Sara Hurtado: From Aranjuez to Japan and Training with John Cena

Do you prefer that I refer to you as Miriam or Sara?

—The truth is, whatever you want. I already respond to both names.

Miriam Torres He is 28 years old, he was born in Aranjuez and, due to things in life, he has ended up living in Orlando, a city in Florida. Sara Leon She is the same age, has short red hair, and is a champion of two companies on the American independent wrestling circuit. This duality is the result of “the passion for martial arts” and the desire to be an actress of a teenager who it was two hours there and two hours back by bus to train in a gym in Carabanchel.

After several attempts to balance the time difference, Miriam attends to this newspaper by video call and with the company of her dog. Right now he combines his artistic side with pro wrestling. It is a pioneer from Spainwhere is sports entertainment is increasing in numbers, among other reasons, due to the issuance of all WWE productsthe great mainstream wrestling company, on Netflix. She did not make the trip to the United States alone, there it is too Carlos Ruizhis partner, best known in WWE like Axiom today.

Miriam, for now, is waiting for her opportunity in the big leagues and enjoying the journey. He has gone from that small neighborhood gym to fighting in Germany, England or Japan. He has also been able to train with John Cena now a Hollywood star, and considered the GOAT (greatest of all time) in the business. There was a time when he hid from his close circle that he trained wrestling “out of shame”; Now she assumes the face of change for Spanish fighters.

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ASK. How does your story with wrestling begin?

A. This started when I was 14 years old… 14 or 15 years old, at that time I was doing martial arts. And I had seen on TV the topic of wrestlinglike everyone. There I met my partner right there, who started talking to me about how there was a school here in Madrid and I went to a show. Back then there wasn’t as much variety as there is now. It was very shocking because I had never seen a live wrestling show. Never. I had always seen it on video, I had always seen it on TV…

When I saw it for the first time, it seemed like something so special and something so unique that there were a lot of people watching something like that live. I decided to try and sign up. He mixed martial arts with acting; I had always wanted to be an actress.

Q. When you take the step of, okay, I want to do this and I’m in a city like Madrid, what step do you take? Where are you going?

A. There was a school in Carabanchel, which is where I started. It was a small gym, there was taekwondo, there was kick boxing…And then there was a wrestling ring. I was leaving from Aranjuez, which is about two hours there and two hours back by public transport, so I could train for two hours. It was very intense to live so far away, then the schools were only in Madrid and Barcelona.

Q. You take the step to become a fighter, let’s say, more seriously, when does it stop being a hobby and become something more?

A. I debuted in a ring with an audience about a year later. But it was complicated, at that time I was very focused on my acting career. I realized that I wasn’t bad at it. [risas] and I told myself why not make it compatible. I have always been a very shy girl, very insecure, and both things added a lot to me when it came to projecting myself, how to face certain social events and everything related to an audience. How to show you. At two years old I started to take it more seriously and train, because with other teammates in Spain, everything became more open. Fighters began to come from abroad, from Ireland, from France, from England. I realized that I had to get out. There were a lot of mental and economic limitations and a bit of culture. Spanish shyness or fear, right? It was a matter of thinking about it and moving forward.

Q. I understand that there is a point at which suddenly you see that this is starting to be true. How does your environment take it? Telling your parents “I want to get into wrestling or try my hand at wrestling” has to be a bit of a shock.

A. The first time I went to train, I spent a month saying that I was going to the sports center because I was embarrassed. I didn’t know how to approach that conversation. I mean, I’m telling you, I discovered it when I was 15, 16 years old, until I was 18 I didn’t dare to try it, and of course, I felt like I was very young. But nothing, it made me laugh because they had already gotten the idea that I wanted to be an actress. They were a little reluctant to accept it, but later, when they saw that I was working hard, that I wanted to try at all costs regardless of the difficulties there were… They were the first to support me and now they are my biggest fans.

Q. You were talking about markets like Ireland, France or Germany. But the great places for wrestling are Japan, Mexico and, obviously, the United States. What is that process like? How do you go outside?

R. The first time I left Spain as a fighter was to Germany. It wasn’t with just any company. Westside Xtreme Wrestling, wXw, one of the largest. They were missing women due to the covid issue, which was hard for the industry. I was reluctant, but I sent in my proposal and they invited me to go. To his academy, to train, then to debut… It was really hard: “Okay, here there are people of a professional level who are seeing me for the first time.” I was very afraid, I was very green, very inexperienced and I had a lot left to learn. But after that debut in Germany, I made contacts in England and even Japan.

Q. Of course, I understand that, being such a small circuit, word of mouth is super important, right?

A. Indeed. That opened the possibility for me to fight in England, to fight in Japan. Be there in the circle and try to be prepared. That is, we will never be emotionally prepared; We Spaniards have this limitation of believing that we cannot. You have to throw it in his face.

Q. The way you say it, it doesn’t look that different from an acting or acting career. Being everywhere a lot, letting yourself be seen, letting people get to know you…

A. It’s exactly the same. In the shows I have here in USAyou never know who is going to see you. You never know who is going to be at a show because suddenly there is a talent scout or suddenly there is someone who is a wrestling coach and sees something in you. Every show is a casting. You have to be giving your best. There is always someone.

Q.How does it work? Do you have a contract with a particular company or do you go through different circuits testing?

A. Now I am stable in two companies: one is Floridabecause I am one of the champions of the company called Shine Wrestling and also in Minnesota, in Minneapolis, I am also the GenNext champion. They have one event a month, depending. The rest is to send a request, send a message: “Hey, I’m available these dates; if you have space, this is my card.” If they like me, I negotiate the trip and my salary and go there. Social networks are also important, it is a way to showcase talent and name. That’s how being a free agent works.

Q. Tell me what the daily life of a fighter is like.

A. It is very routine. Much more than people expect. I try to nourish myself well and eat well. Play sports, go to the gym. Physically, I have to be as good as possible, both in terms of bodybuilding, strength, and cardio. I go to acting classes because I am in a school here in Orlando. And the afternoons vary if I go to train wrestling. Then, well, married life and a lot with the dog [se ríe mientras el animal aparece en la videollamada].

Q. Then comes the day of the shows.

A. Show weekends are more of a hassle. I leave on a Friday, you travel, you fight, you come back. It’s like the life of a theater actor. Shorter and more intense. Last weekend I went to Los Angeles to film an advertisement, then I went to Minneapolis to fight and I returned to Orlando the next day to stop by the house to shower and go to rehearse. There are crazy moments and then there are weeks when, due to availability or lack of companies, I don’t work as much.

Q. Returning to wrestling in general, the figure of women in wrestling has changed a lot. But not so long ago it was completely different. The era of hypersexualization, when stories involving women were treated as objects and fighting in the ring was something anecdotal. What does this change mean for you?

R. I live it with joy. I’m so glad it’s different, especially in USA. Now there is no longer such a distinction and it has been normalized that women have the same quality in the ring as any other man. I’m also relieved to not have lived through that time, to not have sucked it, if I had seen this when I was young or since I started training wrestling, because maybe I wouldn’t have compared myself to men. When I started watching wrestling, I watched both men’s and women’s matches. Some inspired me as much as others. So I didn’t see any limitations. It is true that you see that there are differences, you see that there are still mentalities, there is a lot of machismo around you and that in some way they judge you, simply by your appearance. I have realized that it is everyday life that changes these attitudes. You have to have the responsibility to take your space; Nobody is going to give it to you. I think I have been a participant in certain changes in wrestling in Spain. I’m very proud of that. I know there are many things to do. I wish there were more Spanish women fighting; little by little it is changing.

Q. You told me before that you were not a superfan as a child, but as you have become interested in wrestling, have you had female wrestlers as role models?

A. Mainly Asuka [luchadora japonesa de WWE]. It’s very inspiring to see. I loved the wrestling that was done in Japan, the attitude that those women generally had; It was normal to see intergender combat there. And that made me fall in love and amazed me; I understood that what we do is an art. And Meiko Satomura [leyenda del prowrestling japonés]who retired a few years ago. It made me very sad. I dreamed of sharing the ring with them. Asuka and Meiko really inspired me to have that attitude and that kind of energy.

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Q. You recently participated in an event with people like Bayley, Charlotte and even John Cena, the great wrestling superstar, recently retired and focused on acting.

A. That event is called ‘Lodestone’, it was created by Bayley, a WWE star. Nobody knew what exactly it was going to be. He asked fighters from all over the world to send their fights because he wanted to do a kind of free seminar. She was going to keep track of the candidates and choose. She was going to select the people, the women who were going to be part of it. It was crazy, I saw it by chance on a video online and it was like a sign. A few years ago, I would have been living in Spain and I would have said to myself: “No, the flight from Spain is so expensive that it doesn’t make sense.” But yes, I mean, she paid for flights to women from different parts of the world because she wanted us to focus 100% on this opportunity, on learning and, above all, on getting to know each other.

Bayley was very obsessed with us coming together, with us supporting each other. We ended up being 22 women. I sent the application, my combat material, and she wrote me after two weeks: “Please be part of the seminar and, even though you are living in Orlando, don’t worry, I want you to be part and come home with us.” It was super generous of them, something that had never been done before. Bring together 22 fighters for three days. They were days of training, seminars, and WWE wrestlers came to tell us their experience and chat about it. I improved a lot of technical things from “joe, no one has ever explained this to me this way”, but above all on an emotional level. I came out revitalized, understanding that I am not alone in this, that we all go through very similar things.

The last day was basically a 10-fight show, where we were training behind closed doors, and in which certain fighters came to see us and among them was John Cena. Crazy, nobody knew anything. Bayley didn’t tell us anything at all so as not to make us nervous. That came the next day. Holy shit, we fought John Cena! It was a very surreal feeling. We didn’t believe it; He made time to be with us a week before he had his last fight. He was very generous, he showed his passion for this business. I was there and I kept asking myself: “What is a girl from Aranjuez doing here?”

Q. From the outside, Bayley’s initiative is surprising. It has always been said that wrestling was a very selfish business. In the 80s or 90s, the internal politicking of superstars to try to cover up the rest and guarantee themselves the best piece of the pie was very famous.

R. There you can see that things are changing. Bayley had a journey very similar to ours. He worked a lot in the indies until his mainstream opportunity. She remembers where she comes from and wants to create this community for women’s wrestling.

Q. Let’s talk about kayfabe, the concept within wrestling that speaks of the public’s illusion or predisposition that what is happening in history is real. Sara or Miriam from “kayfabe”. Everything has changed a lot. Now people who consume wrestling are very aware, children aside, of what is kayfabe and what is not. It has become almost meta, mixing reality with kayfabe. Even Netflix releases documentaries about what happens behind the scenes in WWE.

R. I have never experienced anything of that caliber because I have never worked for a company in which the main driving force of what you move is really that. I have always interacted with fans on liveshows, where everything is more natural, much more intimate, there is nothing super crazy. I share my life as an actress and as a fighter on social networks without any type of distinction. If I sign for a larger company tomorrow, that could change.

Q. How do you build your character within wrestling? Go from Miriam to Sara León.

A. It was born with a desire to change things. To show that women can be different in Spain and that I don’t want to be in anyone’s shadow. I want to be seen as one fighter and not as a woman who is wrestling. Many times they only see the body or a pretty face; I wanted to be respected for my professionalism and for what I do technically in the ring. It moved me a lot. Now, with more experience, with more confidence, every year I get into a ring I discover more who I am and what aspects I can give.

Q. But when you go out to fight, are you acting or do you feel like another person? It’s as if you were a method actor, you get so immersed in it that you believe you are that character.

A. Mmmm, it’s interesting and I don’t really know how to explain it. You have to leave a lot behind; You come out of the curtain, it’s like “here I am, this is my strength and this is what you’re going to want to see from me.” You have to attract the public, but it must not be artificial. There are moments when, because of how technical the combat is, you do have to be very focused. For example, I show my tiredness and I don’t pretend at all, but if they hit me, then you have to sell it. You have to generate that emotion in the viewer to be able to tell a story. Beyond that, it’s like the actor’s job; You have to be someone else, but without overacting or making it obvious that you are pretending.

Q. What is more important, having a good character or being good in the ring?

R. 100% of the basis is that you know how to fight, that you defend yourself in a ring. That will give you freedom and security to create a good character or create a good story around your character. If you have a great character, but then you don’t know how to defend him in the ring, there will be a kind of disconnection with the public. People expect something from you and you are not able to give it to them. There has to be an interesting balance.

Q. The stupid interview question. What movement or situation you do seems very painful and then is not so painful? And vice versa.

A. It depends a lot. But I would say that there are very spectacular suplexes, which seem like they are going to be very painful, and then it is a fall without further ado. And what does sting are superkicks or dropkicks. For whatever reason, a kick to the head is not pleasant. [risas].

Q. Your partner, Carlos [Axiom, primer luchador español en despuntar en la WWE]is also dedicated to this, as you mentioned. Did you meet in high school?

A. We met at high school in Madrid, yes, we have been together for eleven or twelve years, our whole lives. I don’t feel like it’s been that long.

Q. When it comes to understanding the other’s career, it must be comforting that he is involved in wrestling.

A. Sometimes I am not aware of it and then I actually realize how lucky we are in that aspect. We are able to support and understand each other, that perhaps there are couples who have completely different jobs and in different environments and it becomes more complicated. For me, it has always been a guide.