One ring to rule them all.
No, this isn’t about Lord of the Rings, instead it’s about Impact Pro Wrestling having two matches on Saturday outside Hot Air Brewing at 3 p.m. and 6 p.m.
Impact Pro Wrestling is in Des Moines, which puts on family-friendly, while also professional, wrestling shows.
On Saturday, the women’s champion Sage Hale will be wrestling her twin sister Briar Hale. A wrestler known as Malice, a 450 pound “wrecking ball” will be participating as well in addition to Creston native Justin Decent.
Troy Peterson, the promoter of Impact Pro Wrestling, has been a fan for life.
“Some people were born with far more useful talents and passions, and I got pro wrestling as mine,” Peterson said, “I’ve been fortunate along the way to do a lot of work with the Dan Gable museum out in Waterloo.”
He grew up in Rice Lake and then moved to Minneapolis after graduating from Iowa State.
“I’ve always loved pro wrestling and then started wondering, what does it take to do this,” Peterson adds.
Impact Pro Wrestling trains people to wrestle as well.
Peterson, being a promoter, when it came to wrestling he look up to promoters.
“I looked up to people like Bill Watts and Verne Gagne who could put together these shows and I got fascinated with how this live theater can come to existence,” Peterson said, “It’s upsetting to me and the 10 other people this is important to that wrestling is quote, unquote, ‘fixed’ because it’s so much more than that.”
He also enjoyed watching specific wrestlers as well.
“I really liked the wrestlers who were more chaotic, Bruiser Brody, Stan Hansen, Randy Savage, those were people I idolized as wrestlers. you never knew what you would get out of them,” Peterson shares.
Finally, for Saturday’s show, Peterson has the following goal.
“Hot Air Brewing looks real nice, you can go have a beer and your kids can watch pro wrestling, maybe you’ll catch a glimpse of it, and not hate it,” Peterson shares “We won’t convert everyone, but I try to greet everyone for the last 20 years, tell them thanks and ask what they liked and didn’t like.”