![]() I just knew that I had something to hide, so I went even further to try and hide it. I put in effort to look more masculine-I'm a fairly masculine person in general, but I felt like I had to go even harder so no one would know I was gay. ![]() I would deepen my voice, I would wear certain things to look manlier. I was going to be a straight male pursuing wrestling. I signed up to do this, and I decided that no one was going to know who I am. At the time there was no relation whatsoever. My personal life involves a lot of people who do not know about wrestling, who don't care about wrestling. I was openly gay in my personal life, but that was X'ed out in training. Were you openly gay during your training?Ītlas: Oh, no no no. It was harder mentally for me because it came to me so easy at first, and then I had to struggle. It wasn't just wrestling-it was all of it.Įverything happens for a reason, and I feel like the universe was like, “OK, that was too easy for you? Let's put you back.” So from that point forward, wrestling training was hard. I had to learn how to run again, to do sit-ups. I had to learn how to be an athlete again. Once that was up, it was a year after I first started training, and that was when I realized this is hard. I was essentially bedridden for six months. But about six months in, I had an injury, I hurt my neck. I fast-tracked a lot of the classes and got through the program very quickly. It kind of was a blessing and a curse: a blessing because I knew I made the right decision but a curse because at first I didn't really struggle. So a lot of the stuff was just similar to that. I did gymnastics growing up, I was a cheerleader. That was too easy! People always expect me to talk about how hard it was-and I don't mean this to be cocky-but I was already an athlete. Wrestling Academy in July, and that was my real starting point. I needed a more structured environment: I need a coach, a trainer, someone that I could trust, a mentor. I realized very quickly that that was not for me. I was there for two months learning the super basic stuff, how to bump and run the ropes. When did you start training? What was that like for you?Ītlas: I started training in January of 2014. I had my moments where I would drift away, but it was always a part of my life. He eventually grew out of it when he found it was a work, but I just kept going. To me it was just so different from lucha libre. When I was seven, my older brother found WWF and was a huge fan, and I remember him watching an episode of SmackDown, right before Wrestlemania XVII, the huge Rock and Austin feud. So the first time I ever saw any wrestling was when I was four or five-we'd go to AAA shows or CMLL shows in Guadalajara. It was kind of a pastime in my family that was passed on to us. ![]() My parents were huge lucha libre fans in Mexico when they were kids. Jake Atlas: Wrestling's been in my life ever since I was born. ONE37pm: How did you first get into pro wrestling? What are some of your first memories of wrestling? Atlas offered us several honest opinions about controversies within the world of wrestling and what his achievements could mean in the future. We caught up with Atlas for a frank conversation about his views on progressivism and diversity in wrestling. His potential success within the world's biggest wrestling company could open up possibilities for countless wrestlers in the future. In October, unconfirmed rumors began circulating that Atlas had finally been signed to WWE, specifically on the NXT brand-which, if true, would make him one of the company's few openly gay performers. Did his outspoken advocacy on behalf of the LGBTQ community have something to do with it? Considering his exceptional skill set, it seemed patently criminal to almost everyone that he hadn't been signed already. Regularly cited as a favorite in discussions among other athletes, Atlas has the unique ability to make every fight feel explosively dramatic.Ītlas has made appearances in countless indie wrestling federations since his career began in 2014, and many have wondered when exactly a bigger company would snatch him and position him as its bigger star. Of all the rising stars on the independent pro wrestling scene, few are more universally beloved than California-based Jake Atlas.
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