Kaua‘i Duo on the Forefront of Hawai‘i’s Pro Wrestling Revival

By Léo Azambuja

Pro wrestlers Chris Isaacworth, standing, and Noa Gusman (The Incredible Chris Wilde and The Kaua‘i Kid Noa Kaho‘omana) at the gym above Breath of Life Calvary Chapel in Lihu‘e. Photo by Léo Azambuja

A couple of fighters from Kaua‘i are leaving their mark — both inside and outside the ring — in the latest attempt to bring back the golden years of pro wrestling in the Hawaiian Islands.

“What makes the Kaua‘i Kid the Kaua‘i Kid? He is really very energetic and likes to fight a lot, that’s the core of my style, being a brawler rather than the technical guy like this dude,” said professional wrestler Noa Gusman, pointing to his tag team partner, Chris Isaacworth.

A showman in his own right, Isaacworth said his character is basically an eccentric strong man who loves the color pink. It’s easy to spot the tall fighter in the crowd, wearing pink jaguar-print leggings with the word WILDE embroidered on the back of it.

“When I’m in (the ring), I like the unpredictability,” Isaacworth said. “I like people to be drawn into the match, you’ll laugh, stomp your feet, have a good time. Whether it means I’m picking somebody up and throwing them overhead or I’m doing a dance in particular, I want people to experience my matches like they would a Rick James concert, that same kind of energy.”

Chris Wilde applies his ‘gut wrench supplex’ on Makena, of the Nightmarchers. Photo by Oudom Seng

Since May, “The Incredible Chris Wilde” and “The Kaua‘i Kid Noa Kaho‘omana” — Isaacworth’s and Gusman’s personas in the ring — have held the tag team championship belts at the Unify Championship Entertainment, a promotion that brought pro wrestling back to Hawai‘i less than a year ago.

“UCE wrestling is trying to establish something that was here earlier,” Isaacworth said.

There was a time when pro wrestling was a big deal in Hawai‘i. Pro wrestling arrived in the Islands in 1936, and by the mid 1960s it became a popular entertainment, rising to popularity for the next three decades. Matches would attract large crowds, and weekly TV specials would get kids — and their parents and uncles — glued to the tube.

Ironically, as wrestling soared in popularity across the United States in the 1990s, it fizzled out in Hawai‘i by the end of the decade. Despite attempts to revive pro wrestling in Hawai‘i in the early 2000s, it never reached the popularity of its golden years, when guys like Sam Steamboat, Ripper Collins, Curtis Iaukea, Neff Maiava, Harold “Odd Job” Sakata, The Sheik, Rocky Montero, Tank Morgan, Bearcat Wright, Maddog Mayne and so many others entertained crowds.

Nightmarcher manager Ahuna swings a bat on The Kaua‘i Kid, who is surrounded by Nightmarchers Makena and Kiko, while Chris Wilde is on the ground. Photo by Oudom Seng

Last year, the husband-and-wife team of Aleki Lee and Brandon Maxson-Lee filled the gap by buying their own wrestling company and opening UCE. Both are professional wrestlers with more than 30 years of combined experience. They are also active in UCE’s roster of more than 30 fighters. Lee, originally from Hawai‘i, uses the stage name The Pineaple King Aleki Lee, and Maxson-Lee, a Minnesota native, goes by Radiant Rain.

UCE’s debut event was The Unveiling, at Honolulu’s Aloha Tower Dec. 22. Subsequent events were held there, and after a few months, the monthly events moved to the Filipino Community Center in Waipahu, O‘ahu. Besides being open for about 300 paying public, UCE events are shown weekly at K5 TV channel.

Isaacworth and Gusman fight in both tag team and individual matches, but it’s in the tag team matches where they are leaving their mark. They have successfully defended their belt since May. It hasn’t been easy, but it’s always entertaining.

The Kaua‘i Kid flies toward Makena. Photo by Oudom Seng

“Sometimes the crowd is really lively,” Isaacworth said. “For us as wrestlers, we learned to just go with it and then take that tide and have as much fun with that energy as we can.”

The crowd, Isaacworth said, is just as much part of the performance, sometimes switching back and forth to who they pick as their favorite fighter during a match.

“We’re fighting, but at the same time we are like gladiators. We’re trying to entertain the crowd,” Gusman said.

The main rivals of The Incredible Chris Wilde and The Kaua‘i Kid Noa Kaho‘omana are the Nightmarchers (Makena Cruz and Kiko Kekauoha), who have been trying to take the belt from the Kaua‘i duo by using questionable tactics. Both their last matches — in August and in September — ended in disqualification, which means the championship belt remains with the current champions.

The Kaua‘i Kid and Chris Wilde receive their tag team belts from referee Richard Hamasaki at Aloha Tower May 25. Photo by Oudom Seng

“We get out there, we do our thing,” Gusman said of their title match against the Nightmarchers in August. “Chris is out there doing his dance thing. He’s taunting them, being Chris Wilde. Cause Chris Wilde, as the name implies, is wild, so you’ll never expect what he does out there.”

As the match progresses, it gets more physical, and all four of them start laying into each other, Isaacworth said. The Kaua‘i Kid is taken to the Nightmarchers’ corner and takes a beating.

“They’re beating me up. They’re trying to win anyway they can, even to the point where they’re trying to play dirty,” Gusman said.

In a tag team match, you work as a team, but there are dirty ways you can be a team, Gusman said, such as bringing your opponent to a corner, holding him there and start laying punches on him like they did to The Kaua‘i Kid.

Chris Wilde and The Kaua‘i Kid facing Hernandez from the LAX tag team at Honolulu’s Aloha Tower. Photo by Oudom Seng

“And closed-fist punches are illegal because it’s wrestling; we’re grappling,” Gusman said.

Meanwhile, Chris Wilde was outside the ring in his corner, hoping to get tagged by The Kaua‘i Kid so he could step in and take over.

“From that point on, we’re 12 minutes into the match. I just got desperate,” said Gusman, adding he was thrown into a neutral corner, only to see his opponent charging at him. He put his foot up and the Nightmarcher ran right into it. In a last-ditch effort to get away, The Kaua‘i Kid climbed the rope and dropped kicked his opponent.

“I mustered all my strength and went for the five-foot reach, and boom, finally tagged (Chris Wilde) back in after so many minutes of struggling back to my corner,” Gusman said.

As soon as Chris Wilde stepped into the ring, Makena came running toward him, but got chopped right onto his chest. Chris Wilde then applied what he said is one of his special moves, the “gut wrench suplex.”

Chris Wilde, left, and The Kaua‘i Kid. Photo by Oudom Seng

“I grab him by the midsection, may or may not shake my butt to the crowd, depending on how I’m feeling, and I arch backwards and throw him over my shoulder,” Chris Wilde said. “I did so, and was ready to pick him up for the final throw, which was the Wilde Ride, and his tag team partner, Kiko, came in and hit me from the side.”

Kiko’s hit caused all three of them to fall outside the ring. The Kaua‘i Kid came rushing in from his corner, and a major brawl ensued out of bounds.

With everyone out of bounds, the referee started a 10 count. The legal fighter (the fighter who was tagged in to enter the ring) of each team needs to be inside the ring by the end of the 10-count, or else his team loses the match. Since everyone was outside the ring when the referee reached 10, the match ended in disqualification, allowing the Kaua‘i team to keep their belt.

“We’ve been feuding with these guys for a while,” Isaacworth said.

“We really don’t like each other, since we got the belts,” Gusman added.

The Kaua‘i Kid gets ready to throw Kumu Oceans while his opponent’s manager, Honey Girl, grabs his leg to prevent him. Photo by Oudom Seng

In September, the Nightmarchers had another shot at the tag team belt. But they and their manager, Ahuna, bumped into The Kaua‘i Kid in the bathroom right before their match, and couldn’t resist starting the fight right there.

“Wrong place, wrong time,” said Gusman, adding he ended up getting knocked out.

“They just left me unconscious in the bathroom, and while I was there, the match started,” he said. “They beat me up and left me in there. I was nowhere to be found during which was supposed to be a tag team match.”

With The Kaua‘i Kid missing in action, the referee switched the tag team match to a single fight between Chris Wilde and Kiko.

As soon as the match started, both fighters collided and started trading punches. Chris Wilde was thrown on the floor and suffered a concussion, but recovered quickly. At that point, however, The Kaua‘i Kid had come back to his senses, and in a fit of rage came running to the ringside and attacked Kiko.

Chris Wilde lays a kick on his opponent. Photo by Oudom Seng

“In the heat of the moment you just attack people, and it was during (Chris Wilde’s) match, unfortunately, so he got disqualified because of me, my bad,” Gusman said.

At the end of the day, the Kaua‘i team still kept the championship belt, since there was no tag team match. Isaacworth said he hopes there are no shenanigans or disqualifications in their next scheduled match Oct. 4.

Pro wrestling is not just about entertainment. Gusman and Isaacworth said the wrestlers do a lot of community service before the matches. They visited Shriners Hospital for Children, volunteered in soup kitchens, bowled against domestic violence, did several beach cleanups, answered phones for donations during telethons and did many other community services.

If UCE is able to bring an event to Kaua‘i, they said, the fighters will also do some community service here. Besides offering a fun entertainment to the children, the Kaua‘i fighters said they want to become role models for them.

Chris Wilde, left, and The Kaua‘i Kid. Photo by Léo Azambuja

Gusman is 27 years old, and about four years ago, he went to Missouri for formal pro wrestling training. Isaacworth, 31, said he was informally trained in pro wrestling, but he has a nine-year history of Mixed Martial Arts competition and 15 years of community theater on Kaua‘i. Both train along other UCE fighters at the Wild Samoan Training Center on O‘ahu, and also at a gym in Lihu‘e.

UCE’s roster has two additional fighters from Kaua‘i, and they carry a blue-blood pedigree. Brothers Marshall and Ross Von Erich are the sons of Kevin Von Erich, who was inducted in the WWE Hall of Fame, Class of 2009 along with his father and four brothers. The Von Erichs (their real name is Adkisson) grew up in Texas and moved to Kaua‘i in 2007.

The next UCE event, Unify, will be at the Filipino Community Center in Waipahu, O‘ahu on Oct. 4. The event will be taped by K5 TV and shown in weekly segments.

Visit www.ucewrestling.com for more information. Follow Gusman and Isaacworth on Instagram at kauaikidnoa and intothewilde_est1988 respectively.