Steve Austin reflects on WrestleMania 38.
Austin returned to the ring at WrestleMania 38, taking on Kevin Owens in the main event of night one. Austin hadn't wrestled since WrestleMania 19 when he lost to The Rock.
Austin had been shown videos and photos of himself training and getting in shape before WrestleMania, but said he was doing that to stay healthy. When it came to being in ring shape, Austin said he didn't do any in-ring work before his return.
"Zero. Zero in-ring training," Austin told Ryan Satin on Out of Character. "I was doing cardio. Here is an inside tip for you. I love Sheamus, he has a great YouTube channel, the Celtic Warrior Workout. I got on there, I watched Edge's routine, I watched Bryan Danielson's training routine. The one that really got me was Becky Lynch's comeback routine. I did her routine over and over, then I invented my own out of that. I was training hard at my house, but I didn't have a ring. Once I got to Dallas, I got there three or four days early because I always do, I ran the ropes a lot with Drew Gulak, who is absolutely wonderful, a great talent. Super guy, very intuitive in the ring, we did a lot of criss-cross stuff. Locked up, grab a headlock, a couple of spots. Just a little bit of that and I was gassing. When I tell you I was in good shape, I was, but doing cardio at the house, as hard as I was working out, is not in-ring activity. It's very specific, cardio is. When KO [Kevin Owens] or Drew come in, they've worked on the road a lot. As much as I worked, it was short notice, but as hard as I worked, I still wasn't in shape because they were doing a specific task."
When asked if he was happy with the match, Austin replied, "It was what it was, I wanted to give them more, but the whole time, when you have that amount of people out there, I've been in front of a million crowds, but you're trying to pace yourself. When you saw me go sip beers, I wasn't doing that to advertise my beer, I was doing that to take a breather and kind of monitor the system because I was getting a little gassed. You don't want to go out there and freak out. I was taking those opportunities to slow down and catch a breather."
Austin was victorious in the bout against Kevin Owens.
Elsewhere during the interview, Austin discussed a potential match against John Cena. You can find his full comments by clicking here.
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