Impact Wrestling World Champion, Austin Aries, will defend his title against Moose on Sunday in Toronto. He took part in a sit-down interview to promote his Slammiversary title defense and also mentioned why he decided to return to Impact earlier this year.


“Why did Austin Aries choose to come back to Impact Wrestling?” Aries asked himself. “Cause Impact Wrestling needed me and I like to feel needed. I like to feel wanted. But in some ways maybe Austin Aries needed the platform of Impact Wrestling.

“Not every platform is created equal,” Aries continued. “Not every platform allows the same freedoms, not every platform gives guys the opportunity to truly grab the brass ring.”

They offered me an opportunity, they said ‘hey, we love what you do, we respect the artist you are, please come to Impact Wrestling, we’re going to give you a blank canvass to paint as you see fit.”


Austin Aries is a vegan and promotes the diet and lifestyle whenever he can. He recently sat down with Live Kindly last week and spoke about what it’s like to be a vegan professional wrestler.

“I’ve really had a positive impact on a lot of my fans just by being who I am,” he said before recalling a moment with a fan at a Veg Fest. “After a panel signing books, and a longtime fan of mine came up to me and said I was the reason he chose to become plant-based himself and in the time since, he lost 200 pounds. His sister-in-law lost 100 pounds but went back to her previous lifestyle, but the point is, I affected this young man’s life in such a huge way and turned his life in a completely different direction.”