The Wake

Peter McCormick celebrated Halloween dressed in a red velvet robe with feathers glued down both sleeves and a platinum blond wig. Channeling the spirit of 16-time-World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair, McCormick looked at ease pretending to be the legendary wrestling veteran.

Dressing as Flair wasn’t a stretch for the 21-year-old kinesiology major from the “U.” That’s because he has spent the last year and a half working on his own presence in the ring.

Every Sunday McCormick makes the 40-minute drive to Elk River, Minn., to the renovated warehouse where the Midwest Professional Wrestling School holds their weekly matches.

For these few hours every week, McCormick is no longer a student. He dons a blue singlet, fake arm cast and transforms himself into Pete Mac; professional wrestler.

A long-time fan of professional wrestling, McCormick began wrestling in the spring of 2003. He decided to try wrestling after hearing an advertisement on the radio for a contest the MPW was holding. The first prize was a year of free training.

McCormick decided to see what it felt like stepping into the ring.

“I loved watching wrestling and I wanted to know what it was like to go out there and hear the crowd’s reaction—I like it even without the crowd.”

McCormick didn’t win the original MPW contest, but he did reach the final four and this allowed him to receive heavily discounted training.

In the beginning, learning the moves was physically demanding, but now keeping up mentally with what is going on in the match is more difficult.

“When your in the ring; you really have to be on top of your game,” McCormick says.

One of the most annoying parts of wrestling for McCormick is the lack of competition.

“Sometimes I will be wrestling someone I could beat the crap out of and I will have to lose to them and it is frustrating,” McCormick says.

Sunday Night Matches

Every Sunday, fans fill two sets of aluminum bleachers surrounding the ring at the MPW. There are thirteen-year-old girls screaming for their favorite wrestler. Mothers sit quietly staring anxiously at the ring. Old men sit in the dark corners quietly watching the action.

The air is thick and salty. The noise of bodies slamming down onto the mat is deafening, reverberating off the concrete walls. Colored lights spin as rap music blares. The announcer swings his voice up and down into the microphone introducing the wrestlers. Stomping down the stairs, the wrestlers punch their fists into their palms in anticipation.

Once inside the ring Pete Mac exchanges punishing blows with his opponents. Pete Mac broke his arm earlier this year after he clotheslined someone too hard.

Next to his opponents’ flashy, gothic-style outfits Pete Mac looks clean-cut, like maybe he got lost on his way to a collegiate wrestling meet.

This is all about to change.

Soon, like so many professional wrestlers before him, Pete Mac will turn to the dark side. At the end of November, Pete Mac will turn into Prime Time Pete Mac, an evil alter ego. New leather “booty shorts” will help mark the change.

Opponents may want to watch out when Prime Time Pete Mac comes to town because now their arms are the ones that are going to get broken.