Page A14 • March 7, 2013 • Inland Empire Community Newspapers

Jessie Hernandez helps wrestlers to get their name in the spotlight

By Naomi Bonman

We hear about a numberof sports officials whoare doing great things

to bring football, basketball andbaseball to the inner city. How-ever, rarely do we hear about whatis going on in the world ofwrestling. San Bernardino resi-dent, Jesse Hernandez, is thefounder and owner of the EmpireWrestling Federation and Schoolof Hard Knocks. It is the oldestwrestling school in the state ofCalifornia.“I have always loved wrestling

since I was a kid,” Hernandez said.“I was never able to participate insports in junior or high school be-cause I was working for the familybusiness.”After his school days, Hernandez

was able to become more involvedin wrestling. He was inspired tostart his wrestling school after hav-ing a conversation with one of hiswrestler friends when a gentlemanmentioned to Hernandez that therewere no wrestling schools in thearea where he could train. Hernan-dez offered to help train him at theYMCA. After training in theYMCA for a year and trainingmore wrestlers who started to be-come famous, such as The GreatGoliath, Hernandez’s career as awrestling referee and trainerstarted to skyrocket, and then hestarted the school. “The name for the school, School

of Hard Knocks, came fromCNN,” Hernandez said. Since the launching of his school,

Hernandez has trained wrestlerswhich include Bobby Bradley,“Bulldog” Simpson, Rocky LeeEsters, Tim Patterson, MikeLozanski, Hulk Hogan and manymore. Hernandez’s passion for hisstudents has always been to givethem experience that they need tosucceed beyond the school. “The Empire Wrestling Federa-

tion was started in order to openup doors for our students,” Her-nandez said. “However, as wehave grown we have started toopen up our doors to otherwrestlers.”He continues, “My goal is to give

students the opportunity to maketheir dreams come true.”Students who are interested in

training with Hernandez at theSchool of Hard Knocks are re-quired to fill out and sign a releaseform. Those who are under the ageof 18 must bring a parent or legalguardian with them. Studentsshould also be in good health. A

sports physical is required prior totraining, and each student is alsorequired to have his or her ownmedical and liability insurance. Those who would like to see

Hernandez and his students in ac-tion are welcome to come to theirshow on March 30 at 8 p.m. Theschool is located at 293 E. Red-lands Blvd., San Bernardino. For more information on Hernan-

dez or the Empire Wrestling Fed-eration, visitwww.sohktraining.com or em-pirewrestlingfederation.com.

IECN COURTESY PHOTO

Jessie Hernandez is the owner of Empire Wrestling Federationbased out of San Bernardino. He has always had a love forwrestling. He has trained several wrestlers who are now wellknown across the world, such as Hulk Hogan and Greg Flair, justto name a few.

IECN COURTESY PHOTO

Jesse Hernandez (right) is pictured here with one of thewrestlers who he has trained over the years.

IECN COURTESY PHOTO

Jessie Hernandez (left) with wrestler Hulk Hogan. Hernandez has trained several wrestlers whohave made their dreams come true, and have had a successful wrestling career worldwide.