AWA World Light Heavyweight Championship

AWA World Light Heavyweight Championship
Details
Promotion	American Wrestling Association
Date established	June 1981
Date retired	1993
Statistics First champion Mike Graham Most reigns Buck Zumhofe (3 reigns) Longest reign Steve Regal (613 days)

The AWA World Light Heavyweight Championship was a title in the American Wrestling Association (AWA) from 1981 until it closed in 1991.

Title history

Key

No.	Overall reign number
Reign	Reign number for the specific champion
Days	Number of days held

No.	Champion	Championship change			Reign statistics		Notes	Ref.
		Date	Event	Location	Reign	Days
	American Wrestling Association (AWA)
1	Mike Graham	June 1981	House show	[Note 1]	1	[Note 2]	Graham was awarded the title.	[1]
2	Buck Zumhofe	June 19, 1983	House show	Hamburg, Minnesota	1	280		[1]
3	Steve Regal	March 25, 1984	House show	Saint Paul, Minnesota	1	613		[1]
4	Buck Zumhofe	November 28, 1985	House show	Saint Paul, Minnesota	2	[Note 3]		[1]
—	Vacated	July 1986	—	—	—	—	Zumhofe is sent to prison
5	Mike Graham	December 13, 1988	House show	Chicago, Illinois	2	[Note 4]	Records are unclear on how Graham won the championship.	[1]
	Championship history is unrecorded from December 13, 1988 to August 11, 1990.
6	Buck Zumhofe	August 11, 1990	House show	Rochester, Minnesota	3	[Note 5]	Defeated Jonnie Stewart to win the title in AWA. AWA goes out of business on January 12, 1991.	[1] [2]

FMW version

In 1989, the Japan-based Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling (FMW) began billing Florida Championship Wrestling/Professional Wrestling Federation champion Jim Backlund as the AWA champion. This was never sanctioned by the AWA. FMW's claimed title became FMW's lower weight division title. In 1992, FMW renamed the title to the WWA World Martial Arts Junior Heavyweight Championship before retiring it in 1993. ^[1]

Key

No.	Overall reign number
Reign	Reign number for the specific champion
Days	Number of days held

No.	Champion	Championship change			Reign statistics		Notes	Ref.
		Date	Event	Location	Reign	Days
	Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling (FMW)
1 (6)	Jim Backlund	December 10, 1988	House show	Tampa, Florida	1	477	Backlund defeated Tyree Pride for the FCW Light Heavyweight Championship; because of this victory Backlund is recognized as the sixth AWA champion by FMW in Japan during 1989 but not by the AWA itself.	[1]
2 (7)	Lee Gak-soo	April 1, 1990	House show	Tokyo, Japan	1	[Note 6]		[1]
—	Vacated	September 1990	—	—	—	—	Title vacated after Lee left FMW.	[1]
3 (8)	Katsuji Ueda	September 25, 1990	Battle Field	Nagoya, Japan	1	41	Defeated Jim Backlund in a "Different Style Match" tournament final.	[1]
4 (9)	Jim Backlund	November 5, 1990	FMW 1st Anniversary Show	Tokyo, Japan	2	205		[1]
5 (10)	Ricky Fuji	May 29, 1991	House show	Tokyo, Japan	1	87		[1]
6 (11)	Mark Starr	August 24, 1991	House show	Tokyo, Japan	1	7		[1]
7 (12)	Katsuji Ueda	August 31, 1991	House show	Chiba, Japan	2	205		[1]
8 (13)	Dr. Luther	March 23, 1992	House show	Saitama, Japan	1	197	The title is renamed to the WWA World Martial Arts Junior Heavyweight Championship in April 1992.	[1]
9 (14)	Katsuji Ueda	September 7, 1992	House show	Saitama, Japan	3	[Note 7]		[1]
—	Deactivated	1993	—	—	—	—	The title is retired and replaced with the Independent World Junior Heavyweight Championship.	[1]

Footnotes

1. The location of the title change is not documented.
2. The date the title is changed is not documented making the championship reign too uncertain to calculate.
3. The exact date the championship was vacated is unknown, which means that the reign lasted between 215 and 244 days.
4. The length Graham's reign has not been verified by documentation, making the length of the actual reign too uncertain to calculate.
5. The exact date the AWA stops promoting on a regular basis is unknown making the length of the reign too uncertain to calculate.
6. The exact date the championship was vacated which means that the reign lasted between 518 and 542 days.
7. The date the title is abandoned is not documented making the championship reign too uncertain to calculate.

See also

• Independent World Junior Heavyweight Championship
• WSL World Light Heavyweight Championship

References

1. "American Wrestling Association World Light Heavyweight Title". Wrestling-titles.com. Retrieved December 27, 2015.
2. Hoops, Brian (August 11, 2015). "On this day in pro wrestling history (August 11): Verne Gagne vs. Lou Thesz for AWA title, first ever G1 final". Wrestling Observer Figure Four Online. Retrieved February 18, 2017.