On Sunday the 28th of October Toni Storm competed in the final of the Mae Young Classic at the first ever all women’s PPV in WWE history, Evolution. For many WWE fans, this was their first time seeing the Australian sensation who has been taking independent wrestling by Storm for the better part of three years. With a lot of fans wondering “just who is Toni Storm” we are here to let you know about Storm’s time on the indies and how an Australian girl became one of the hottest names in the UK.
Toni Storm started wrestling at the age of 13 and by the time she was 18 had made the move to the UK. In her early days in Australia Storm was a regular for Chaos Championship Wrestling, PROWL Wrestling and appeared for the likes of Impact Pro Wrestling Australia, All Action Wrestling and Gippsland Pro Wrestling. She even managed to capture the PWAQ Women’s Championship (now known as the AIWF Australian Women’s Championship) twice. 2013 and 2014 saw her work for a whole host of new promotions including most notably Melbourne City Wrestling where she would cross paths with Evie and Demi Bennet, now known as Dakota Kai and Rhea Rhipley respectively, Storm even managed to wrestle for REINA in Japan. From her early days it was clear that Storm was a talented performer as more and more companies were booking her but she felt the need to keep improving so in 2014 she moved to the UK to start training there and working shows.
2015 would see Storm really apply herself and work for over a dozen different companies in the UK. She competed most frequently for All Star Wrestling, a place that stars such as Juice Robinson and Daniel Bryan have worked and associated with helping them learn. She competed for companies like Southside Wrestling Entertainment, HOPE Wrestling, Futureshock Wrestling and Kamikaze Pro as well as many other companies as she wrestled more matches in 2015 than from 2011-2014. In 2015 she also debuted for a company called PROGRESS Wrestling on their smaller ENDVR shows where she would meet a woman by the name of Jinny.
2015 saw Storm start to make her name as companies and fans took notice, this left 2016 as the year for her to prove she was worth the hype. In 2016 Storm would debut with two companies that she would become synonymous with as she debuted for Westside Xtreme Wrestling (wXw) and World Wonder Ring Stardom(commonly referred to as Stardom) and would make her Chapter debut for PROGRESS having only previously featured on their ENDVR shows. wXw fans were treated to Storm taking on Melanie Gray and eventually Alpha Female as the German company continued to build it’s women’s division. But it was in Stardom that Toni Storm would make the biggest impression. She took part in the tournament to crown the inaugural SWA Undisputed world women’s champion. She would lose in the final to Io Shirai as the two met for the first time ever. Storm would go on to defeat Shirai for the title a few months later and would hold it for 612 days. Toni Storm would also compete in her first 5 Star Grand Prix, Stardom’s version of the famous G1 Climax. She finished with 8 points as she fought Mayu Iwatani to a double KO in the final block match.
2016 was the year Storm proved the hype but 2017 is the year she ARRIVED. She blew away the competition in Stardom to win both the Cinderella Tournament and the 5 Star Grand Prix becoming the first gaijin in Stardom history to win both. She would then go on to capture the World Of Stardom Championship due to Mayu Iwatani suffering an injury during the match. Regardless of the circumstances Storm had one of the most successful years of anyone in Stardom history as she held the most prestigious title in women’s wrestling and was officially made MVP for 2017. While she was busy killing it in Japan Toni Storm also became the first ever PROGRESS Women’s Champion a title she would hold for almost a year as she helped provide legitimacy to the young division. Over in Germany for wXw Toni Storm won the Femmes Fatales tournament besting Jinny, Wesna and Viper to win the tournament which has only been won by Alpha Female, Storm and Meiko Satomura. On top of her achievements in the world of indie wrestling, Toni Storm was also selected to compete in the first-ever Mae Young Classic as she reached the semi-finals of the historic all women’s tournament losing to eventual winner Kairi Sane. 2017 is the year that Toni Storm became one of the most talked about wrestlers on the independent scene. Her work in numerous countries and the WWE drew the eyes of fans to her and her always stellar performances.
As you already know 2018 has seen Storm win the Mae Young Classic and become a key member of the NXT UK roster as she gets the push to the stars that many fans feel she deserves. At just 23 years old she has already been to the peak of Japanese wrestling, German wrestling, the British wrestling scene and even the WWE. A star that has such a bright future in wrestling and is positioned to take women’s wrestling by storm.
