GEW Winter Bash 2006

Winter Bash 2006 was the first of Global Extreme Wrestling's annual Winter Bash series of pay-per-views. The official theme song was Deify by Disturbed.

History
On the previous edition of Friday Night Chaos, “Swift” Tony Wright – in his first night with the promotion – won a seven-man battle royale to crown the first holder of the reinstated GEW Undisputed Championship. Early on, Wright left the ring under the bottom rope. At the end of the match, Shawn Michaels threw Randy Orton over the top rope and assumed he’d won, but Wright re-entered the ring and eliminated Michaels. The three were scheduled for a triple threat match at the following pay-per-view.

Also the on the previous edition of Chaos, “The Superstar” Nathan Irwin debuted, challenging Luke Mason, Dean Heartly and X-Pac to a match of his own devising, for the GEW United States Championship. The match in question was the Journey To Hell match. The central feud, between Irwin and Mason, was continued from the time they spent together in FWA. The feud tied into the nationalist tensions in GEW at the time, as Mason, Irwin and Heartly were each vying to prove that they were the best British wrestler in the promotion (although largely uninvolved in that feud, the eventually winner could be argued to be Tony Wright, as he won the Undisputed Championship). Similarly, Edge and Petey Williams, as Team Canada, were attempting to prove their dominance over the American wrestlers. The pair were number one contenders to the GEW Tag Team Championship until the titles were vacated as a result of them being attacked. As expected, they worked together in the United States Championship elimination match until Undertaker eliminated Williams. The Undertaker had previously announced that he would leave the company if he lost the match. Following the match, neither Undertaker nor Petey Williams were seen again on GEW programming.

Triple H and K.C. McGrath’s perennial feud had taken a more personal turn over the previous weeks as McGrath started an affair with Triple H’s wife Stephanie Levesque. Prior to the public revelation, Triple H attacked McGrath in increasingly violent ways, including running him over and shooting him, and assaulting McGrath’s mother. Triple H would claim that McGrath had limitless potential but was wasting his attention on Stephanie when it should have been on wrestling, and that the attacks were lessons to teach him where his heart should be. Triple H’s increasingly dangerous actions left him generally considered unfit to run the company and Jeff Hardy was declared temporary General Manager. This left Triple H focusing all his attention on McGrath. He challenged McGrath to a 60-minute iron man match at Winter Bash under street fight rules, with the winner taking both Triple H’s GEW World Heavyweight Championship and McGrath’s GEW Extreme Chaos Championship. McGrath accepted, assaulting Triple H in the process.

At the contract signing for the match on the following edition of Friday Night Chaos, Triple H taunted McGrath until McGrath swung for him, and Triple H pulled Stephanie in front of the punch. While McGrath was distracted by checking on Stephanie, Triple H pulled his sledgehammer from beneath the signing table and hit McGrath in the back. Stephanie then realigned herself with McGrath, also hitting him with the sledgehammer.

The Event
Early on in the night, K.C. McGrath delivered an ultimatum to Stephanie: if she interfered in the main event, she would pay. He then kissed her, pushed her to the ground and walked away.

Immediately prior to the Journey To Hell match, we saw a brief clip of each competitor preparing or reflecting. Following the match, a vignette aired with Christopher Daniels and Paul E. Dangerously. Daniels announced that he was returning to GEW, and bringing the stable The Prophecy – Allison Danger, SIN and Slash – with him and that his first target was the GEW Intercontinental Championship.

This event marked Tony Wright and Klown’s GEW pay-per-view debuts, and Nathan Irwin’s in-ring GEW debut.

The Journey To Hell match held at this event is to date the only such match ever held.

Results

 * John Bradshaw Layfield def. Cuervo.
 * Layfield pinned Cuervo after a Clothesline From Hell.


 * Klown def. Myles Taylor.
 * Klown pinned Taylor after a Murder-Go-Round.

Ryan Gracie def. The Undertaker ©, Edge and Petey Williams to win the GEW United States Championship.
 * Williams and Edge pinned The Undertaker following a Canadian Destroyer from Williams.
 * Following his elimination, The Undertaker grabbed Williams in a chokehold and the lights went out. When they returned, both men had disappeared, and the match was continued as Edge vs. Gracie.
 * Gracie pinned Edge following a Halloween’s Dawn.


 * Nathan Irwin def. Luke Mason ©, Dean Heartly and X-Pac in a Journey To Hell match to win the GEW Intercontinental Championship.
 * Mason and Heartly eliminated X-Pac.
 * Irwin eliminated Heartly.
 * Irwin eliminated Mason.


 * Tony Wright def. Shawn Michaels (w/ Jay Phoenix) and Randy Orton (w/ Cowboy Bob Orton) in a triple threat cage match to retain the GEW Undisputed Championship.
 * Wright escaped the cage after several chair shots to Michaels and a chair shot and a Swiftness Stunner to Orton.
 * Wright had the steel chair specially lowered to him from above the cage.


 * GEW World Heavyweight Champion Triple H and GEW Extreme Chaos Champion K.C. McGrath fought to a no-contest in a 60-minute iron man match contested under street fight rules.
 * McGrath pinned Triple H after a Pedigree. (1-0)
 * Triple pinned McGrath after a Natural Disaster (1-1)
 * McGrath pinned Triple H after two chair shots. (2-1)
 * Triple H pinned McGrath after a low blow and high knee lift sending McGrath onto a burning barbed-wire covered board. (2-2)
 * After the time limit was reached and the score was even at 2-2, Triple H announced that the match would continue under sudden death rules, with the first fall for the Extreme Chaos Championship and the second fall for the World Heavyweight Championship.
 * Triple H pinned McGrath after a pedigree to win the Extreme Chaos Championship.
 * McGrath pinned Triple H with a schoolboy rollup to win the World Heavyweight Championship.