AEW stars Colten Gunn and Austin Gunn of The Gunn Club recently appeared on Chris Van Vliet’s “INSIGHT” podcast for an interview covering all things pro wrestling.
The sons of WWE Hall of Famer Billy Gunn revealed how Colten left a well-paying job in California to pursue a career in pro wrestling.
Colten recalls paying a low-key visit to WWE Hall of Famer Rikishi’s KnoxPro wrestling school. He tried to keep it a secret from his father, but word got around, and his father wanted to know if he was truly committed. Colten then spent two weeks training at the Flatbacks wrestling school run by Shawn Spears and Tyler Breeze before quitting his job to work for AEW.
Austin: “So Colten has been in California when I started.”
Colten: “I was in Santa Monica. Right after college I was ready to move into corporate America. I was moving to LA and was building custom houses out there, like 3 stories with elevators. We had a few Lakers players move in and the CEO of Snapchat. I was doing that, I was in my trailer and on the job site, and for some reason I always, because him and dad were on AEW and doing their thing. So I just kept thinking of promos or moves or names of stuff.”
Austin: “He would just text me out of the blue like ‘This would be cool if you and dad did it. But it would be cooler if we did it.’ He was subtly over time just pushing and pushing.”
Colten: “So I called Rikishi because he has a school out there. I was like ‘Don’t tell my dad and don’t tell your students.’ But I was going to come in one time to see what it was like. Of course when I got there, I am like a clone of my dad, so everyone knew who I was. That didn’t work very well! So after that I called my dad and I said ‘Dad I want to try this, I went to Rikishi’s school…’ And he was like ‘Why didn’t you tell me!’”
Austin: “He was heated. We were driving to some town one day and he says ‘Did Colten tell you he went to Rikishi’s the other day?’ I went ‘Yeah.’ Then he went ‘Well why didn’t you tell me! What does he want? Does he want to be a wrestler?’ He started asking me and I’m like I don’t know.”
Colten: “So I took 2 weeks off from work and went to the Breeze and Spears school, Flatbacks. My dad said ‘Do you really want to do this? 110%, no half ass?’ No pun intended. So I quit my job in LA and drove across the country and started. In November that will be 2 years.”
Austin worked the original All In event as well as various ROH dates before making his AEW debut in January 2020, teaming up with his father, who was recruited by AEW in January 2019 as a coach and wrestler. Colten began joining his father and sibling to the ring in June 2020, and made his ring debut in November of same year.
The Gunn Club’s success on AEW Dark and Elevation continues, with greater TV time on Dynamite and Rampage.
You can check out the complete interview below:
