User:Paulley/FWA World Heavyweight Championship

thumb|Former FWA Champion, [[Doug Williams (wrestler)|Doug Williams wearing the FWA British Heavyweight Championship belt]] The FWA World Heavyweight Championship is a professional wrestling championship created and contested for in the Frontier Wrestling Alliance (FWA).

Originally a British Heavyweight title, the championship earned the right to be classed a world title when it was unsuccessfully defended by American wrestler Christopher Daniels in Philadelphia in 2003. Yet it would take another 6 years and the relaunching of the FWA brand before the promotion would reclassify the the title. Before the relaunch however, the FWA promotion became briefly defunct and the British Heavyweight Championship, along with its lineage were used by another promotion known as XWA; which still continues to use the British title.

The championship have been known as:
 * FWA British Heavyweight Championship (1999 – 2007)
 * British Heavyweight Championship (2007 – current)
 * FWA World Heavyweight Championship (2009 – current)

History
The first FWA British Heavyweight Champion was Mark Sloan, who defeated Paul Glory in a tournament final on the 11 July 1999. Jody Fleisch was the first person to win the belt twice after being stripped of it, while American wrestler Christopher Daniels was the first non-British person to win the belt and go on to defend it on foreign soil.

Originally the belt was mostly defended under two out of three falls match rules, as was the tradition in British wrestling. This changed on 12 April 2005, when champion Alex Shane signed a cast-iron contract to make new FWA British Title rules official and permanent making all future championship matches simply one fall.

On 13 May, 2006 the FWA British Heavyweight Title belt was stolen from the Morecambe Dome immediately following the FWA event at the venue during an FWA versus All-Star Wrestling show. The FWA offered a reward of £100 for information leading to the safe return of the championship belt.

On April 11 2009 at XWA War on the Shore V, former FWA owner 'The Showstealer' Alex Shane made his return to the Morecambe Dome after a three and a half year absence. In an angle, British Heavyweight Champion Sam Slam handed Alex the old FWA Heavyweight Title belt which the XWA had continued to use as its main title belt ever since the XWA was formed. In exchange, Shane handed Sam the brand new XWA Title belt. This angle was conceived so Alex Shane could once again take possession of the FWA Title belt ahead of the reformation of the FWA, which was announced a week afterwards, and also to 'pass the torch' to Sam Slam.