Rusev Recalls Early Days In Wrestling, When He First Got Noticed By WWE

Rusev recently spoke about how he got his start in wrestling and how long it took him to get noticed by WWE. The WWE star left Bulgaria for the US in order to become a wrestler and trained with Gangrel before he joinedgot a tryout with WWE in 2010. He spoke about those early days in his appearance on Insight With Chris Van Vliet.

Rusev recalled many of the jobs he did in the US before be started training and talked about his tryout at WWE SummerSlam 2010. You can see the highlights below:

On Working Other Jobs Before He Began Training to Wrestle:

“No, there was the first month. Then I started working cleaning stores, Dollar General stores, traveling around half of the country with these chemicals, we were cleaning Dollar Generals. I worked in Wendy’s for a week. It was the weirdest place I’ve worked at. Especially with the burger they tell you to draw a W on it. I’m like, ‘Well sir, if you turn it the other way, it says McDonald’s, M for McDonald’s.’ They were looking at me like I was reinventing the hot water. But then it was even embarrassing to go get my check back because I was there for a week, I didn’t call because I was so embarrassed. I didn’t want to go back to work, but I didn’t want to call, Hey, I’m not coming back to work. So that was weird. And then my friend said, ‘Hey, I’m moving to California. I’m gonna drive cross-country with this 1988 Oldsmobile.’ I said, count me in brother, all the dreams are in California. I left, I jump in the car with him, and we drove for three days, I think, to San Pedro, California.”

on How Long It Took To Get Noticed By WWE:

“So I remember getting pulled in the office in the school one day. At this point I’ve been training not even two years, probably. They said, ‘Hey, you may have an opportunity to go with TNA or WWE.’ I said No freaking way. These guys are giants, man. They’re Titans. What am I? A 24-year-old Bulgarian gonna go through that? I just didn’t think it was a possibility. Then I just kept training, kept training, kept training. Then Rikishi pulled me aside and said, ‘Hey, we’re gonna have this [try-out].’ Because I trusted him, because a lot of people like to go out there and do their own thing. I trusted Rikishi. I trusted his training, trusted Gangrel and his training, and I know that when I’m ready, they’re gonna set me up for success. And they set up a tryout for me. Was 2010 SummerSlam in LA. I went out there with a torn ACL. Had to go through the bathroom, wrap my knee with duct tape because it was giving up. I wrapped the motherf**ker, hiding away from everybody and going to the tryout, almost in a fight with one of the other guys.”

“It was like you’re in and you get in. Then we go in and we work, and this guy, boom, clotheslines me, right in my mouth and my nose. I was like, All right, whatever. Kickout, then work again and again, boom, right in my mouth again. I lay down, all right, cover me. He covered me, and I kick out with my elbow in his face, because I got tired. I get it. We all want a job, but you can’t be just like killing over here, because I’m trying to succeed as well. They stopped us. Then we kept going a little bit. After that, Johnny Ace came and he offered. He said, ‘Hey, do we have any problem relocating to Florida?’ I said, No, sir, I don’t. And yeah, that’s where they offered me a contract, and I had to wait another year to fix my paperwork, because still a little issue with the paperwork situation. So there was another callback that I had to take. There are these people they’re saying, Hey, we’re going to sign you to your dream, it’s about to come true. But then you have to go back and work and everything else, that was so hard. It was probably one of the hardest things I’ve ever done is to be like, hey, it’s right here. No, you can’t get there yet. But anyways, everything got arranged in 2011 in March, I believe I went to Florida, to Tampa, to FCW.”

On If He Was Worried At Any Point That It Wouldn’t Happen:

“No, I couldn’t be worried. I just have to stay focused. Because once you start worrying, you start getting distracted and negative thoughts come in. I didn’t want any of that. I just put my head down, keep working hard, keep doing whatever I can, because at the end of the day, when you have a huge desire, when you have a dream, and it’s not like an ill intent, it’s not like, oh, I want to make money to screw with all these guys. It’s not like a bad intent, and you pray to God, he’s always going to be there with you. He’s always going to help you out.”