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Impact Knockouts World Championship

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Impact Knockouts World Championship
Impact KOTitle.jpg
The current Impact Knockouts World Championship belt
(2020–present)
Details
PromotionImpact Wrestling
Date establishedOctober 14, 2007[1]
Current champion(s)Tasha Steelz
Date wonMarch 5, 2022
Other name(s)
  • TNA Women's World Championship (2007–2008)
  • TNA Women's Knockout Championship (2008–2010)
  • TNA Knockouts Championship (2010–2017)
  • Impact Wrestling Knockouts Championship (2017)
  • Unified GFW Knockouts Championship (2017)
  • GFW Knockouts Championship (2017)
  • Impact Knockouts Championship
    (2017–2021)
  • Impact Knockouts World Championship (2021-present)

The Impact Knockouts World Championship[3] is a women's professional wrestling world championship owned by Impact Wrestling. It is primarily contested for in Impact's women's division, known as the Knockouts. The championship debuted on October 14, 2007 at the Bound for Glory pay-per-view (PPV) event under the name TNA Knockouts Championship until the promotion changed its name in March 2017, then added the world status in 2021. The current champion is Tasha Steelz, who is in her first reign.

The tag team counterpart of the title is the Impact Knockouts World Tag Team Championships, which was re-introduced at Hard To Kill in January 2021. There have been 58 reigns shared between 24 wrestlers. The first champion was Gail Kim.

History[]

TNA Knockout[]

TNA Knockout, or just Knockout for short, is the term used by TNA to refer to its onscreen female performers; this is similar to TNA's main rival World Wrestling Entertainment and their Divas pseudonym. TNA's first women's accomplishment was announced at TNA's first weekly pay-per-view event on June 19, 2002.[4] It was called the "Miss TNA" crown. The holder of the crown was determined in a lingerie battle royal on June 19, 2002, which aired on June 26, 2002. The participants in the match were Alexis Laree, Elektra, Erin Bray, Francine, Miss Joni, Sasha, Shannon, Taylor Vaughn, and Teresa Tyler.[5] Vaughn last eliminated Elektra to win the crown.[6] The TNA Knockout of the Year is another award in TNA given to the knockout who achieved the most or had the best run that year.[7] The most recent Knockout of the Year was Gail Kim in 2007;[7] no award has been given out since.

On the August 20, 2009 episode of TNA Impact!, backstage interviewer Lauren announced that TNA were planning to host an eight-team single elimination tag team tournament to crown the first TNA Knockouts Tag Team Champions.[8] The tournament began on the following Impact! and continued on for four weeks, concluding on September 20 at TNA's No Surrender PPV event. There, the team of Sarita and Taylor Wilde defeated The Beautiful People (Madison Rayne and Velvet Sky) to become the first champions.[9] Two DVDs on the topic of the TNA Knockouts have been released by TNA. The first was named "Knockouts: The Ladies of TNA Wrestling Vol.1" and was released on August 29, 2006.[10] "Knocked Out: The Women of TNA Wrestling" was the second, released on October 7, 2008.[11]

Creation[]

TNA first announced in early September 2007 through their TNA Mobile service that they planned to start an official women's division and debut a women's title soon.[12][13] Later that month, TNA began to promote a 10 knockout gauntlet match to be held on October 14, 2007 at TNA's Bound for Glory PPV event to crown the first-ever TNA Women's Champion.[14] At the event, Gail Kim defeated Ms. Brooks, Christy Hemme, Awesome Kong, Roxxi Laveaux, Talia Madison, Shelly Martinez, Jackie Moore, ODB, and Angel Williams to become the first champion.[1][15] The championship was renamed in 2008 to the TNA Women's Knockout Championship until 2010 when it became simply known as the TNA Knockouts Championship.

Belt designs[]

During the championship's history, the belt has had four designs. Its first design featured a white leather strap that is covered with two small gold plates that are encrusted with silver. In the center of each plate stands a figure resembling a globe made out of gold. On the outer edge of the plate are red gems, which circle the entire plate. The center golden plate of the belt has TNA's official logo engraved in the very center with the word "Womens" [sic] above it and the word "Champion" below it. At the very top of the center plate is a queen's crown. The word "Knockout" does not appear anywhere on the belt.

At the end of December 2014, TNA uploaded a photo on their Instagram account, in which the Knockouts Championship has a new design, replacing the white strap with a black strap, with the red color scheme changed to blue to coincide with the company's color scheme and the plates are now fully gold thus the encrusted silver is removed. As with the previous belt, the word "Knockout" does not appear on the belt, despite its current name.[16]

After Slammiversary XV, the Impact Knockouts Championship and the GFW Women's Championship were carried together, with the unified championship representing the lineage of the Impact Knockouts Championship. At Destination X 2017, a recoloured version of the former GFW Women's Championship was created to represent the championship.[N 1] This belt was later modified to cover the GFW logo with an Impact Wrestling logo. At Redemption, Impact revealed new championships. The Main plate has Impact Wrestling logo with the "Knockouts Champion" below the logo. On each side of the center plate is a group of four smaller silver plates, with each side featuring separate circular owl symbol and a "KO" Symbol. In 2020, a new belt was made, with red being the dominant color.

Reigns[]

Main article: List of Impact Knockouts World Champions

As of March 29, 2022, there have been 59 reigns shared between 25 wrestlers. The inaugural champion was Gail Kim, who defeated Ms. Brooks, Christy Hemme, Awesome Kong, Roxxi Laveaux, Velvet Sky, Shelly Martinez, Jackie Moore, ODB, and Angelina Love in a ten Knockout Gauntlet for the Gold match on October 24, 2007 at TNA's Bound for Glory PPV event. She also holds the record for the most reigns, with seven. Kim also holds the record for shortest reign in the title's history, during her seventh reign at 25 hours, while Taya Valkyrie's reign holds the record for longest in the title's history, with 377 days.

Tasha Steelz is the current champion in her first reign. She defeated former champion Mickie James on March 5, 2022 at Sacrifice in Louisville, Kentucky to win the title.

Notes[]

  1. ^ This description is based on the design of the GFW Knockouts Championship, used from August 17, 2017 to November 5, 2017, also as seen in the image at the top of the article

References[]

  1. ^ a b Sokol, Chris (October 14, 2007). "Angle gets stung at Bound For Glory". SLAM! Sports: Wrestling. Canadian Online Explorer. Retrieved September 21, 2009.
  2. ^ Oliver, Earl; Gonzalo Soto. "TNA Knockout Championship Title History". Solie.org. Retrieved September 21, 2009.
  3. ^ "CHAMPIONS – IMPACT Wrestling". impactwrestling.com. Archived from the original on November 16, 2020.
  4. ^ Martin, Adam (June 19, 2002). "Full NWA-TNA Pay Per View results - 6/19/02". WrestleView.com. Retrieved September 20, 2009.
  5. ^ "TNA Weekly PPV #2". Pro Wrestling History.com. Retrieved September 21, 2009.
  6. ^ Martin, Adam (June 26, 2002). "Full NWA-TNA Pay Per View results - 6/26". WrestleView.com. Retrieved September 20, 2009.
  7. ^ a b Total Nonstop Action. TNA Wrestling: Best of TNA 2007. TNA Home Video.
  8. ^ Keller, Wade (August 27, 2009). "Keller's TNA Impact report 8/20: Results, star ratings, thoughts, observations, quotebook". PWTorch.com. Retrieved September 21, 2009.
  9. ^ Meltzer, Dave (September 21, 2009). "TNA No Surrender PPV match-by-match coverage". Figure Four Online/The Wrestling Observer newsletter. Retrieved September 21, 2009.
  10. ^ "Knockouts: The Ladies of TNA Wrestling Vol.1". For Your Entertainment. Archived from the original on July 11, 2011. Retrieved September 20, 2009.
  11. ^ "TNA Wrestling: Knocked Out - DVD". Best Buy. Retrieved September 21, 2009.
  12. ^ "TNA Mobile Update: Women's Title, Ultimate X At BFG". Sescoops.com. September 12, 2007. Archived from the original on October 13, 2007. Retrieved June 4, 2009.
  13. ^ Martin, Adam (September 12, 2007). "Possible Women's Title coming to TNA, + 'Ultimate X' returns at BFG PPV". WrestleView.com. Retrieved June 4, 2009.
  14. ^ Martin, Adam (September 14, 2007). "Scheduled card for TNA Bound For Glory PPV on Sunday, Oct. 14; Atlanta". WrestleView.com. Retrieved June 4, 2009.
  15. ^ TNA Home Video and Navarre Corporation (October 14, 2007). "Bound for Glory 2007". TNA Bound for Glory. In Demand.
  16. ^ "new TNA KO Championship belt". Instagram. Archived from the original on December 26, 2021. Retrieved February 16, 2015.

External links[]

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