Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Madison Rayne

Ashley Nichole Simmons (born February 5, 1986), is an American professional wrestler working for Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) as Madison Rayne. She is a former four-time TNA Women's Knockout Champion and a two-time TNA Knockouts Tag Team Champion.

Simmons began her wrestling career on the independent circuit wrestling under the monikers Ashley Lane and Lexi Lane. She joined the all-female promotion Shimmer Women Athletes in 2007, where she was one half of the first-ever Shimmer Tag Team Champions with partner Nevaeh. In 2009, she joined TNA, aligning herself with Angelina Love and Velvet Sky as part of The Beautiful People. In March 2010, she, along Lacey Von Erich and Velvet Sky won the TNA Knockouts Tag Team Championship, with the three defending the title under the Freebird rule. In April 2010 at Lockdown, she won her first TNA Women's Knockout Championship, a title she has held a total of four times. In addition, she was the first Knockout to hold both titles simultaneously. She also made appearances in Wrestlicious as Amber Lively.

Simmons grew up in West Lafayette, Ohio, with her two older brothers. During high school, Simmons was the Homecoming Queen and a varsity cheerleader, and she ran track and was a member of the drama club, as well.

After high school, Simmons began training for fitness competitions, although she never entered any. Initially she studied Radiology at college part-time while working on the independent circuit. She left college to pursue a wrestling career. At the time she left school, Simmons had a 4.0 GPA.


Simmons first got her start in professional wrestling shortly after graduating from high school. She saw a poster for a local independent promotion, contacted the promoter, and began training a short time later under the name Lexi Lane. After completing her training under Jeff Cannon, she started her wrestling career in the state of Ohio. Her first match was in her former high school and was refereed by female wrestler Ivory. In October 2006, she competed in World Xtreme Wrestling's Elite 8 Tournament. Lane also competed in Ohio Championship Wrestling (OCW), where she became the promotion's first ever OCW Women's Champion in March 2007. She lost the title in November, regained it in May 2008, and lost it to Sara Del Rey in February 2009. In Ohio, Lane wrestled Nevaeh in several promotions as part of a scripted rivalry between the two.

On October 13, 2007, she made her debut in Shimmer Women Athletes as Ashley Lane. On the taping of Volume 15 of their DVD series, she teamed with Lorelei Lee in a losing effort to Portia Perez and Nicole Matthews. On Volume 16, she lost to Alexa Thatcher.

Lane then began teaming with Nevaeh, and they made their team debut in losing to The Experience (Lexie Fyfe and Malia Hosaka) on the Volume 17 taping, then scoring a win against The Minnesota Homewrecking Crew (Lacey and Rain) on Volume 18. They beat the duo of Veronika Vice and Cat Power on Volume 19, and then lost to The International Home Wrecking Crew (Rain and Jetta) on Volume 20. On October 19, Lane and Nevaeh emerged victorious from a six-team tag team gauntlet match to crown the first Shimmer Tag Team Champions. Later in the evening, they successfully defended the belts against The Canadian NINJAs (Portia Perez and Nicole Matthews). At Volume 26 on May 3, 2009, Lane and Nevaeh lost the Shimmer Tag Team Championship to The NINJAs.


On April 19, 2008, Lane appeared in Shimmer's sister promotion Ring of Honor, competing in a Four Corner Survival match against Daizee Haze, Lacey, and MsChif. Lane made a second appearance at Southern Hostility on December 6 in a match against Haze, Sara Del Rey, and Serena Deeb.

On October 1, 2011, Lane returned to Shimmer as fan favorite, calling out former partner Nevaeh for turning on MsChif and Jessie McKay during a tag team match. Nevaeh in turn claimed that Lane had turned her back on Shimmer by leaving the promotion in 2009, which led to a brawl between the two. Later in the same event, Nevaeh defeated Lane in her return match. The following day Lane teamed with Mia Yim in a losing effort against the team of Nevaeh and Sassy Stephie.

In 2009, Lane took part in the first season tapings of Wrestlicious, which began airing on television in March 2010. In the promotion, she played in the role of "Cheerleader" Amber Lively. She debuted in the third episode of Takedown (aired on March 17), teaming with Lacey Von Erich and winning by disqualification against the team of Draculetta and White Magic. On the April 7 episode of Takedown, Lively participated in a Hoedown Trowdown battle royal to determine the top two contenders for the Wrestlicious Championship, but faile to advance.

Since 2011, Rayne has been wrestling for Family Wrestling Entertainment (FWE). On September 22, 2012, Rayne made her debut for Northeast Wrestling, teaming up with Rosita to defeat The Beautiful People (Angelina Love and Velvet Sky) in a tag team match.


No comments:

Post a Comment

Popular Posts