In a recent interview with Busted Open Radio, All Elite Wrestling star Jay Lethal discussed several topics, including training with WWE Hall of Famer Ric Flair prior to the Ric Flair’s Last Match event.

“I found out that he had moved or lived in Tampa in March, somewhere around March, he had found out that I had a school and he hit me up around the end of March, early April. Me, being such a big fan, anybody standing around me at that time knew that I just got a text message from Ric Flair, because I’m going crazy.

He said, I heard that you have a school, I want to get in, let’s do it okay. The next day, I get a text from him that says let’s do it m*****f*****, let’s get in the ring, what time, whatever time you tell me, we meet at the ring, a little rolling around and locking up and when we leave he goes, okay same time tomorrow. In the back of my head, I’m like what the hell is going on here, is this going to be a normal thing, me training with my idol.

The next day, I don’t know what time he normally wakes up, but I wake up every day around 8:30 or 9 and I woke up to a missed call from him and I woke up to a voicemail, it’s a voicemail I will never delete and all it said was, wake up m*****f*****, suplex off the top, let’s go. It started late March, early April, I didn’t know what it was leading to, I just thought, Ric is near a ring, he’s a wrestler, wrestling is in his blood and he just wants to get in there and roll around a bit, feed the beast. It wasn’t until late April where I heard rumblings that he was going to potentially have a match, he never told me straight out, but he would hint at it and I was like, how do I become a part of this. We were training since the end of March, early April and I had no idea what was going on.

Not to give away too much behind the scenes stuff, but of course Ric Flair doesn’t believe in planning too much, he likes to do things on the fly, so it feels more real that way. My favorite part of the whole, since the beginning of the training in March to last weekend, my favorite part of the entire thing was, we were supposed to get in the ring during the match, there was supposed to be a point near the beginning where we would get in the ring and I asked him, when you and I get in there, what do you want to do and he goes to me, the f*** are you talking about, listen to me kid, follow me and I’ll guide you and I was like okay fine, yes sir. Something about the way that he said it was so cool to me, he didn’t miss a step.

Another thing that I’d like to point out is that I told Ric and everyone who would listen that he really didn’t have to do anything, a few chops and a Wooo! and everyone would be fine. To be trying to take all these moves, he wanted to be in there forever to show that he could still go, he wants us to “beat the s*** out of me, you guys can’t hurt me, don’t worry”. To do all that, it was unreal that he still wants to do all that. Nobody saw him being in my ring, practicing in Florida in that hot building, pushing himself to the point where he couldn’t get up.

Nobody will see that. He didn’t have to do that stuff, it wasn’t needed and it was just a personal thing and he wanted to make himself the best that he possibly could have, pushing himself to the point to where he almost threw up and passed out. Nobody will see how hard he actually worked to put on the best wrestling match that he could possibly put on. It motivated me to like, what the hell is my excuse, so many emotions when I would watch that at class.”