah, I guess I have a lot of likes, and I'm at a position in my life now where I've just built my house in Richmond Hill, a new house. So I built it and I had a lot of thing customized to my needs, to display some things. For example, I travel a lot so I get a shot glass from every city or country that I travel to for my bar. I built a bar where I have a stand with all my little shot glasses.
Q: Are there wrestling groupies?
A: Oh yeah, I see them in person, I see them on the Internet. Wrestling fans are very passionate and they're really fanatical, and they're wonderful.
Q: Who's the coolest person you've got to meet?
A: Probably Adam Sandler. He was really different in person that I figured he would be. I felt like I was being more comedic than he was, so I thought maybe he's just playing his role when he does TV. So he was a really interesting person to meet, just because I'm a huge fan of his work.
Q: What was the last book you read?
A: Memories Of A Geisha, and it's interesting because I just got back from Japan last week, we did a two-day show in Tokyo, and it was very interesting. Not only was I fascinated by the culture in this book, I was blown away by the culture and the life of a geisha — it blew me away. So it was neat when I went to Japan and take some of the terms I had read about, and the streets, and the customs and some of the cultural things I had read about in the book and actually see it. It made me think that it's really important to read about these things, because when you experience these things, when you have a knowledge of it, it's just amazing thing. So Memories Of A Geisha was a terrific, fabulous book and I highly recommend it.
source: waymoresports.com
Born Patricia Anne Stratigias, the 5-foot-4 Richmond Hill native attended York University. Due to a prolonged professors' strike, she left school and made her wrestling debut in March, 2000.
At 27, she's at the top of the wrestling world. Out of the ring, she's a movie buff and enjoys designing furniture for her newly built home.
Q: What's the worst injury you've received from wrestling?
A: Well, the worst one was when I had a bone chip in my ankle. It was bad because I had the surgery to remove it, and it put me into rehab. It was bad because I was off TV for three months, just rehabbing and getting better. But that point in my career was the turning point. Because when I did take that time ... off, with the training and the rehab, I was determined to come back and be better than ever in the ring. Then I came back in October and in November I won the women's title for the first time. Now four years later, it's like the rest is history. It was a bad but good thing.
Q: Have you ever had an accident with your costume?
A: Umm, yeah (laughs). I've had the front portion of my costume slip into places it shouldn't. Does that make sense? It revealed things it shouldn't. I'll let you guys do the math.
Q: Have you ever employed a wrestling move in your personal life?
A: No, thank God (laughs), but I wouldn't hesitate to.
Q: How do you respond to the question: Is wrestling fake?
A I chuckle first. I'm 27 years old, and the way my body feels, no, it's not fake. The chair shots are real. We land for real. I try to maybe educate the person as far as what they're saying. I kind of relate it somewhat to stunt work we're doing out there. It is somewhat choreographed but at the same time we do take the falls, we do take the hits.
Q: What type of music do you listen to?
A: Mostly R 'n' B and hip-hop. Depending on what I'm doing. I like to unwind to R 'n' B at night. My hip-hop keeps me up. When I work out I listen to hip-hop.
Q: Who's your favourite artist?
A: I have a lot of favourite artists. I'm diggin' Lil' Kim. She's one of my favourite artists, and recently she just redid my entrance music, so that was really cool. I come in to Lil' Kim and the words are really cool, they talk about me making it in a man's world and you know her talking about that is very cool. I mean she made it in a man's world as well, the rap industry, so that's pretty cool.
Q: Does it bug you that people think you're a diva?
A: I think the WWE divas have redefined the word diva. There was a perception of what a diva was like, and when we call ourselves divas, we encompass so many different characteristics that aren't diva-like. I mean we are down to earth, we are go-getters, we are athletes and beautiful. I think it's just an interesting mix of characteristics that we have that the former definition of diva didn't have. So I don't mind being called a diva, if it pertains to that definition.
Q: Are you a big hockey fan?
A: Love hockey. Huge hockey fan.
Q: What's your team?
A: The Toronto Maple Leafs, thank you very much. I'm a Tie Domi freak. He reminds me of me as a player. He's got a great combination of basically kicking ass, which I tend to do for a living, but also when the time counts he scores the right goals and he's there for the team.
Q: Did you play hockey?
A: I played field hockey for York University on the varsity team. I played rec league soccer since I was 8 years old till I was like 21 for Richmond Hill, so I'm used to playing sports. I'm a real aggressive player and pretty much my play is really reflected in Tie Domi's play. Which is kind of cool.
Q: We're going to get onto your collections. I hear you collect Barbie dolls.
A: Yeah, I know, I'm a non-girly girl but I collect Barbie dolls. Actually there's a story there. When I graduated from high school, when I got accepted (to university), my mom's friend gave me a full set of Barbie dolls. I always played with Barbies my whole life. It's funny, as much of a tomboy that I was I always loved Barbie. I think it's because of a role-playing thing, you know what I mean? You could let her do whatever the hell she wanted to do at the moment, you know what I mean? So I think that's why I liked it. So she gave me this collection of Barbies, so I just appreciated them for just how beautiful they were and how unique they were.
Q: What's the most you've paid for one?
A: Probably about 300 bucks. The reason, and this is actually a cool story, when I was kid I had a magazine clipping of my favourite Barbie. She was a wedding Barbie and she was wearing this Vera Wang dress. And I said, when I grow up I want to wear this wedding dress. So I pulled out this clipping maybe 10 years later, and it was all yellowed, and I was like now I collect Barbies, I should find her. So I went on E-bay and I found her, and I probably spent about 300 bucks Canadian. She's proudly displayed in my case, and hopefully on my wedding day I will be dressed as, I don't want to say I'll be dressed as Barbie, but it'll be sort of something that I've always looked into doing.
Q: You have a lot of hobbies.
A Yeah, I guess I have a lot of likes, and I'm at a position in my life now where I've just built my house in Richmond Hill, a new house. So I built it and I had a lot of thing customized to my needs, to display some things. For example, I travel a lot so I get a shot glass from every city or country that I travel to for my bar. I built a bar where I have a stand with all my little shot glasses.
Q: Are there wrestling groupies?
A: Oh yeah, I see them in person, I see them on the Internet. Wrestling fans are very passionate and they're really fanatical, and they're wonderful.
Q: Who's the coolest person you've got to meet?
A: Probably Adam Sandler. He was really different in person that I figured he would be. I felt like I was being more comedic than he was, so I thought maybe he's just playing his role when he does TV. So he was a really interesting person to meet, just because I'm a huge fan of his work.
Q: What was the last book you read?
A: Memories Of A Geisha, and it's interesting because I just got back from Japan last week, we did a two-day show in Tokyo, and it was very interesting. Not only was I fascinated by the culture in this book, I was blown away by the culture and the life of a geisha — it blew me away. So it was neat when I went to Japan and take some of the terms I had read about, and the streets, and the customs and some of the cultural things I had read about in the book and actually see it. It made me think that it's really important to read about these things, because when you experience these things, when you have a knowledge of it, it's just amazing thing. So Memories Of A Geisha was a terrific, fabulous book and I highly recommend it.
source: waymoresports.com
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