Brian Damage
Grappling with Tragedy is a series of articles that deal with unfortunate, tragic incidents that have occurred throughout the history of professional wrestling. It is unlike the ‘Wrestling with Sin’ series that deals more with the seedier side of wrestling like arrests, murders and suicides. Grappling looks more at particular tragic incidents that have in some instances altered pro wrestling in some way.
Isak Rain
Isak Bjerknes was born on July 6th, 1985 in Drammen, Norway. A life long wrestling fan, Bjerknes began his training to become a pro wrestler at the age of 19. Bjerknes was initially trained by a fellow Norwegian wrestler named Erik Isaksen. He made his pro debut in May of 2004 and became a regular for the Norwegian Wrestling Federation (NWF) winning the NWF tag team titles on two occasions. Bjerknes adopted the ring name of ‘Isak Rain’ and decided to go on a European excursion to fine tune his skills.
Isak Rain wrestled in countries like Finland, Italy and the United Kingdom. It was in England where he befriended the famous Knight family and continued his wrestling training with the patriarch of the family Ricky Knight. Rain became a star for the Knight family’s promotion World Association of Wrestling. Despite his young age and not wrestling for an extended period of time, Isak Rain helped train other wrestling hopefuls. Rain was considered small in stature only standing 5 ft 9 and weighing approximately 175 pounds, but was seen by many to be a rising star in the industry.
Rain battled depression, drug abuse and a failed suicide attempt. He credited professional wrestling for saving his life and giving him purpose. He also became heavily involved in Dutch youth programs and his local church to help him stay on the straight and narrow in life. His former trainer Erik Isaksen said of Rain…“His charisma was great, he simply had the ‘it’ factor which is so important in wrestling. He could have become an international star.”
Sadly, on the early morning of October 10th, 2007, Isak was driving to a construction job he did on the side to supplement his wrestling life in Darbu, Norway. It is believed Isak fell asleep and lost control of his vehicle and crashed into a tree. Isak died from his injuries…he was only 22 years old at the time of his death.
In 2016, WWE star Paige and daughter of Isak’s trainer Ricky Knight got a tattoo on the left side of her torso that reads “If You Could Read My Mind Love.” It was a lyric from a Gordon Lightfoot song that played during Isak’s funeral.
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