In an exclusive interview with FanSided, Bianca Belair spoke about the advice Triple H gave her throughout her career in NXT and WWE.
Last week, Triple H revealed that he has officially retired from in-ring competition due to a cardiac issue. Even though his wrestling career is over, he is still a large presence in WWE, as he oversees talent development.
I spoke with Bianca Belair in a FanSided interview, days before her Raw Women’s Championship match with Becky Lynch at WrestleMania 38, and asked about any advice that Triple H has given her throughout her career in NXT and WWE.
“Triple H was such a huge part of the development of Bianca Belair. The first person that believed in me in NXT and put me on the stage and put me in all these big huge moments in NXT so that I can get exposed to the WWE universe,” said Belair. “After the Mae Young Classic, that’s the moment that sticks with me the most, because that was the moment I really felt the realization of ‘okay, you found your purpose, this is what you were born to do, and you’re walking in your purpose.’ It was the moment after that match, where it’s a video of us together and he’s just giving me affirmation of ‘this is what you were born to do’ and gave me affirmation of that. Everybody always asks ‘what did he say to you in those moments’ and I’m like I can never tell because those words are for me and I still hold those words dear to my heart and I replay those words in my head before all my big moments and it’s really cool because he’s been there for all my big moments.
“Mae Young Classic and he was the one who told me I was getting called up to Raw and then he was there for when I won the Royal Rumble, and when I main-evented WrestleMania. Even when i main-evented WrestleMania and I won, he brought up exactly what he said to me at the Mae Young Classic and he was like ‘See I told you so,’ and even told me you just won the main event of WrestleMania and you’re just still getting started.
“He was the first person who gave me affirmation in WWE, and I always hold those words dear to my heart.”
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Bianca Belair credits Triple H with realizing ‘this is what you were born to do’
Belair competed in the inaugural Mae Young Classic in 2017, making it to the second round of the tournament. The moment she referenced with Triple H can be viewed at this link. Over three years later, she would stand tall in the main event of WrestleMania as the SmackDown Women’s Champion after defeating Sasha Banks.
Belair spent the next two years following the 2017 Mae Young Classic in the NXT brand, where she challenged for the NXT Women’s Championship at three TakeOver events (Phoenix, New York, Portland) and was a competitor in the first-ever Women’s WarGames match in 2019. On the Raw after WrestleMania 36in 2020, Belair made her main roster debut.
It was quite the first year for Belair, as she moved over to the SmackDown brand in the WWE Draft that fall and won the fourth-ever Women’s Royal Rumble match in January 2021 after entering as the No. 3 entrant and spending a couple of minutes short of an hour in the bout. That culminated in the historic main event with Belair and Banks, as they were the first two Black women to ever main event WrestleMania. And Belair won her first major wrestling championship at the “Grandest Stage of Them All.”
It is true, Belair is only just getting started. Now, she has the chance to win her first Raw Women’s Championship at WrestleMania against Lynch, who is the only other female to win a main event of WWE’s biggest show of the year.
WrestleMania will take place this weekend, Apr. 2-3 at 8:00 p.m. ET each night, live from AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
For the seventh consecutive year, SNICKERS will return to WWE’s WrestleMania, this year joining forces with WWE 2K22 as presenting partners. SNICKERS and the WWE once again created some hilarious videos featuring some of Bianca’s fellow WWE Superstars, Otis and Chad Gable, Happy Corbin and Madcap Moss and Sheamus, which will bring more fun and smiles to WWE fans ahead of WrestleMania. The videos show each of the superstars either feeling ‘confused’, ‘oblivious’ or ‘unfiltered’ providing a satisfying SNICKERS as a solution in each situation. Fans can check out the videos on the WWE YouTube page as well as on TV screens during WrestleMania
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