DATE: December 1999
COMPANY: The Wrestler
AUTHOR: Bryan Ethier

The WWF's male wrestlers say they aren't afraid of "hitting a girl". Yet when it comes to getting into the ring with Chyna, most guys want to run the other way!

Hardcore Holly stood in the middle of the ring and issued a challenge: "I will kick the butt of the biggest, toughest, most hardcore wrestler out there!"

He turned and motioned to a scale behind him. "If you think you're big and tough enough, step on the scale."

Holly gasped when he saw Chyna emerge from the locker room area and strut down the ramp. "You're a woman. I'm a man," Holly barked as Chyna stood ringside and cringed. "I don't wrestle a woman with 200-pound sacks of silicone!"

The WWF's "Ninth Wonder of the World" said nothing. She climbed into the ring and froze Holly with her trademark sneer.

"This aint no place for a woman," Holly warned.

It was the wrong thing to say.

Her eyes were smoking. Flames were pouring from her mouth. Chyna hoisted the scale onto her shoulder and, in one sweeping motion, slammed the scale into Holly's back.

Feminism had taken five steps forward, right into Holly's face, and Holly did not like it one bit.

Down the rampway raced Intercontinental champion Jeff Jarrett. Down the rampway raced Billy Gunn. Neither man was interested in dating Chyna. They were a pair of linebackers pouncing upon a smaller opposing fullback.

First, Gunn flatted Chyna with his famouser. Then Jarrett provided the finishing moves, a series of boots to the woman's brawny physique.

"Everybody wants a piece of Chyna!" exclaimed an excited Jerry Lawler.

Men like Jarrett and Gunn in the macho WWF world act as if they want Chyna. But when you get right down to it, they, and their fellow whiskered brethren, want little to do with the world's premier female wrestler.

A gang attack like the aforementioned one is fine. Maybe a quick run-in and a dropkick to her chops. That works, too. But to a man, few wrestlers actually wish to wrestle Chyna in a legitimate bell-to-bell match.

What are the reasons?

Holly may have hit the mark with his chauvinistic proclamation: When you get right down to it, guys just aren't really comfortable leglocking with female wrestlers, particularly one as capable and talented as Chyna.

Chyna, like the typical pretty gal, has the male wrestlers' heads spinning. Ask Jarrett, who does a blubbering, self-conscious mambo every time he gets near Chyna.

"Chyna, I want your butt in this ring, and I'm going to show you who's the greatest Intercontinental champion of all time," said an audacious "Double-J" before encountering Chyna at Unforgiven. "You parade around here with all them muscles like you think you're one of us. Well, you aint."

Jarrett was so obsessed with showing up Chyna that he embarked on a bizarre practice of attacking women wrestlers in the ring. Perhaps you recall the night he assaulted the legendary Fabulous Moolah and Mae Young.

"Strange behavior from a strange jerk," said Ken Shamrock. "That's no way to treat a lady".

Then again, who can blame Jarrett for acting strangely?

No one seems to know exactly how to behave around Chyna. then again, it's easy to cower around a 201-pound woman who specializes in upper-cutting wrestlers in their private parts.

"She sure packs a wallop for a woman," said X-Pac. "I'm still a little sore from the last time she sucker-pounded me."

One would think that Chyna's sneak attacks would serve as ample motivation for the men to want to beat the black leather off her.

Not so.

"These guys want to beat the crap out of her, but they can't," said Rodd Dogg. "She's like two people in one; one moment she'll try to cripple you, the next she'll hug you."

A few things to keep in mind as you ponder the Chyna mystique: She is a trained boxer and wrestler (Killer Kowalski taught her how to wrestle). She is also a former professional bodybuilder. And she once tested to be an FBI secret service agent.

Does that scare you?

Then there's her softer side, as revealed by her close friend and training partner, Hunter Hearst Helmsley.

"The fans and the nimrods in the media don't see the behind-the-curtain Chyna. She loves to read, knit, and she enjoys practical jokes. She meticulously applies her makeup and takes great care in the way she looks. She can really stop a guy cold when she's not kicking his [butt] in the ring."

It's this dichotomous demeanor that confuses male wrestlers and makes it so difficult for them to go right at Chyna and hold nothing back.

"Nothing like putting her in a headlock and catching a whiff of her perfume. You lose your concentration, to say the least," said X-Pac.

The muscles, the athletic skill, the grace, the furious power, the batting eyelashes, the perfume, the clench holds...this is Chyna. This is what makes her so daunting to male foes.

Does it all also make her her own worst enemy?

This woman is loaded, the real deal," said Pat Patterson. "She has the mechanics, the training, the persona, to be champion. Problem is, she's still a girl in a boy's league, and most guys just aren't ready to risk their titles on a woman."

This is a world, after all, where "puppies" score more points than chokeholds, where a pretty girl gets more attention baring her body than does a talented woman baring her soul.

Chyna has a battle before her. Not only does she have to beat Bob Holly and Jeff Jarrett and The Big Show and the rest of them, but she also has to conquer an age-old adage: "Never hit a girl".

The would-be Queen of the Ring has shown she can suplex the strongest of men. She has proven she belongs in the squared circle not as a carnival attraction, but as a serious contender to the World title.

If any woman can become the first female WWF World Heavyweight champion, Chyna is likely to be the one.

She already has most of the WWF competition running scared!