When you’re trying to be a beauty but the beast seeps out with your lethal braid, that’s when you become Bianca Belair. With her powerhouse moves, she was a standout competitor in the inaugural Mae Young Classic. Yet, most fans know very little about this wrestler who made NXT popular. In this article, we take a look at 20 things to know about Bianca Belair for any superfans!
Bianca Belair: 20 Binge-Worthy Facts
1. Real name:
Her real name is Bianca Blair.
2. Early life:
Bianca Blair was born in Knoxville, Tennessee, the United States in the year 1989. The 31 year old is of American nationality and belongs to Afro-American ethnicity. She’s the daughter of Travonda Blair and Leonard Blair and she has four siblings: Jeffery Phillips, Leonard Jr., Jermaine, and Jasta.
3. Education:
Regarding her education, Bianca went to Austin East Magnet High School in her hometown, Knoxville, Tennessee where she participated in sports such as track and succeeded. Bianca Belair got into the University of Southern California and later Texas A&M University. She graduated from the University of Tennessee where she was named SEC’s Academic Honor in 2011 and 2012.
4. A track and field star:
Long before stepping inside the squared circle, Bianca was a standout collegiate athlete.
Powerful, fast, and athletic, those exact qualities made her an athlete with the highest pedigree her entire life.
However, her path to success was a rocky one. It took Belair six years and three different universities to complete her college career. She started at the University of South Carolina before transferring to Texas A&M. Then she took a year off from track and field before transferring yet again to the University of Tennessee. It was there that she finally found her place, earning All-SEC and All-American honors, and being named to the SEC’s academic honor roll in 2011 and 2012. By the end of Blair’s time with the Lady Vols, her coaches were pushing her to go pro – but she felt that track had fully served its purpose: “I feel [track] got me where it needed to get me to,” Blair said. “It got me a scholarship into college and it took care of college. It just felt like a chapter that I needed to close and move on from there.”
5. Before moving on to WWE, she was in CrossFit:
Before she dreamt of becoming a wrestler, however, Belair planned for a future in CrossFit. Bianca Belair battled for victory in the regional circuit and was successful enough that she appeared in RX and Femme Rouge magazines, as well as on CrossFit.com.
6. Her CrossFit career was cut short because:
An overuse injury dented her CrossFit cot: “I have shifting rib syndrome,” said Blair of her injury, formally known as intercostal chondritis, described as inflammation of the cartilage that connects a rib to the breastbone. “There’s no treatment, there’s no surgery, there’s really nothing you can do for it. Once again, Bianca Belair was forced to start from scratch. But she wouldn’t immediately turn to WWE.
7. When she lost CrossFit and track, she got a regular job:
Faced with a more regular lifestyle devoid of the lights from track and CrossFit, Belair found herself giving into the 9-to-5 drudge. Believe it or not, she worked as a sales representative for a flavoring company in Atlanta – and she felt like her life was going nowhere: “I was just settling,” Blair said. “I was trying to live the life I felt was the hand I was dealt. I thought there would be something bigger, but this is what it is.” Unsatisfied and craving a return to competition, Belair submitted her info to WWE on a whim. Less than two weeks later, fate intervened.
8. Mark Henry sent a DM to her regarding a tryout:
About a week and a half after entering her details into WWE’s prospective database, the ex-CrossFit star received a message on social media. It was Mark Henry – and it was pure coincidence.
It seemed that WWE legend Mark Henry had found Belair through the CrossFit circuit, not her submission to WWE! He was interested in hiring her and said that he could get her a tryout, but she would have “to do the rest of the work.” Belair took Henry’s message as a sign that she was destined for wrestling: “I just thought this was so ironic,” Blair said. “So many times throughout my life I tried so hard to make things work with track or with CrossFit. All the pieces were just coming together, and I had to go for it. This is for me. This has to be for me. There’s no way that all of this is lining up perfectly.” After two tryouts, Belair signed with WWE in April 2016. She made her first in-ring appearance at an NXT live event in June 2016 and made her in-ring debut in a losing effort against Aliyah that September.
9. Making NXT famous:
Bianca Belair was one of the recent wrestlers to graduate from NXT, as she made her main roster premier at WrestleMania 36. Belair surprisingly came out to rescue The Street Profits, who were assaulted by Austin Theory, Angel Garza, and Zelina Vega.
10. When she started with NXT, she had no experience as a WWE wrestler:
Starting the journey in 2012, NXT has quickly become the third brand of the company, thanks to a huge TV deal last year. The black and yellow brand is famous for hiring a number of talented names from all over the world. Other than hiring athletes with professional wrestling experience, NXT also adds athletes from different backgrounds. When Bianca arrived in NXT in 2016 she had no prior experience as a professional wrestler. As a result, Bianca was held back to be groomed about the process before making her in-ring debut in NXT. Bianca was truly a homegrown talent of WWE.
11. She defeated Aliyah to qualify for Mae Young Classic event:
Mae Young Classic began in 2017, and Bianca Belair was part of the inaugural edition. Beating Aliyah in NXT, Belair punched her ticket for the Mae Young Classic tournament. In the first round of the tournament, Belair pinned Sage Beckett to qualify for the second round. Unfortunately, she failed to go past the second round, as she was beaten by Kairi Sane in a highly entertaining round. Although Belair spent several years in NXT, she never won the most coveted women’s prize of the black and yellow brand, the NXT Women’s Championship.
Belair was one of the biggest rivals of Shayna Baszler, who was then the champion. Subsequently, Belair also got a title shot against Rhea Ripley, but she was unsuccessful once again. Given her talent, she has the potential to win titles on the main roster in the future.
12. Bianca Belair in 2020:
The American pro wrestler ran riot at the women’s Royal Rumble match in 2020 by eliminating a total of eight women, the highest by any female Superstar. On the other hand, Shayna Baszler also eliminated seven women in the same match. Belair’s performance made a lasting imprint, and she showed her mettle. Besides securing the record of most number of eliminations, she also lasted thirty-three minutes in that match.
13. Bianca Belair husband:
When it comes to her marriage, Bianca Belair is married to a fellow professional wrestler Kenneth Crawford, who competes in NXT under the name Montez Ford. While working together, she met the Street Profits member Montez Ford, who has held both the NXT and RAW Tag Team Titles.
Getting to know each other from their NXT days, they got engaged in 2017, and the couple tied the knot in 2018.
14. Belair admitted that she had a crush on Montez Ford when she first met him:
According to an interview with Chasing Glory, Bianca Belair that the couple had an immediate connection and she had a crush on him.
“For me it was. I remember seeing him and just thinking, I have friends here and they can be witnesses, ‘Wow, that’s a beautiful man.’ I had an immediate crush on him. He got hurt for a while and he disappeared for a little while, for a couple months when I first started. It was kinda just, it was an immediate connection. We’ve kind of been inseparable ever since. We got married, and it’s just crazy, because we come from two completely different sides of the world. He was a marine, he was in the military. I was just living life and going to college and working in Atlanta. If it hadn’t been for WWE, and coming into wrestling, I found my husband through wrestling, and wrestling has brought me so much joy and my husband and it’s brought me this career that I can’t imagine myself doing anything else. Man, I’m just blessed.”
15. She makes her own ring attire and has her own shop:
Many fans have become aware of the fact that Bianca has many talents outside of the squared circle, which she shares via social media.
Even though many female wrestlers are able to design their attire and take it to WWE’s seamstress to have it made, Bianca Belair is able to create the entire thing herself. The former NXT star shares many of her creations on her own Instagram page.
The shop is co-owned by both Bianca and her husband Montez Ford, and it allows WWE fans to purchase some of Bianca’s creations from her directly. The shop mainly consists of jewelry, bags and even custom-made children’s clothes. It’s definitely worth it to shop from her site if you like a custom-made shirt from the NXT star.
16. Residence:
Although Bianca resides in Orlando, Florida, United States with her husband, she is originally from Tennessee.
17. Famous moves:
She was known to perform the finishing moves Hair Whip and 450 Splash.
18. Training:
She received training from Sara Del Rey at the WWE Performance Center.
19. Networth:
As a sports personality, Bianca earns a decent amount of money and salary from her work as a professional wrestler in the field of the sports industry. Based on some online sites, her estimated net worth is said to be $5 million at present.
20. Body stats:
Observing her body physics, Bianca stands a height of 5 feet 7 inches and weighs around 64 Kg. Besides being well-built, Belair is an incredible athlete combined with raw strength.
Similarly, her eyes are dark brown and her hair is black.
So what do you think about one of the fastest-rising stars in all of WWE? Hopefully, you’ve learned some impressive things about her.