Lyra Valkyria recently appeared as a guest on the wildly popular INSIGHT with Chris Van Vliet podcast for an in-depth interview covering all things pro wrestling and WWE.
During the discussion, the first-ever WWE Women’s Intercontinental Champion spoke about being one of the few from Ireland to make it big in WWE, being inspired by fellow Irish star Becky Lynch and now working with her, being a former double champion in WWE, the meaning behind her ring entrance, changes at WrestleMania 41 this year and more.
Featured below are some of the highlights from the interview where she touches on these topics with her thoughts.
On being one of the few from Ireland to make it in WWE: “It’s crazy. But also, you look at how small Ireland is, and how many of us are on Raw right now. It’s crazy, I feel like we’re really good at producing the best.”
On being inspired by Becky Lynch: “Honestly, I don’t think I went, I can go do that. It was one of those things where I was watching Raw super late, because it starts at 1 am and I was again, down the rabbit hole. Where can I go to do this? I was looking at who’s in the club? I was not very outgoing. I was very, very shy. So if I started something, I needed a friend to go with me and that kind of thing. I was never the one. I was the quiet friend, I think. I was always a bit awkward, but this was the one thing that I was like, if I go, I’ll just do it. I even considered giving a fake name so that if it goes really badly, no one has to know about it, and my friends would never find out anything like that. It must have been 3 am, and I was on my phone looking it up, I kind of just went, I’m just going to do this. It was actually a Saturday night, and I was up watching wrestling, and I went I’m just going to go tomorrow. Because if I put down my phone right now, go to sleep, and I say, maybe I’ll do this next week. I won’t. It was just one of those freak things that I was like, just get up and go, and it turned my whole life around. That one little decision to just try something really did change my life. Because it sounds like it’s just something to say, but it really did. I decided that day that good or bad, that’s what I’m gonna do. So yeah, that one decision to try something changed everything.”
On now working with Becky Lynch in WWE: “It’s just crazy, she’s the one that broke all the glass ceilings, the one that did it all. But she didn’t just do it and succeed; she went and did things that no one ever thought possible. So I have a crazy level of respect for that. Because once someone does something, there’s all these studies about the 4-minute mile, the human capability, how much they can go, right? But then once one person broke that. And then one person broke it, and then when that one person broke it, it was broken by the next person and the next person and the next person. It’s almost like you just need that one person to show you that it’s possible. Then suddenly, it just opens up the floodgates and suddenly there’s no limit. So to have a woman from my tiny country of Ireland to have gone that far, I really feel like if she can, then why not me?”
On winning the Women’s Intercontinental Championship: “[It’s brought me] A lot of confidence, it’s a big responsibility, and there’s a lot of pressure that comes with it. But I think I’m kind of in control once I get in the ring, that’s where I’m like, no matter what outside noise there is, I’m completely in control of what I do here. So that’s kind of where my power is. No one can take that away.”
On when she first heard about winning the title: “I never was a part of that conversation. I just find out on Mondays what I’m doing. I found out the day of. I was never a part of the decision or the conversation. I just showed up to work.”
On how it felt when she was told that: “Amazing. I couldn’t believe it. I really couldn’t believe it. But things don’t hit me when I think they’re going to. I always say that it never hits me in the moment. It hit me when I was driving home and taking my bags out of the car on the Tuesday. The title is just sitting in my bag, the zip opens, and I’m like, Oh yeah, that’s the Intercontinental Championship. I won that. I brought that home. That’s when it hits me.”
On becoming a double champion in WWE: “I was tag team champions with Becky. It’s funny, when you look at JD McDonough, he always says his dream was to be tag champions with Balor. They did that. And, yeah, however short-lived it was, I was a double champion.”
On the meaning behind her entrance: “So on the Independents I wrestled as Valkyrie. That’s not Marvel character-based, not bird-based. It’s actually from my favorite book, which is written by an Irish author. I discovered it when I was 12 years old. The main character was 12, living in Dublin, starts this whole new secret life, she has to take on a name to start this new life, and she calls herself Valkyrie. So I started that, and until I went to WWE, I never used the kind of imagery that’s associated with the Valkyrie at all. So then I was like okay, well I should probably use that. So I got the kind of Valkyrie-looking gear for NXT UK, and then when I was moving across, I had to change my name, and I actually contacted the author of that book. So his name’s Derek Landy, and he’s Irish, and he suggested this character called the Morrigan. I was actually a little bit familiar with it. It’s like the Irish Valkyrie from Irish mythology. Finn Balor and his demon character also drew from Irish mythology and stuff. The Morrigan basically transforms into a raven or crow and hovers over the battlefield and decides who’s going to win a battle. So I was like, that’s really cool. I went down that rabbit hole, and it’s just a very cool female warrior character who transforms into a raven. I just thought that was very cool. It was related to the Valkyrie, so it’s still tied to my book and my favorite stuff, and I love mythologies. So yeah, that’s where it all comes from.”
On Becky Lynch replacing Bayley at WrestleMania: “It came at the expense of Bayley, which is a bit sad because we clicked so well as a tag team. So it was genuinely hard to have my Mania moment come at an expense. Becky is a big part of the reason I started wrestling. But it was the era of the four horsewomen in NXT. It wasn’t just Becky; Bayley was a massive influence as well. So it did kind of taint how great it was knowing it was coming at her expense.”
On the moment being bittersweet: “It’s hard to talk about or to because there’s so much good, but there’s so much, I don’t know, it’s just tough. [There’s a lot of history with Bayley]. Quick history. We only tagged for a couple of weeks, but we hit it off so well outside of the ring. She’s very easy to chat to and get along with, and she’s just so personable. You meet Bayley and you feel like you’ve known her your whole life. I introduced her to my fiancé, and he was like, I haven’t met her before, have I? And I was like, No. And he was like, I feel like I have just from talking to her there.”
