Hayden Loeve, known as ‘Dutch’ to pro-wrestling fans, has run Lincoln‘s Fight Factory Wrestling school for 11 years.
Since opening it’s doors in 2013, Loeve has trained hundreds of young people: some finding a hobby, other finding a profession.
He said: “It’s a good community we’ve built, it’s a really supportive group. It’s not just the wrestling, it’s everything: when someone is going through something we all bound together. I think we’ve all created that through what I felt wrestling should be.”
“It grew from just two hours a week to nine hours a week, to a place where it’s open for bookings throughout the week. It’s hard to describe, how much it has grown,” he added.
The school’s head trainer, Loeve, said it is “like a second family” to him, as he helps teach a craft to the younger generations.
He said: “I’m proud. We’ve got a decent reputation, we’ve trained people from their first session who are now out there, getting to a point where they are working a lot. One of the guys we trained is flying to and from Japan to wrestle.”
“If people want to pay to come and watch our shows, and essentially watch us play fight in lycra then it puts us in a position where we can help more people.” – Hayden Loeve, FFW Co-owner
In 2023, FFW raised £4,100 for various cancer-related causes at their ‘Bodyslams to Cancer’ event, an annual tradition for their promotion.
Loeve’s love for wrestling started at a young age – a familiar story of those in the industry.
He said: “I was a fan as a kid, watching World of Sport with my grandparents and then the WWF [now the WWE] with my Uncle. I got captivated by it, my teenage years I did backyard wrestling, then I found someone to train me and I took it serious from 2011 really.”
‘Backyard wrestling’ is as it sounds, wrestling in your own back garden. It is a way some make their first steps into the world of pro-wrestling, before under-going on professional training.
Fight Factory Wrestling (FFW) has been training the new-crop of since 2013. Loeve co-owns the company alongside his wife, Becca.
Loeve revealed that the training school grew almost by accident, explaining: “It was supposed to just be a hobby, but it was a perfect storm. Things just kept happened where it fell into place. It become rather than be just wrestling, having a training school, from charity shows to regular shows. Everything just of fell into place.”
The school currently trains close to 40 students, during classes that take place throughout the week.
“It started as someone else’s idea actually, he asked if I would help and I was happy to do that. We wanted a place to train and found the Lincoln Fight Factory,” he added.
“There’s a lot of pressure”:
However, working in pro-wrestling comes with its own, unique challenges. Loeve explained some of the difficulties he has faced in relying on pro-wrestling, a niche market in the United Kingdom, to provide a full income.
“This is pretty much all I do, with a little bit of personal training on the side. I’ve always got emails and phone calls, one of the touring companies in America contacted us once at three o’clock in the morning. It’s not-stop, the phones are always on,” he said.
Adding: “If you miss a call, or you miss an email, someone else gets that work. You’re constantly grafted, there’s a lot of pressure with that.”
Adrenaline shot…
Loeve wrestles across the county under his in-ring name ‘Dutch’, including on FFW’s own shows.
He said: “I still get a massive buzz of performing. Whether it’s in front of hundreds or thousands at some of the bigger shows, I still get a great buzz. But, seeing someone I’ve trained make their debut, that’s where I get most of the adrenaline shot from now.”
“When people come in thinking they can’t do it and then I see them perform at our level, and then going onto bigger companies. That’s always the highlight, seeing people hit the goals they set themselves,” the FFW co-owner added.
That sentiment is what is at the heart of Lincoln’s pro-wrestling school. Loeve has built a community, alongside his wife, that can help young people in the city reach their personal goals.
The company’s next event is Saturday, March 30. It will be their first show of the year at Gainsborough‘s X-Church, entitled ‘Retribution’.
They return to Lincoln‘s One NK Leisure Centre on Saturday, May 4th for an event named ‘May The 4th Be With You’. It will feature former WWE NXT UK talent Amir Jordan.
Tickets and more information on both events can be found here.