10 Things We Learned From The Secret Diary Of A WWE Superstar
3. The Grind
It's a tale as old as time and one shared by every wrestler that braved Vince McMahon's "Killer Kalendar", but they all deserve the platform to vent about just how gruelling the life can be. Hakushi's diary was his. Jinsei Shinzaki was keen to preserve kayfabe as much as possible in his missives, but the exhaustion and daily grind is a constant theme throughout.
He speaks of being out of breath and having much to improve during his first match of many with The 1-2-3 Kid, and speaks again on stamina issues weeks later for an Action Zone clash with Bob Holly.
Interestingly, he notes that his anxiety from travelling across the world as well as familiar new job nerves had just as potent an impact on his experiences in his earliest days. As the months pass so too do some of these emotions (or at least, his documenting of them), but in an age long before regular conversations around mental health, Shinzaki was spotting patterns between body and brain.