The Great Muta & 9 Other Wrestlers Who Won World Titles In Their 50s

One great thing about pro wrestling compared to many other “legitimate” sports is that, if an athlete remains healthy enough and physically able, they can actually perform long past what is considered their “prime.” Whether they should is a source of debate among fans, but there are some stars that perform in their 50s and manage to put together some great matches.

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In some instances, these older wrestlers even capture championships, including World Titles. Let’s look at 10 wrestlers who have managed to win World Championships in their 50s, which include some of the all-time greats putting on competitive matches, performers doing so for storyline reasons, and one who did it in one of the first major screwjobs in wrestling history.

10 The Great Muta

Best known to wrestling fans in the West as the face-painted Great Muta, Keiji Mutoh became a major star for New Japan Pro Wrestling in the 1990s, capturing the IWGP Heavyweight Championship three times. In the years since he’s moved on to pretty much every major Japanese promotion possible, and made Pro Wrestling NOAH his home since about 2020. There, as Keiji Mutoh rather than Great Muta, he defeated Go Shiozaki in February of 2021 to become GHC Heavyweight Champion for the 1sst time at the age of 58.

9 Vince McMahon

Of course, fans know Vince McMahon, real-life boss of WWE and frequent on-screen authority figure. In 1999, at the age of 54, McMahon defeated Triple H to become WWE Champion, which he vacated days later because he was (kayfabe) banned from WWE television. But that wasn't the end of his championship achievements. In 2007, 61-year-old Vince McMahon teamed with his son Shane McMahon and monster heel Umaga to take the ECW Championship from Bobby Lashley in a Handicap Match. After a couple of title defenses, McMahon dropped it back to Lashley at One Night Stand: Extreme Rules.

8 Ric Flair

Born in 1949, Ric Flair had a respectably lengthy in-ring career, lasting from 1972 to 2012 and with World Title wins adding up to anywhere from 16 to 25 depending on who you ask. In March of 1999, at the age of 50, Ric Flair would defeat Hulk Hogan in a First Blood Steel Cage match, becoming WCW World Champion for a sixth time.

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The following year, at age 51, Flair would capture the belt two more times in what would be his final World Title reigns.

7 PCO

Few fans could have predicted the career resurgence of Pierre Carl Oulette, French-Canadian legend and former WWE pirate who found notoriety on the indies by reinventing himself as a Frankenstein character known only as PCO. After signing to Ring of Honor in 2018, PCO took on Rush in the main event of Final Battle 2019, capturing his first world title ever in the ROH World Championship, at the age of 51. PCO held the belt for 78 days before losing it back to Rush at Gateway to Honor 2020.

6 Tim Storm

Shortly before Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan purchased the National Wrestling Alliance in 2017, a new champion was crowned in Tim Storm, a Texas-area journeyman indie wrestler. Storm started his career surprisingly late, debuting in his 30s, and at the age of 51 defeated Jax Dane to become NWA World Heavyweight Champion for 414 days. This win made Storm the oldest wrestler to win one of the sport’s most historic and still-active belts, which he lost to Nick Aldis at a Combat Zone Wrestling show.

5 Terry Funk

Debuting in 1965, the legendary Terry Funk has done it all: held the NWA World Heavyweight Champion, helped birth the hardcore/deathmatch style that he’d be associated with in his later career, wrestle pretty much everywhere notable, and retire countless times. In 1993, Funk was in his late 40s when he held the ECW World Championship, but his second reign kicked off when he was 52. It was at the first-ever ECW pay-per-view, 1997’s Barely Legal, that Funk dethroned Raven as champion in the main event.

4 Verne Gagne

The founder and booker of the Minneapolis-based American Wrestling Association, Verne Gagne was an icon of the Midwest wrestling scene. In 1980, Gagne was already a nine-time AWA World Heavyweight Champion when he beat Nick Bockwinkel for the belt at the age of 54.

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This 305-day reign would come to an end in 1981 when Gagne decided to retire from full-time competing while he was still champion. Rather than lose the belt in a match, Gagne awarded the belt to the previous champion, Nick Bockwinkel.

3 Sting

Another face-painted icon of 1990s pro wrestling, Sting became a full-time member of the Impact Wrestling roster in 2006, winning the NWA World Title from Jeff Jarrett at the age of 47. But that wasn’t his only World Title win in the company — after the NWA and Impact split up, Sting would win the new Impact World Championship four times, including twice in 2011 at the age of 51 and 52. Had Sting captured the WWE Championship from Seth Rollins in his infamous 2015 match at Night of Champions, he’d have been 56 years old.

2 The Fabulous Moolah

Born in 1923, The Fabulous Moolah’s in-ring career lasted an impressive from 1949 to 2004, and was considered a pioneer in women’s wrestling — that is, until stories about various abuses and exploitation of her trainees and proteges tarnished her legacy. In 1983, she became the first WWE Women’s Champion, losing the belt to Wendi Richter the following year, but regained it in a legitimate screwjob — sometimes called The Original Screwjob — in November of 1985, at the age of 62 years old. If that weren’t egregious enough, Moolah re-captured the title for a final time in 1999, defeating Ivory for the belt at the age of 76.

1 Goldberg

Arguably WCW’s biggest homegrown phenomenon of the Monday Night Wars era thanks to his legendary winning streak, Goldberg eventually made his way to the competition, and returned to WWE in 2016 for the first time in about 12 years. In March 2017 — months after his 50th birthday, Goldberg defeated Kevin Owens to become Universal Champion. Nearly three years later, at the age of 53, Goldberg beat “The Fiend” Bray Wyatt at the Saudi Arabia show Super ShowDown to capture the Universal Title a second time.