10 More Wrestling Facts You Probably Didn't Know
4. Chris Benoit Held A WWF Title Nine Years Before He Signed With Them
Two months after defecting from WCW and arriving in the WWF with the rest of the Radicalz, Chris Benoit would win the WWF Intercontinental Championship at WrestleMania 2000.
This, and his many other accomplishments, have of course been overshadowed by the tragic and horrifying events of June 2007. What many don’t realise is that this title victory wasn’t his first WWF championship.
Back in the early eighties, the WWF had a working relationship with the Universal Wrestling Association (known internally as Lucha Libre Internacional) in Mexico. To promote the WWF brand in that territory, Vince McMahon Sr. agreed in 1981 to create the WWF Light Heavyweight Championship for use within the UWA.
In 1991, Benoit was wrestling for New Japan Pro Wrestling under a hood as the Pegasus Kid, and would occasionally travel to Mexico, as NJPW also had a working relationship with the UWA. He won the WWF Light Heavyweight Championship from Villano III on 3 March, nearly nine years before signing with the WWF, and held the title for 560 days.