Q&A With Koloff- #90

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Enjoy it, share it, but most of all, thank you for listening and choosing the Truth Podcast Network. Ladies and Gentlemen, the following contest is set for one flaw. Introducing first, from Lithuania, he weighs 123 kilos, the Russian nightmare, Nikita Kolov. Welcome to another episode Q&A with Kolov, the Devil's Nightmare. Today, today, coming all the way from our friends up north, north of the border, up in old Canada, Jordan Clark. Welcome to the Q&A show with Kolov. Thank you very much, sir.

Thank you. Some of your listeners might know me better as Duktor Angle, former wrestler at Stampede Wrestling and Prairie Wrestling Alliance. Well, come on. Yeah, because I know. We'll talk about that. We'll talk about what you're doing up there in Calgary. But you guys, you say, like we say Calgary down here, you've pronounced it a little different, right? Well, we just kind of, we're lazy, right? I should say lazy.

We're just too busy to say the whole word. So we kind of take the airy out of the back and just make it a reek, right? So yeah, most people from outside will say, you'll hear people say, I'm from Calgary.

Yes. No, you're not. You're from Calgary. That's how I'm like, Calgary.

How's that? Anyway, so, well, which is home of the Hart Foundation, right? The Stu Hart. And of course, you said you're a product of the dungeon for those who are familiar with the Hart family, right? I am. I am. I started training there in fall of 1996.

Okay. Yeah. Yeah, under Bruce Hart. So I got stretched by Stu a couple of times. By the time I was training there, I think Stu was probably, boy, I'd guess I'm at 80, 81 when I was breaking in. So he could still, you know, once he got his hands on you, he could still stretch you, but you know, you could run away from him. He could, he could, he couldn't keep up with you. That, oh my gosh.

If you could get a run for it, you could get away. But once he got a hold of you, even at 80, you were finished. Yeah. You have hands like vice grips, like he just tie you up, like in a pretzel or something, right?

Oh man. He, like the first time my friend and I met him, I mean, actually met him at an amateur wrestling tournament when I was a kid, he was giving out medals or something. And I met him there and I met Owen actually at the university of Calgary tournament doing the same thing. And so the first time I really get to have a conversation with him, we were up in the kitchen of the Hart house. And I don't know if you're familiar with it, but it was an industrial sized kitchen. Like it was, you know, they had 12 kids, so did a commercial kitchen in their home. And, um, he had my buddy up and up against his cabinet, up against the spice cabinet and kind of had sort of a reverse version of the thread through one and had his chin in my pal's eye socket.

And that was what he went to get in the kitchen. Okay. Oh, I'm just trying to get a visual of that.

Right. And, uh, now, now for the record, like, like I recently interviewed Danny Warren, who has an organization, he's had an organization, I think since 20, 2009, I think, um, uh, Canadian, Canadian wrestling elites. And I was fortunate in 2017 to do a 21 city tour in 21 days across your beautiful country of Canada and, and with Calgary being one of the stops. In fact, uh, the night we did our show there, I got to meet quite a number of the Hart family cause, cause Danny honored the Hart family there that night at the show. So it was kind of, yeah, it was kind of fun to meet them all.

We did a drive by. I didn't get to go into the house and, and, or, uh, see or, or experience the dungeon, but I've heard many, many stories. Were they all true?

Jordan, all the stories true. You know, what's funny is you hear the story and you think there's hyperbole there. You always think, okay, you know, this is, this is the wrestling business.

So it's all been laced with, with exaggeration or hyperbole. And then you kind of start digging into it and realize that everyone tells the same story and there's no deviation. Do you know what I mean?

It's like, well, obviously if I'm hearing the story from six different people and they're telling me the exact same story, it, there must be truth there. You know what I mean? So it's like, I always kind of wondered like people wonder about the Hart family and I always say like, I don't care who you are. I don't care what you do. But when you grow up with a wrestling bear that lives under the front porch of your house and you'll let ice cream drip down your toes.

So a wrestling bear can like ice cream off your toes. You know, I've had a different upbringing than anyone else. Yeah.

Okay. So you were just making that up. Were you, that was like a real story, right? That's a 100% true story. And again, when I heard it, it's like, no.

And then you see pictures of the wrestling bear and hear from a couple of different family members, the same stories like, Oh man, they did have a wrestling bear under the stairs that lived ice cream out there. Oh my gosh. This is classic.

This is, this is incredible. So, so, so you, okay. All right.

I'm not even sure where to go from there from the wrestling bear. So, so, okay. But let, all right, let's back up just for a second. So you're, so you're born and raised up there. You got a family up there. Tell us, tell us a little bit about, about, about Jordan.

Yeah. You know, I mean, when I wrestled, you know, everybody can't be from the same hometown. And most of us were local here when I broke into a stampede. So, you know, I built out of Waco, Texas, and for a long time, they made me walk around and try and put on this phony Texas accent.

It sounded horrible. Um, but yeah, I'm actually, I'm born and raised in Calgary as well as my wife, which is kind of a rare thing. Um, Calgary is in oil, kind of an oil boom city. So it's a lot like Las Vegas where it's getting to a point where there's not a lot of people from Calgary anymore. Most people move here and, um, yeah, I have a fantastic daughter.

She lives up north in Grand Prairie and another one of the oil cities here in Alberta. Um, so yeah, man, I, uh, you know, just kind of do my thing, roll along. I'm actually a parts technician by trade. So, uh, you know, didn't retire on my huge wrestling, my huge wrestling money. Right, right.

Yeah. So your career, so your career, so you, you, you break it, you broke it, you break into stampede wrestling, uh, essentially. And, and you, how long, how long was your wrestling career? Um, you know, kind of little breaks here and there, um, you know, burnout things like that is, you know, you can, uh, um, but I probably, I, I started wrestling, I started training in 96 and I had my very last match November 24th, 2018. So I would say in between there, I probably had five or six years where I wasn't wrestling. So probably 14 or 15 years.

Sure. You know, probably I tried to do the math once and it was tough cause we used to wrestle, you know, like that schedule. You wrestled with Danny Warren and one of the things that impresses me about Danny Warren, if I can put him over for a second is the sheer number of shows he runs for an independent promotion, because that's how we broke it in stampede. Right. Like our first tour was 10 shots in 11 nights. Um, so I have nothing but respect for that. Um, so yeah, I, you know, we, there was a lot of nights we worked twice.

I kind of counted it up one time and figured I probably had about 1800 matches. Right. Yeah.

It is hard to calculate, right? Like people ask me, you know, and I, I, I was able to break it down into one year and, and where, where I had a 454 matches in, in just one year. Right. And so, so yeah, so you get it.

So, so when I went on, when I went on Danny's tour, fortunately I wasn't in the ring and putting the boots and tights on, but it nevertheless, it was still grueling. I mean, 21 days in 21 cities and we covered 5,500 miles. I don't know what that translates into into kilometers, but a lot, you know, that's a 10,000 kilometers. Okay. So there you go.

Yes. 6,300 miles would be 10,000 kilometers. So close, close to 10,000 kilometers. We can all, all by the way, all over the road, by the way, there was no flying involved other than when I flew into Canada and then flew, flew back home. But a great experience, none the less.

And one of my, one of my favorite memories, you're probably familiar, the, the town of Banff, I guess, how you say it. Yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah. You bet.

Yup. One of my all time favorite memories was, was we took four young guys up there. We, we got up there early. We were able to kind of spend part of the day there in between towns and, and just had so much fun there in, in, uh, seeing, seeing the city of Banff. And so anyway, so what, what would be a, just a, a highlight or a quick highlight or two of, of your career?

What, for our listeners, what would you share? Uh, you know, probably I would say the height, probably, you know, I had a couple of, for me, my highlights were maybe different than some people, but, um, I wasn't somebody that got into wrestling to win titles and things like that. I truthfully got into trying to make a living at wrestling. I was an amateur wrestler that converted the pro wrestling. Um, so it wasn't about winning belts, which I think was maybe wrong.

I should have, you know, maybe I should have set the goals a little differently. Um, but having said that, probably my biggest moment was that, was when I, I won the British Commonwealth mid heavyweight title from Bruce Hart. Um, and more important than the title for me, Nikita was actually who held that title previously.

Cause if, excuse me, if people know the Calgary territory, they know the guys like, you know, obviously Bret Hart and Owen Hart. And then you have Davey Boy Smith and dynamite kid and kind of somewhat less famous, but local legends, like the, you know, the great guy was saying, um, the lineage that held that title more than anything. Um, and the respect that came along with it was probably the highlight of my career and then being able to carry it.

Or I think 400 and somebody told me a while ago, I had the longest, the most amount of championship date with that belt. But, um, that's probably my biggest, my biggest highlight. Well, that's awesome.

Well, congratulations on that. That's that's amazing. And I learned from Danny, I didn't realize that the Canada had, had his, uh, Tara territories all across all across Canada, right?

Much like the U S in the early days of wrestling in the U S before, before the, the, the major organizations took over. But, so that was pretty amazing to learn that six main territories. Yeah. Yeah. That's amazing though.

That's amazing. So, well, uh, very good. Well, that's a, thank you for sharing, uh, sharing that I'm excited about that, uh, to hear that part of your, your story.

So, well, let's, let's segue in transition here and, and, uh, give you the opportunity to ask me a couple, three, four questions and, uh, and have some fun. You ready to do that? Absolutely. Absolutely. All right. Fire away.

What's your first question, Jordan? Well, now one of the things we keep hearing and you and I talked briefly before we came on that you don't watch a ton of wrestling today, which I can attest. I try to keep up, but Hey, it's too much. There's too much on TV for me to watch it all.

And he it's, you know, it's hard to find carbo three hours on a Monday to watch it. Um, but the one question I had, I have for you now, I don't know if you've heard about this interview that, um, the undertaker did probably last year in the last year. And he talked about how, you know, maybe back in the day, you know, actually back in your day, especially, you know, the late, you know, the late seventies, early eighties, the men were manlier for lack of a better term. And, you know, there were guys that traveled with guns in their bags and he said it the way he said it almost romanticized it. Do you know what I mean?

That, that the business was a little better off then. And I'd wondered if you to a, have you ever, you know, did you ever happen to see anybody say, with a gun in the locker room or did you ever, and did you have to deal with anything like that in your day? That's a good, it's really a very unique question. I've not been asked anything like that before, but believe it or not, I have an answer.

Yeah. So really a couple of guys come to mind, uh, Don Crenodle, who, you know, he and, and uncle, I'm uncle of Chateau Eta, right. Who, who, by the way, people ask me all the time. They're like, so was I, so, okay, I just figured out you're not from Russia. And I'm like, oh, good, good, good.

You figured that out. And, and then they're like, like for real, like this just recently happened, like within, you know, a week or two ago. And I'm like, okay. And then they're like, well, but was Ivan really from Russia? I go, well, no, but he was closer than I was. Cause he was from Vancouver, Canada. Oh, Canada.

Right. And they're like, oh my gosh, he wasn't even from Russia either. I go, no, but he was much closer, much closer to the border there. So anyway, um, but Don Crenodle, who was Ivan's partner always packed, but, uh, an even better story, I think is a guy by name of Buddy Landell. Do you know that name?

Yeah, you bet a hundred percent. Nature boy, Buddy Landell. He was kind of, kind of a flare spinoff and it kind of the way I view it, but I'll never forget Jordan, like he and I were riding to a town one time and we were actually, I remember going through Charlotte and, and he, he was weaving in and out of traffic. I mean, reckless in my view anyway, like I valued my life. Okay. Uh, especially in an automobile and he was reckless dude. And I'm like, I'm like, dude, like, like slow down.

We're not late. It's not that. And, and if, if anyone knew Buddy Landell is just kind of who Buddy Landell was. Right. He was just, he was kind of reckless. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, and I'm like, dude, and the next thing I know, he goes, he goes, we're all good. He goes, if anything happens and he reaches underneath his seat and I'm like, dude, what are you doing? Like put that thing down, put that thing away.

I mean, somebody sees that. I don't even know what the laws are here in North Carolina, you know, the, the whole conceal, open carry, all that kind of thing. I'm not even familiar with any of that. I'm like, but, but it, so here's the story. Here's the deal though. Here's the rest of the story. We get to the town, wrestle. He gets me home and I made a decision right there.

And then I will never ride in a car again with Buddy Landell behind the wheel. I just, uh, done. Right. Yeah. Oh my gosh.

I'm like, and, and he was in my view reckless while he was driving reckless. Right. So anyway, so, so yeah, it was, uh, yeah, it was, I get it, you know, and then of course, you know, you hear the stories of a Harley race and, and, you know, Dick Murdoch, the redneck Dick Murdoch and, and, and I mean, some tough, just like legit tough guys. Right. And so, yeah. So you know, what's funny is I had this, I was talking to somebody a while ago and it, when you talk with the tough guys and the way, and I don't think this necessarily a bad thing, it just is. And I think it's actually more of a tell on society is each generation in wrestling seems a little bit softer than the last.

Do you know what I mean? Like, I remember going to the dungeon. There was a crop of kids at the dungeon and they were all really nice kids and they were good athletes.

And I remember thinking these guys wouldn't have made it out of our dungeon. updated life story, a tale of the ring and redemption. Go to www.colof.net and donate today. Nikita Koloff here and I am excited. Did you hear the huge announcement, the big announcement? Well, maybe it's a minor announcement. Anyway, Facebook, go look up my new fan page, Nikita Koloff fans and like it and follow today.

You're listening to the truth network and truth network.com. But then I remember, and I started thinking like, well, what I made it out of the dynamite kids Dutch. Do you know what I mean? Dynamite have made it out of old stew hearts, original dungeon, you know, back in the day. And, and I thought, you know, we, we come down harder on this new generation is like each generation's probably got it a little easier than the last one.

And, and I think your generation was kind of the last generation of that where you really had to be able to look after yourself on the road. I think I would, in a sense, certainly agree with that. And, and even, you know, think about my, my good friend, Lex Luger and, and his experience with, uh, with, uh, um, oh gosh, the, the, the Japanese, uh, um, the name just, no, no, no, no, no, not as match who trained him. Um, oh gosh, why did it slip my mind anyway?

Uh, it may come back to me, but you know, in Tampa and, and he literally his, his trainer, like literally broke Hulk Hogan's leg in training camp because Hulk was goofing off. And, and I know it's just slipping my mind, but, and especially the Japanese right there. I mean, they take it super serious. Right. And so, so Lex took it super serious because that's who he was trained by. Right. So anyway, all that to say, some of those different trainers, Vern Ganya, you know, Brad Ringins, you know, you talked about Stu stretching guys, you know, Brad Ringins would have guy, um, only in Jean Anderson.

I mean, they, they guys want to break into the NWA and they stretched guys. Right. So, um, anyway, so the question you can find, what is the interesting things in it? One of the things I'll tell you about the hard houses, it was boiler heated. So there's pipes that ran through every floor of the house. And there was a hole from one of the living rooms, um, down into the dungeon and Stu had somebody down there. You can hear this. If you watch the documentary wrestling with shadows, I know there's this footage is on there and Owen dropped an old tape recorder microphone down that hole.

And you can hear Stu making a grown man cry down there. Uh, I, I have no doubt hero Matsuda. I want to say, I'm pretty sure that was, uh, Lex's training here. Hero Matsuda while we were sitting here.

Yeah, it is hero Matsuda. Well, great question. Let's, let's roll on. Have you got another one for let's roll on? I do.

I do. Um, now if you have one piece of advice that, you know, young, I bet you get this a lot. If you're one piece of advice, you just consistently give young people trying to break in.

What is that? Uh, great question. I'll use my tour across Canada actually, as part of the answer to that question, because there were a lot of young guys on that tour and early, early into the tour, you know, they were coming to me going, Hey, did you watch my match? Would you know? And they were very respectful, uh, and, and very sincere and saying any advice you'd have for me.

Right. And, and, you know, there's a seven, eight matches on the card. I'm like, guys, I can't watch all the matches and remember all the matches. You know, if I had a notebook, well, like literally like the next night, one of the young guys brought me a notebook and an ink pen. He goes, could you like make notes? I'm like, sure. And so I did, but, and here's what I said to him though, Jordan, I said, I said, I could probably give you, I said, give you some advice, but understand this.

I came, I was trained up old school by Ivan Kolov, Don Coronado, Dusty Rhodes, other guys. So the advice I give you, what I'm seeing, the product you're, you're putting on, what you're doing in the ring, I go, my brain can't keep up with. I go, I go, so I go, I can give you some advice if you'll listen to it. No, no, no, we'll, we'll do it. We'll do it. I'm like, okay.

Okay. So the, the best piece of advice I gave them was, was more, excuse me, less equals more, less equals more. And they just kind of looked at me.

I'm like, guys, you go out there and do a hundred moves in 37 seconds and nobody in that audience can, can compute what you just did. I go, I could work a headlock for, for three minutes and do nothing else but a headlock and, and, and draw the fan into the story. And so here's my advice. And so I, and I, I share, and I will say to their credit, a couple, three, four of them, I'd give them my advice. They'd actually go out the next night and actually do it and come back and say, they'd look at me and they go, wow, that, that really worked.

I'm like, hello. That's what the business was founded on, you know, way back when. So that's one thing with these young guys don't understand is if you get to the show at WWE and you're working 270 days a year, you need to be able to work a headlock for three minutes a night.

You know what I, you know, that wear and tear like that's like, say less is more less equals more. And so slow it down, let the fans actually register what, what it is you're doing and, and don't let them dictate the match to you. Your objective should be to dictate the match to them. Now on that note, I'll say this and we'll, we got time for one more question for you.

Sure. Is on that note, obviously the business has changed over the years and, and many of these guys don't have the luxury of, of calling their own match or, you know, telling their own story. Right. You know, maybe, maybe some do, but for the way I understand it, cause I don't watch a lot of the new product is, you know, between writers and even interviews, I mean, 100% of my interviews were spontaneous, no scripts, none, zero zip, 100% spontaneous.

And I would say 95, 96% of my matches were, were spontaneous improv done in the ring, very little communication prior to a match. And so different business, but hopefully some of those guys get that opportunity. And I will say this too. You're right.

I do agree that some of the guys, you know, wouldn't have, wouldn't have made opening bell, you know, in, in, in our era. So great question. Well, it actually segues that whole answer segues into my third question, which was kind of, how do you feel about where the business is going today? Do you know what I mean?

And I kind of think you just answered it. Well, and again, kudos, kudos. I mean, not taking away anything from the guys. I, one thing I say is these kids athletically and creatively are at a level I could have, I don't think I could have achieved.

And so I always give them that respect. Yes. Well, and, and so I would say to the guys in the ring in today's, in today's era, you know, certainly taking nothing away from their athletic ability and, and for their performance and what they're doing in the ring at all, taking nothing away from that, you know, could it, could it ever come full circle background? I think they've pushed the envelope far enough that, that, that no, I don't, I don't think it could. So it's a different product and it certainly has a fan, you know, a fan following. But I'll say this too.

And I've just recently had this discussion. Somebody asked me recently, did you ever think, you know, 40, like almost like literally like 40 plus years later, 40 years later, you know, you'd be traveling around doing these autograph signings and people would be coming out of the woodwork to get your autograph, to get a picture with you and all that. The short answer is no, no, no, never in a million years did I ever feel, you know, there'd be such a demand for, for the quote legends of wrestling and what many have termed the golden era of wrestling.

Would we have this kind of appeal to the fans? So kudos to all you fans out there that fell in love with wrestling at whatever age and, and whatever, whatever period of time you, you from current day product to all the way back, kudos to all of you for your support. Like for real, I can't, you know, I'm just appreciative of that.

So, yep. I think that's something I think all us wrestlers need to really recognize is, you know, without the fans, we have nowhere to apply our trade. No, no, look, I was just honored at a banquet in Charlotte. It was called the gathering and they, they honored me at a banquet that night. And, and I said, you know what, I'm, I'm only up here because of all of you. I mean, you know, I got to sit at the table with eight fans and share some personal stories and, and said, if not for you, the fan, I would have not have had a career.

And certainly all these years later, be able to again, go out and, and the, and Jordan, the fact that somebody still wants my signature and is he, or a picture with me and, and is even, you know, willing to pay for that, it just blows me away. I'm so honored and grateful and just feel so blessed to be able to have that opportunity. So, and I mean, it's an honor and a blessing for us to have guys like you around, you know, Nikita, you're such a gracious man, and you're just so respectful to the business and all the people in it. And I, and I really truly believe that it's our good fortune to have, to have men like you in the business. Well, I appreciate it. I appreciate your time today. I certainly appreciate the questions and, and, and, and just excited. I was mad.

I didn't know that part. So, you know, some of, some of your stories, so I'm excited. I was excited now to hear some of your story, Jordan, appreciate you being on the show today. Oh man, I appreciate you having me on, you know, you know, I'm kind of pretty humble about my status of where I am in life. And when somebody like you is willing to take some time to talk to me, it's always a big thrill. So I appreciate it.

Well, Jordan Clark, Q and A with Koloff. I hope you, those of you in Listening Land, enjoyed the conversation today and some of Jordan's story and tune in again for another episode of Q and A. God bless you. This podcast is made possible by the grace of God and your faithful prayers, support, and generous gifts. May God bless you for your continual contributions. Go to koloff.net and donate today.

Hi, Nikita Koloff. Be sure to check out The Man Up Show, now available on television, broadcast, and podcast. Go to MorningStarTV.com or the Truth Radio Network. Check out your local listings or better yet, download the Truth Network app today. Winston-Salem, be sure to check them out today at wsmc1.com because you are number one. This is the Truth Network.