3XW Waukee, IA 7/15/2006

From the Waukee Middle school in Waukee, IA 3XW had their 1 year anniversery show with special guest Nora Greenwald, aka Molly Holly.
Buck Albright defeated Vin Cross. The fans at 3XW really like to do bad sounding chants as they would chant 'Buck him up'.
Ryan Cruz w/Darin Corbin defeated Aaron Masterson. This was my first time seeing Masterson and I believe it was just his second match as he is one of the new trainees from the 3XW training camp.
Arik Cannon beat Austin Bayless in a hair vs hair match. Cannon borrowed a camera from a fan at ringside to show Bayless what he looked like with out his hair. This was not really the most dramatic hair vs hair match as Bayless really only had a few stands of hair on the front of his head.
Nate Bash & Benjamin Sailer beat Casanova & Devin Carter to win the 3XW tag team championship.
3XW womans champion Ann-Thraxx was surprised by former WWE ladies champion Nora Greenwald aka Molly Holly. Ann-Thraxx didn't stay in the ring for long once she saw Nora. I read on teh 3XW message board that some fans were surprised/disappointed that Nora did not wrestle on this night. In conversations I've had with Nora she has made it clear that she is done with wrestling in the ring. Never say never but I don't see her getting back in the ring anytime soon.
Matty Fitness retained his 3XW cruiserweight title against Chance Cordova.
Darin Corbin w/ Ryan Cruz defeated Tony Sly.
3XW Heavyweight champion Tony Scarpone & Cousin Mikey defeated The Blue Chippers - Brian Ash & Gage Octane w/ David Andersen by DQ.

NIW Cottage Grove, MN 7/2/2006

Northern Impact Wrestling finished off their first ever triple shot weekend with the finals of the Impact Invitational 16 man tournament at the Cottage Grove armory.
Kid Krazy beat Jimmy Jacobs to win the NIW Universal title and advance in the tourny. At the start of the show NIW owner Frosty came out with a new belt that was named the NIW Universal title as it was to replace the belt/title that Al B.C. held on to for 9 months.
Arik Cannon beat Jigsaw to go to the next round of the tourny.
Austin Aries pinned The Prophet to move on to the next level. The Prophets NIW Impact title was not on the line.
Delirious beat Darin Corbin in this second round match. In the photo here Corbin is wearing a Delirious mask that he found under the ring. Corbin must have been watching the best of Delirious dvds becuase he had Delirious down to a t.
Arik Cannon beat Austin Aries for his spot in the final match. The last time these two wrestled each other was when Cannon was the IWA MS champion and after a lariet from Aries he broke his coller bone.
Kid Krazy beat Delirious to face Cannon in the Impact Invitational finals.
In a classic surviver match Ryan Cruz was the final to win the match and Larry Sweeneys Tex-Arkana tv title but he quickly lost it as Cody O'Neill helped Sweeney roll Cruz up and leave the tourny with his belt.
The NIW Universal champion Kid Krazy beat Arik Cannon to win the NIW Impact Invitational.
Man! look at the size of that trophy! It's over 5 feet tall.

NIW Amery, WI 7/1/2006

The first night of the Northern Impact Wrestling Impact Invitational 16 man tournament took place at the Northstar Event Center in Amery, WI. There would be 8 first round matches and one womans match. NIW picked 8 of the best young wrestlers from Minnesota and 8 of the top indy wrestlers from outside of MN.
The first match of the tournament was between Darin Corbin and 'Sweet N Sour' Larry Sweeney. At first Sweeney got on the mic and told the crowd that his Tex-Arkana tv title was not on the line but Corbin said he would put his scrolling message belt on the line and Sweeney agreed to make it a belt for belt match. Corbin walked away from the ring with both belts and advances in the tourny.
The second match of the tournament was between Kid Krazy and Egotistical Fantastico. In what some called the match of the night Kid Krazy got the win after giving Ego his world of pain.
Lacey beat Rain with a little help from the ring rope.
Bact to the tourny, Cody O'Niell took on Jigsaw. O'Neill is one of the top cruiser weights in MN but he wasn't able to beat on of the top wrestelrs from the Chikara wrestle factory, Jigsaw.
Al B.C. put the NIW Undisputed championship on the line in his first match of the tournament against Jimmy Jacobs. These two first wrestled each other back in October 2005 when Al made a challenge to Jimmy for him to take a shot at his title. Al won that match with the help of his belt. The outcome was different this time as Jimmy put Al down for the pin and took the title.
Ring announcer Joey Eastman with the Tex-Arkana Television title he won earlier in the night.
Arik Cannon wrestled Ash in a frist round match. It was a battle of the mohawks but it turned out that Cannon had the best mohawk on this night and he made his way to the second round of the tourny.
The Punisher Rob James took on Delirious in a first round match. Delirious went after James's ass which he was using as his biggest weapon in this match. Delirious won.
Ryan Cruz wrestled Austin Ariers in the second to last match of the night. Cruz took it to the TNA wrestler but fell short in the end as Aries advanced in the tourney.
In the main event and final first round match the NIW Impact champion The Prophet wrestled B.J. Whitmer. In a big upset The Prophet beat the much larger Whitmer after a top rope message.

NIW Crystal, MN 6/30/2006

Night one of there nights of wrestling presented by Northern Impact Wrestling this night taking place at the Crystal Ballroom in Crystal, MN. This card was a warm up for the Impact Invitational that was being held the next two nights.
Before the official start of the card a pre show match was held between Robbie Thunder and Bobby Mafi. The more experienced Thunder got the 3 count in the end.
In the opening match Ash beat Joey Envy, Larry Sweeney, Kamikaze Klecker, Malikite and Micheal Elgin in an Impact carnival match. This was the first time Ash and Elgin wrestled in MN. In the photo it's Klecker in hot pink diving on to Larry Sweeney and Ash diving on to Joey Envy.
The NIW Impact champion The Prophet retained his belt by beating Jigsaw. This was my first time seeing Jigsaw but I've seen the ref who is pinning Jigsaw in the photo before as that is Bryce Remsberg. The comedy bits that Bryce does in some matches always gets the crowd going.
The NIW tag team champs Tep and Jones retained their belts in a 4 team match. The other teams involved in that match were The Northstar Express, 101 Proof and The New Generation. In the photo Cody O'Neill is dropping an elbow on Ryan Cruz of NSE who is being held by Aaron Corbin who just reunited with O'Neill after being apart since MPW stopped in the old training center.
Egotistical Fanstatical made his first trip to MN as he took on one of MN's best, Chris Jordan. But Ego went down for the 3 count in his MN debut. Ego can be seen in The Wrestler/Inside Wrestling vol 8 in a 2 page article with 2 of my photos.
In tag team action Rob James & Al B.C. beat Kid Krazy & Jimmy Jacobs as James pinned Jacobs.
BJ Whitmer beat Arik Cannon. This was BJ's second time in MN as he once wrestled for Steel Domain Wrestling.
Austin Aries, one half of the ROH tag team champions beat Benjamin Sailer.
In the main event Delirious made Horace the Psychopath tap out. This was as great as I thought it would be and even better. This photo was taken seconds before Delirious's foot hit one of those lights and broke it. Glass was all over the floor as Delirious hit the floor. That's when this match turned 'hard core'.

MPW Minneapolis, MN 6/27/2006

So these MPW First Ave shows have pretty much turned into the old MPW Sunday shows where they showcased there new trainees.
The second match of the card was between two of the newest MPW trainees as Johnny Ridlin beat Craven Knyte.
In the 4th match of the night Mitch Paradise answered The Big Bad Booty Daddys challenge and he got the win.