“I try not to get my hopes up too high with anything, because I’ll never be let down that way.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I don’t want to be good, I want to be great.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Witnessing the crowd come to their feet mid-match, that’s the ultimate sign of respect.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Honestly, the All In women’s locker room was such an inspirational group of women. What I love about all the women involved – Chelsea, Britt, Madison, Jordynne Grace, Brandi Rhodes, Tenille Dashwood, Penelope Ford, Mandy Leon – is we all bring something so different to the table for a common vision.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“When I first started wrestling I knew that I wanted to work as long and as hard as it took to be able to have a great match with anyone.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“People think that we hired a bunch of actresses and taught them how to wrestle, and that couldn’t be further from the truth.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Women today are respected as athletes now and that’s a really cool thing to see.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Both my stepdad and my dad have said, ‘Follow your heart and your dreams, but Tessa, this is a business and you need to become the best.’ They don’t sugarcoat things and I’m very, very blessed for that.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I get to travel all over the world and win titles everywhere I’ve gone.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I was part of the first ever women’s match to ever be televised in China. That’s something no one can take away from me.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I’ve gotten to wrestle some of the best women and men in the world – Brian Cage, AR Fox, Scorpio Sky, Tracy Williams, David Starr.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I want to become one of the most versatile wrestlers in the world.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I came into Impact and I ran through the entire Knockouts locker room just like I said I would.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I am grateful to both Impact Wrestling and the WOW executives for working out the details to allow me to pursue my dream of competing at the highest levels within our industry.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I don’t think I’d be the wrestler or the athlete that I am today if I didn’t have some of the intergender matches that I have.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I am happy to join Selina Majors in providing women with a fully comprehensive training program designed specifically for them. I was trained by men, and while that worked for me, I know a more supportive community for women wanting to join our profession will increase the participation.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I’m a born legend.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“And I’m so grateful to have that family name and continue my family’s legacy, but I’m also very excited to create my own.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Depending on what country I go to, my style might be a little bit different and my tactics might change a little bit, but at the end of the day, I’m still Tessa Blanchard and I’m still the same wrestler.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I think that wrestling guys has elevated my game in a whole different way. My timing, my transitions, everything is crisp. It’s a whole different level.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I was a music theater nerd in high school.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I never wanted to be a wrestler, I wanted to get into musical theater. I always wanted to be on Broadway.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I know what my goals are, and I always keep that in the forefront of my mind.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Every time I step into the ring there is a different obstacle but I’m very confident in myself and my ability.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“My favorite wrestler of all-time is Johnny Valentine. I believe him to be the best bad guy ever in wrestling and he is my absolute favorite.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Female-wise, one person that I really, really, really would like to share the ring with is Gail Kim. I say that because I believe her to be one of the best women’s wrestlers in the world!”
― Tessa Blanchard
“My dad had already retired by the time I was born.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“After my freshmen year of college, I really wanted to pursue wrestling.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I wish my grandpa could have seen me wrestle, even once.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I love hard work and proving people wrong.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I have goals, I have my purpose. I want to build upon what my grandpa and my dad and my stepdad did in the past.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Impact is such a fun place to work, I enjoy it so much I can’t stress that enough.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I do, I put so much pressure on myself whether it’s in the gym, whether it be in wrestling, whatever goals I have.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I remind myself to be grateful and remember where I came from.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“That is the great thing about Impact – they care about each individual talent and everything that we put out on TV has a lot of thought and time put into it.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Gail Kim has done so much and has so much knowledge. I think she’s extremely underrated. She wants the product to be great and she doesn’t mind taking the extra time to get it there. That is a really invaluable thing to me.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I hope to share the ring with Gail Kim one day.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“So, I’m a huge Chris Jericho fan. I’ve always been a huge Chris Jericho fan.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I am not owed anything in this life, especially in wrestling.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I love getting in the ring with Britt Baker. She is one of my favorite people that I got in the ring with.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Honestly, I want to wrestle everybody.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Tasha Steelz, I’ve watched a few of her training videos, and she is super athletic.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“One person that I really love to wrestle again is AR Fox and Brian Cage again too because those are two of my most favorite matches.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I am a huge fan of intergender wrestling. It’s something that I would love to see Impact evolve to one day.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I would love to wrestle Scorpio Sky again, that’s one of my most favorite matches.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“My main goal in Impact Wrestling is to win the Knockouts Championship.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Honestly one woman that I would really love to face would be Taya Valkyrie.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“To make a name for myself, I feel it’s important to do that before I go anywhere else. Impact have given me the platform and the exposure to do that.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Not a lot of people know this story but I actually got into the business without even telling anyone in my family. It was something I did on my own and I had been training for six to eight months before I told my dad and my step-dad.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“On the independent circuit I’ve traveled the world, I’ve won championships, I’ve won tournaments – I’ve defeated some of the best out there so I feel like I am one of the best.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Carrying on the Blanchard name is a huge honor for me because my grandfather, my father and my step-father – they’ve all put a lot into their legacy and for me to carry that on, it’s a lot of weight on my shoulders.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I put pressure on myself to be the best and to carry on the Blanchard name with dignity and with pride.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I’ve always done whatever is necessary to retain my Knockouts title by any means necessary.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“If Gail Kim gets in my business, I’ll make sure there is no more Gail Kim.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“But while Taya is so good, she is still no diamond. She is still no Tessa Blanchard. I am one of the best in the world!”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Being lean doesn’t make you any more worthy, any more beautiful or any more valuable. It doesn’t make you a more fit person, it doesn’t mean you’ve worked harder in the gym, people who are leaner than you aren’t better than you.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I broke my shoulder, or my collarbone, I shouldn’t say my shoulder, and I had surgery, six screws and a plate in here.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I wanted to go and I wanted to drive the miles for no pay, I wanted to set up the rings, I wanted to set up the chairs, I wanted to go to training six-seven days a week for hours upon hours and blow myself up to where I can only work on instinct. I wanted to sleep in my car. I wanted to do all of that.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“No matter what it is, I wanna be great. I wanna be be the best at it.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I think when I started in wrestling, I hadn’t realized how difficult locker rooms were going to be. I thought they were going to be more inviting than they were.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“On numerous different occasions I have had people tell me that I am only booked because of my dad, because of who I was dating, or any other exceptions other than my hard work, so in my mind I wanted to put in the extra hours in the ring.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Scott Armstrong got me my tryout at the WWE Performance Center. I went there and got my tryout and it was one of the most physically trying things in my life.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“There were so many times I was called to go do a match and drive 8 or 9 hours from North Carolina to Orlando, Florida just to go do the NXT extra spots and then nothing, which would break my heart every time, but I was just very young then.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“WOW and Impact are both different brands, but Tessa Blanchard never changes. I’m the same Tessa Blanchard there as with Impact.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“One thing about WOW that I love is that we’re taking women from all different parts of life. We have girls from jiu jitsu and an MMA background. We have mothers. We have students. We have people from everyday life who found this love for professional wrestling.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Taya has never beaten me in a fair fight one-on-one. Taya has always needed a stipulation or a special guest referee or something that puts the odds in her favor.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I’ve gone places where they’ve told me what I need to do, what I need to say, who I need to be, what moves I need to perform. And at Impact I get to just be me. I have creative control to be me and do what I want.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“No matter whether someone has been in the business longer than you or for less time, you can learn something from any of them.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“In a perfect world, I would love to be great at everything.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I watch a lot of old-school wrestling, and one of my favourite matches is my dad vs my step-dad at Starrcade ’85, Magnum TA vs Tully Blanchard. In that match everything looked so aggressive, everything was so real, and it looked like a brutal fight.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I’ve wrestled some of the best wrestlers in the world – both male and female.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I got to travel to Australia and I got to main event at Korakuen Hall.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Everywhere I go, the styles are different. When you wrestle in Japan, it’s more strong style. When I go to Mexico, it’s definitely more high-flying. And in my matches I’ve had with Taya in Impact, it’s been a lot more ground-based.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“You got to be able to work hard. And that’s what I do. I work hard, because that’s what’s necessary. You have to go that extra mile.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“After my WWE tryout in 2014, I thought for sure that I was going to get signed and that it is finally happening and that I was going to finally be there. Then, when it didn’t happen I was heartbroken. I always think it is because God had a plan for me.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I think that I am misunderstood because people perceive me to be a certain way because I am generational. They expect me to be entitled and expect me to have things early on. I think people misconstrued that honestly.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I was so excited for my spot on the Mae Young Classic.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Rebellion’ was amazing, there was a lot of anticipation leading up to that event.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I do not regret anything I do.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I love wrestling, no matter if it is guys, girls or whatever it may be.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I would like to face everyone on the Impact roster. It is filled with amazing performers, I would be honored to share the ring with any of them.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I am getting to travel all over the world doing what I love and making a living out of it. That is a huge blessing to me.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I have very high expectations out of myself.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I have a huge family name to live up to and a huge legacy to live up to. I feel the pressure of that every day of my life, but I feel like it’s a blessing and a curse.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I do feel like since I am a third-generation wrestler, I do have to hold myself – and there are a lot of people that expect certain things out of me – I’m an athlete, and I’m a top athlete.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I train seven days a week. I’m mentally and physically prepared for any situation that I might be thrown in, and that’s what puts me in the upper echelon compared to other Knockouts.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“And one thing for me is I’ve never been motivated by money.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Progress only happens with change, and people love something different.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I’ve really grown to find myself. I’ve started to learn the TV style, if you would. And with WOW, I’ve been able to meet some of the best people.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“I care more about who people are as a person and being around good people because when you leave the world, you’re not going to be able to take the money.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“Watching promos of my dad and stepdad… it’s a lot to live up to. I don’t want to make them look stupid.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“They’ve helped me out so much – Dad from a business aspect and my stepdad on following my heart. They’re both so different but so much alike. I get to pick both of their brains.”
― Tessa Blanchard
“After hours, I would train, train, train, six or seven days a week, until 2 or 3 in the morning sometimes.”
― Tessa Blanchard
Leave a Reply