Bodyslams and Barbecue: The Paste Wrestlemania Road Diary

We’d been planning this for months. My three friends and I were going to Wrestlemania 32 in Dallas, TX, and the gmail threads of our pre-trip discussion easily exceeded 300 messages. We planned to spend a few days checking out Austin and eating barbecue before heading north to Dallas for a weekend full of wrestling action. I’ll keep these first few days short, as the only wrestling involved was with smoked meats, fine spirits and Texas funk.

We spent a few days in a small cottage south of the Colorado River, planning a pre-Wrestlemania bender of real living. We ate “fancy” barbecue at Lambert’s, had shots and beers at Doc’s, and dined on some great smoked meat from Stiles Switch. We hit the Continental Club for live music from Barfield, the Tyrant of Texas Funk, and ended a night shutting down the karaoke at Ego’s. One morning we got in line at Franklin Barbecue, the best barbecue in Texas (and possibly the world), at 7:15 AM. They don’t open until 11. Waiting in line felt like a tailgate party, with camping chairs, cold beers, and friendly barbecue enthusiasts like myself. I was a bit skeptical, but the brisket exceeds the hype. We spent the rest of the day bar-hopping while visiting friends who’ve fled the Big Apple. Williamsburg’s Full Circle Bar now has an amazing Austin location, serving up delicious local beers and homemade knishes. The Roosevelt Room provided us with some stellar cocktails as well. Man… Austin rules.

After three days in Austin, we hit the homestretch on the road to Wrestlemania. But first we housed some breakfast tacos from Torchy’s before heading north in our rental car. Along the way we went to the Czech Stop, a well-known bakery/roadside truck stop. I had no idea what a kolache was, but now I love ‘em. We checked into our next airbnb in the Uptown neighborhood of Dallas, and immediately headed out for our first wrestling show of the trip: Evolve 58 at Eddie Deen’s Ranch.

I’m a big fan of Evolve and have been to several of their shows in the NYC area, including Evolve 57 just a couple weeks earlier. Gabe Sopolsky books some of the best indie talent in the business, including the likes of Ricochet, Marty Scurll, Timothy Thatcher, Johnny Gargano and (a personal favorite) Chris Hero.

The match of the night, however, was between two Brits, Will Ospreay and Zack Sabre Jr. They are two of the best wrestlers in the world today, and they left little doubt during this match. Ospreay’s a high flyer while Sabre Jr. is a technical wizard. The submission he put on Ospreay to win the match must be seen to be believed. I have no idea what it’s even called. Expect to see a lot of both in the future, as Ospreay has signed on with New Japan, and Sabre will be a part of WWE’s upcoming Global Cruiserweight series.

Next up? The most hyped event of the whole weekend, NXT Takeover and the WWE debut of Shinsuke Nakamura. Like many internet wrestling nerds, I worship the ground Nakamura walks on. My entire crew rolled to the event in matching “King of Strong Style” shirts. There were a lot of great matches on the card that night, but none topped Nakamura vs. Sami Zayn. In what was likely Zayn’s final NXT match, these guys tore the house down. There were just so many great matches on this card: Bayley vs. Asuka, Finn Balor vs. Samoa Joe, American Alpha vs. The Revival. Hell, even the dark match was a treat for super nerds like me: Manny Andrade (AKA La Sombra) vs Christopher Girard (AKA Biff Busick). I just can’t say enough good stuff about this show.

After the wrestling, we met up with some of my local friends to check out Radioactivity, who were playing The Texas Theater (where they caught Lee Harvey Oswald!) The show was behind a giant movie screen in a big, classic theater. Very cool venue, and very loud band. Paste covers music too, right?

The second day of wrestling started slowly, as I had one too many Velvet Hammers the night before(a fantastic local beer that’s 9% abv, I discovered far too late). We still made it to Ring of Honor’s Supercard of Honor X Day 2 at 2 pm. While this event was loaded with wrestling stars, I was most excited to see Dalton Castle and his boys. Dalton hails from Planet Peacock and seeks to make the world beautiful again. He walks to the ring with two twin “boys” who fan him with peacock feathers and occasionally double as Dalton’s chaise lounge. Despite all the gimmicks, Dalton is a fantastic wrestler and master of my favorite move in wrestling—the deadlift German suplex.

The final two matches at this event were also very good. The four-way tag match between the Briscoes, the Addiction, the Motor City Machine Guns and the Young Bucks was a spot fest from the word go, with more superkicks than I could count. I love the Young Bucks, but the Briscoes won this one with a Doomsday Device on Christopher Daneils (who dresses kinda like a Nazi General?)

The main event was the first gimmick match we’d seen all weekend, a no holds barred battle between former friends Kyle O’Reilly and Adam Cole. If you follow ROH at all, you know what an intense rivalry these two have been working. The finish to this match was absolutely brutal. After using several chairs, guardrails and tables as weapons, Kyle wrapped a chain around Cole’s neck and arm, and choked him out.

After ROH, it was back to barbecue at Pecan Lodge in Deep Ellum. We’d considered going to the WWN Live Supershow, or WrestleCon that night, but frankly we were a little burnt out on wrestling. We decided to grab a nightcap at a local bar/arcade, Kung Fu. There were loads of wrestling fans there, and several chants broke out over the course of the night.

There was only one thing on our agenda the next day: The Showcase of the Immortals. We all put on our New Day socks and headed out to AT&T Stadium, home of Wrestlemania 32. We brought sandwiches and a cooler of beer, and walked around until we found some folks to tailgate with. One of the most fun parts of Wrestlemania weekend is meeting all the other fans and nerding out together. We spotted screenwriter and noted wrestling nerd Max Landis. After some prime tailgating we noticed the line to get in the stadium was looking pretty monstrous, so we decided we should head inside (also we ran out of beer).

AT&T stadium? Wow. Tremendous facility. As an avid fan of Wrestlemania and SEC football, I’ve been to a lot of big stadiums in my life, but nothing compares to this place. It’s so big. It feels like you’re in a sci-fi movie, travelling in some sort of generation ship. It’s really phenomenal.

The build to this year’s Wrestlemania has been less than stellar. The storylines are more confusing than ever, and frankly, I wasn’t really looking forward to many of the matches. However, my years of experience should have told me that Mania never disappoints live. Being there is special, and all wrestling fans should try to go at least once. I’m not going to get into all the results, but a few highlights for me were the Intercontinental Championship ladder match, the New Day’s entrance, Sasha Banks’s entrance and the brand new Women’s title belt… and of course, Shane McMahon’s death-defying leap from the top of the cell.

This was my fourth Wrestlemania (27, 30, 31, 32) and though it wasn’t the best one I’ve seen (30), the whole week was one of the most fun trips I’ve ever taken. Dallas was great, with more wrestling events than you could possibly care to see, all mostly in walking distance of each other. Wrestlemania week has become the Comic-Con for wrestling nerds, with nearly every prominent independent promotion running some sort of show in the immediate vicinity each year. Throw in the amusement parks and other tourist attractions in Orlando, FL, and I’m pretty sure I’ll be back at Wrestlemania 33 next year.

Mack Williams is an animator from Blackshear, GA. He loves live music, pro wrestling, barbecue and dinosaurs. He lives in Brooklyn, but don’t hold it against him. He’s still #swampwise.