World Wrestling Entertainment’s first Singaporean wrestling star won in his first match on September 21. Twenty-five-year-old Sean Tan who is fighting under the stage name Dante Chen has defeated Trey Baxter in just 60 seconds on WWE NXT.
In today’s news, we will be covering the latest in this story below.
WWE Tryout
Tan has been training rigorously these past few months along with other Asian recruits under the tutelage of professional trainers at the WWE Performance Center in Florida where new recruits of WWE are being trained and groomed to be WWE superstars.
Two years ago, Tan had joined a WWE audition in Shanghai along with 40 athletes from Asian nations of Japan, Singapore, China, Taiwan, Thailand, Hong Kong, and the Philippines.
During the WWE tryout, Tan was announced as one of the three new recruits that will soon participate in the WWE professional training program of the sports entertainment company. Among the three recruits, he was the only Southeast Asian.
Training Program
On July 2, WWE had announced that Tan, along with athletes from China, Feicheng Wang, and Jie Yin were reported to train in WWE Performance Center in Orlando.
The performance center is known to be a modern training facility with complete amenities such as seven training grounds, rooms for body core strength and conditioning, and video production studios where athletes can develop their performance skills onscreen.
The official website of the training facility says that the new recruits will have the chance to “learn under a world-class coaching team as they work toward their dream of becoming WWE Superstars, and talents also work hand-in-hand with members of the creative team to cultivate their on-screen personas”.
After the announcement of his inclusion in the training program, Tan expressed his gratitude in a social media post.
He posted: “To the believers, thank you and don’t stop supporting the dreamers. To the doubters, thank you and it’s never too late to start.”
During the WWE tryout held in Shanghai in 2019, Tan arrived at the audition along with two fellow Singaporean wrestlers. Andrew “The Statement” Tang, co-founder of Singapore Pro Wrestling, and Alexis Lee, who is often dubbed as the first Singaporean pro-wrestler.
Overflowing Support
After the announcement, many have congratulated the 25-year-old champion online including his fellow Singaporean auditionee.
She wrote, “And now the world shall see what you are capable of. No pressures aye. Beyond being proud of the amazing human you are and everything you’ve done so far, we miss you here. But we’ll see you soon.”
One commentary on Twitter wrote the following:
“This guy is living the dream of every wrestling-crazy Singaporean while growing up. While I never got to become part of The Brood. @Trexxus will be making history of his own with WWE. All the best and enjoy that journey!”
Tan responded with, “I’ve never let that dream go and it paid off!”
The difficulty of Being a Pro-Wrestler
In a Twitter post this May, he reflected on the challenges of being a pro-wrestler in Singapore and สยามกีฬา and hinted at his intention to leave.
He also stated that he participated with SPW since the beginning, which already almost a decade has passed, and has grown from being its youngest member to its most senior.
“Whether it’s anyone that has been around before I have, or if it’s people that joined after I did it, it always saddened me when I saw people leave because everyone felt like family to me.”
“Competing in the independent circuit is not something that is easy to make a living out of. I realized that people leave because they have other priorities in life that are more important. Now I find myself in similar shoes as those that have left,” he added.
He participated in SG-Pro Wrestling in 2012, SPW is a training school for wrestlers and it was there where he trained and competed under the moniker Trexxus.
