Ray Lloyd
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Ray Lloyd | |
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Statistics | |
Ring name(s) | Coach Buzz Stern, Glacier, "Sugar Ray" Lloyd |
Billed height | 6 ft 2 in (188 cm) |
Billed weight | 245 lb (111 kg) |
Born | c. 1964 Brunswick, Georgia |
Trained by | Mr. Wrestling, Fred Avery, WCW Power Plant |
Debut | 1991 |
Raymond M. ("Ray") Lloyd is an American professional wrestler. He is best known for his appearances with World Championship Wrestling in the late 1990s under the ring name Glacier.
Contents |
[edit] Career
Lloyd attended Valdosta State University (the same alma mater as former WCW announcer Scott Hudson), where he played college football as a center for the Valdosta Blazers, and earned a master's degree in education.
Lloyd is skilled in Karate, Hung Gar, Judo and Kenpo, and won a regional karate championship before becoming a wrestler. He began wresting in 1991 as Sugar Ray Lloyd. He wrestled in the Georgia independent circuit and Japan's UWFI promotion. He teamed with former college football teammate R.D. Swain as "The Blazers."
He arrived in WCW in 1996 as Glacier. The Glacier character was based on Sub-Zero, from the popular fighting game Mortal Kombat. He was introduced via a series of vignettes with the words "Blood Runs Cold" beginning in February, but his actual in-ring debut did not occur until September. Glacier had very memorable ring entrances in WCW, which included blue laser lights streaming across the arena, snow falling from the ceiling and dramatic theme music; according to Lloyd in a July 2000 interview, production costs for his entrance amounted to half a million dollars, while his costume cost $35,000.
In March 1997, he began feuding with Mortis, whose gimmick was also inspired from Mortal Kombat characters. Both met in the ring for the first time at the WCW Uncensored pay-per-view. The next month, Mortis got a partner, Wrath, and started double-teaming Glacier. He was rescued by three-time karate champion Ernest Miller, who started teaming with him in the feud. After losing the feud with Wrath and Mortis (in a tag team match at Bash at the Beach 1997, although Glacier had beaten both Mortis and Wrath several times in singles matches and still had an undefeated record in one-on-one competition), Glacier eventually turned on Miller. WCW management had Glacier job to Miller and then ultimately buried Glacier. This was due to the fact that despite all the fanfare given before his much heralded debut, the Glacier character was not over.
On June 29, 1998, Glacier suffered a knee injury at the hands of Goldberg during a match on WCW Monday Nitro and was out for several months. He returned in November of that year and then proceeded to job matches to both Chris Kanyon and Wrath.
He eventually got tired of the Glacier gimmick in the kayfabe storyline and "sold" his Glacier outfit to Kaz Hayashi in 1999. He became Coach Buzz Stern, and his protege was Luther Biggs, but the gimmick was short-lived. He wrestled only one match and was released by WCW at the end of the year.
In January 2001, he briefly returned for a few appearances as Glacier during Norman Smiley's matches but left WCW permanently for Dusty Rhodes' upstart Turnbuckle Championship Wrestling soon after that. WCW folded three months after his departure.
He wrestled under his real name while in TCW and won the Heavyweight Title and the Tag Team Titles. He teamed with Jorge Estrada and feuded with Scotty Anton (best known to wrestling fans as Scotty Riggs of the American Males). In 2001, he won the NWA Tag Team Titles with Jason Sugarman but only held them for 1 day. In 2002, he rejuvinated his Glacier gimmick to team with Big Ron Studd and they won the TCW Tag Team titles again.
When TCW stopped running shows in 2003, Lloyd went to wrestle in Georgia Championship Wrestling, where he can still be found at times today. He wrestles sporadically on the independent circuit, occupied a backstage position with Total Nonstop Action Wrestling and acted as a spokesman for the weight-loss supplement Morphoplex.
In 2003, Lloyd became a health and sex education teacher at Hightower Trail Middle School in the suburbs to the north of Atlanta, Georgia. He later worked as a social studies teacher at Lassiter High School in Marietta, Georgia before taking up a position as the head coach of wrestling at North Cobb High School in Kennesaw, Georgia.
In addition to teaching, Lloyd worked as a stuntman at Disney-MGM Studios in Orlando, Florida. He played the part of a German flight engineer in the Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular! show until November 2004, when a serious knee injury forced him to undergo surgery. He also began acting, appearing in his first film in 2003.
Lloyd has reprised his Glacier persona in the The Ultimate Armageddon Tour 2006 part of the Ultimate Christian Wrestling[1] circuit.
[edit] In wrestling
- Finishing and signature moves
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- Cryonic Kick (Superkick)
- Ice Pick (Thumb choke hold)
- Glacier Breaker (Two kicks to the leg followed by two kicks to the midsection and finished with a spinning back kick to the chest)
- Northern Lights suplex
- Belly to belly suplex
- Tilt-a-Whirl mat slam
- Swinging neckbreaker
- Reverse roundhouse kick
- Leg sweep
- Palm thrust
- Rolling thunder leg drop
[edit] Championships and accomplishments
- World Karate Association
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- Southeastern Super Heavyweight Full Contact Karate Champion
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- 1-time GCW Tag Team Champion (with R.D. Swain)
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- 1-time NWA Tag Team Champion (with Jason Sugarman)
- Peach State Wrestling
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- 1-time PSW Tag Team Champion (with R.D. Swain)
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- PWI ranked him # 488 of the 500 best singles wrestlers of the PWI Years in 2003.
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- 2-time TCW Heavyweight Champion
- 2-time TCW Tag Team Champion (1-time with Jorge Estrada, 1-time with Big Ron Studd)
[edit] Filmography
- Blood Bath (2002) (video game) as "Thorko"
- A Conspiracy (2003) as "Lars Tannin"
- Creatures of the Night (2006) as "Gunther"
[edit] References
- Former wrestling icons try to adjust to life outside the ring
- Life after rasslin'
- An interview with Lloyd, conducted by Alex Marvez
- Ray Lloyd at Accelerator3359.com
- Ray Lloyd at Bodyslamming.com
- Ray Lloyd at ObsessedWithWrestling.com
[edit] External links
- Ray Lloyd at the Internet Movie Database
Categories: American film actors | American Hung Gar practitioners | American judoka | American karateka | American professional wrestlers | American sport wrestlers | American schoolteachers | American voice actors | Living people | People from Georgia (U.S. state) | Stunt performers | World Championship Wrestling alumni