ECW original Stevie Richards recently spoke on YourListen.com with WHIP Temple Update about Extreme Rising and more. Here are some highlights of what Richards said about:

ECW’s style compared to Extreme Rising: “I hope Extreme Rising is more wrestling. I like to hopefully think it is more along the lines of what Ring of Honor is doing. There is hardly any wrestling on TV today. There is like an hour and 45 minutes of talking and maybe 15 minutes of wrestling. I hope we can reverse that trend which shows you can come out and see. I’m against on any of these shows like Extreme Reunion…I’m against people cutting promos, angles, great 2 and half hours of wrestling. Not 4 and half hours, even I was falling asleep at the end of the show.”

The importance of staying fit and healthy in professional wrestling: “In the seminars that I do, I like to not only get them in the ring and teach them…I like to take them through a workout, like a real workout. Let’s go to the gym, let’s all train, let’s learn how to live this thing if you’re really serious about it. If you have to wear a t-shirt and jeans in the ring, you’re not a wrestler. You’re not an athlete. If you have to cover up your body when you wrestle, you’re not an athlete. And I think I’m out of shape. I think I’m fat. I always tell my friends ‘oh my god, I don’t even want to take my shirt off, I’m embarrassed.’ And then you look at some of the other guys, and it’s like, ‘Wow, you should put a shirt on. You look horrible.'”

Steroids in sports: “I’m a Libertarian, so I really believe that anyone can do what they want as long as they don’t hurt other people. But we live in a different time; business is regulated as far as it comes to sports. I don’t have a personal stance. To the guys that do it, I don’t know. I don’t ask. I have two eyes just like you guys. You look at somebody and you can kind of tell with most people. If they say no to steroids, more than likely they’re on growth. (Laughs) Here is the follow up question, what about HGH? What about growth? I’m under the notion that growth, something I have never done, the jury is still out. There’s not twenty years of study to see what the damage of HGH is. I refuse to activate cancer cells by using HGH as well, and have my parents losing their child. If I could control that, why would I do that?”

The popularity of DDP YOGA amongst wrestlers: “People are talking about it. Jericho is doing it; Mick Foley might be just talking about it. Mick should do it; he has put his body through more hell than anybody else. Page is just inspirational. It’s marketing sure, but it’s real. Page has given that program to more people than anybody I know. Obviously he wants to create a brand and market his product, but at the core, he is really helping people. He has been touting this ever since he left WWE. This inspired me to create my own workout program with SRX training. I’ve actually been doing DDP yoga for 5 or 6 weeks and even next to Justin Credible as he was passed out during Extreme Reunion.”

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