Darwen Vale High School

Darwen Vale High School on Blackburn Road was RWL’s second hired indoor venue and the home of its summer 2007 run. Like St. Wilfrid’s before it, the school gym was booked through Blackburn with Darwen Council’s sports scheme, an affordable way for a group of teenagers to get a real roof over their heads. The setup was the same recipe that worked at St. Wilfrid’s. Thick school gym mats covered the floor, and a vaulting box stood in for a top rope. There was no ring, no ramp and nothing fancy, but after years of cardboard, tarps and fields it was a proper indoor show with a crowd in the room. The mats had little give, and the hard wooden floor around them was never far away if a move went wrong. Three shows were held here in under a month: Inhuman Creation Station (23 July 2007), Smack!YerBitchUp (30 July 2007) and Misery Business (13 August 2007). Together they covered the death and return of Teh Gr8 Schitzu, the arrival of the Scottish IW contingent, Kris “Overkill” Kage’s debut, the start of the Valo and Cyanide worked-shoot angle and the creation of the RWL Cruiserweight Championship. The original school hall has since been demolished and rebuilt as part of the school’s modernisation, so the gym RWL wrestled in no longer exists.