Pro Wrestling Real Life Stories: Episode 3 - Lana, Rusev, his real-life fight, Russia, Bulgaria and the American Dream

#6 Rusev and Lana -- The tanning bed encounter

Rusev and Lana had a few interesting early encounters with each other

Rusev was the first of this power couple, to have started off with the WWE. Both he and Lana confirmed that it was late-great Dusty Rhodes who paired them together in the developmental territories.

Anecdotes:

Rusev recalled that he met Lana when she started off in WWE's developmental territories, around the time NXT was really starting to gain steam. However, despite working together on the day of their first meeting, the following day when Rusev and a friend were at a tanning booth; Lana who was with another girl, failed to recognize him.

Lana joked that Rusev introduced himself to her, saying that he and his friend are wrestlers; whereas the former said that she is an "entertainer". Rusev then jested that he taught Lana was a str***er--in response to which, both Lana and Chris Jericho exclaimed that Rusev's estimate was pretty close, considering that Lana is a trained dancer...This meeting would turn out to be one of many for the future husband and wife...