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WALTER was the NXT United Kingdom Champion for 870 days. Ilja Dragunov defeated 'The Ring General' at NXT TakeOver 36, ending his record-breaking reign in the process.
WALTER initially won the title at NXT TakeOver: New York in April 2019 during WrestleMania weekend. He defeated 'The Bruiserweight' Pete Dunne, ending his 685 day reign as champion. WALTER is now the longest-reigning NXT United Kingdom Champion in history.
WALTER spoke about his NXT UK Championship reign with Rush On Rock in March 2021.
"The record that Pete set up just before me was very impressive so to break that was a good achievement too. I still gotta be honest, we had a long break in between so I gotta extend it for the half year that we were off to make it legit for myself. I don’t really focus on statistics and stuff like that much, but it’s like I said, it’s still a good achievement and it’s going to be in the history books so it’s nice to have," WALTER said. (h/t Rush On Rock)
How does WALTER's compare to other record-breaking reigns?
Of course, the longest reigning WWE Champion ever is Bruno Sammartino with a record-breaking combined 2,803 days as champion. It is an incredible feat that will probably never be replicated again. WALTER would have had some way to go if he wanted to even get close to breaking such a record.
In the modern era, CM Punk has come closest to breaking championship reign records by holding the WWE Championship for 434 days. Universal Champion Roman Reigns is pushing close to having a long reign standing at 357 days as of this writing.
In terms of record-breaking reigns, it takes quite the superstar, especially in the modern era, to really have a crack at having a long reign. WALTER was by far NXT UK's leading star as champion; nobody really came close. His dominance saw him beat names such as Rampage Brown, Tyler Bate and Tommaso Ciampa along the way.
Rampage Brown spoke to Cultaholic about stepping into the ring with WALTER.
"I’ve been in there a few times with WALTER before in the past, and each time I’ve been in the ring with him it’s a different WALTER. And now he’s the best he’s ever been - there’s no denying that," said Rampage Brown (h/t Cultaholic)
Where WALTER goes from here is unknown, but we're sure he'll be bringing his hard-hitting style back to our screens very soon. For now, he'll be remembered as the longest reigning NXT United Kingdom Champion in history.
