Rhea Ripley Reveals What She Felt Before WrestleMania Match
Rhea Ripley has admitted she was going through something difficult before her championship match at WrestleMania 40.
In the opening match of WrestleMania 40 Saturday, the Women’s World Champion Rhea Ripley successfully defended her title against Becky Lynch. It was a great performance by Ripley, who kicked out of Lynch’s Manhandle Slam while following up with multiple Riptide slams including a Riptide into the turnbuckle and another Riptide for the win.
It was one year ago at WrestleMania 39 when Ripley won the Smackdown Women’s Championship from Charlotte Flair in an outstanding match that won a WWE Slammy Award this year. The title was soon renamed as the Women’s World Title and Ripley has had a strong grip on it ever since.
During an appearance at the WWE World panel (via WrestlingNewsco), Rhea Ripley spoke about how she had a panic attack before her match with Lynch, but she was able to overcome it and perform at a high level as usual.
“It’s quite funny how this whole thing works in this crazy world. I legit was having a straight-up panic attack two hours before I walked through the curtain, and I was violently shaking, just nervous.”
“If you don’t get nervous before you go out, especially at WrestleMania, you obviously don’t love it enough. That’s the way I think about it. So I’m glad the nerves were there. But at the same time, that was sort of taking over my body. So when I got to step through into the stage with the band Motionless in White, all those nerves that I had just sort of flew away.”
I was in the zone, I was moshing out like it was a little mosh pit. I was living in the moment, and that’s what I love about this business. We get to live in the moment a lot of the time. I just snap into Rhea Ripley, and I’m instantly comfortable, instantly ready to go and ready to fight.”
The Judgment Day Adds A New Champion Along With Rhea Ripley
Rhea Ripley isn’t the only World Champion in The Judgment Day now. Even though Damian Priest & Finn Balor lost their Tag Team Titles at WrestleMania 40 Saturday, Priest had a big moment at WrestleMania 40 Sunday when he cashed in his Money in the Bank briefcase on Drew McIntyre to become the new World Heavyweight Champion.
The Judgment Day has claimed that they run WWE and specifically the Raw brand, so it will be interesting to see what comes next for the group now that Ripley and Priest are both World Champions.