Where this female wrestling move originates from is hard to tell, what I can tell you though, is that I first saw it on GLOW. Later, when the girls began using it again in WOW, I read some reviews bashing the move as a GLOW era fossil. Then again, there were lots of reviews bashing WOW those days for various reasons, so it could be just one of many points brought up by experts who probably looked at the McLane promotions through the prism of joshi puroresu or lucha libre femenil.

Apparently however, the move was used in the LPWA too, by none other than Reggie Bennett, so it may be much more than just a GLOW era remnant of goofy, over the top comedy wrestling.

The victim of the hold is on her back on the ring floor. The attacker picks her legs up and grabs hold of them as if she was going for a boston crab. Instead of turning the victim unto her stomach though, the attacker steps closer to her, so that her knees are pressed against the victim’s buttocks. The attacker then falls backward bending her knees and pulling on the victim’s legs in the same time. The victim is lifted off the mat and catapulted across the ring by the momentum built up by the hold. If the attacker releases the legs at the peak of the motion, the victim will be flung across the ring. If the attacker doesn’t release the legs, the victim will hit the mat face first.

Possible escape: once the slingshot is initiated, theoretically there’s nothing the victim can do to escape, practically though, the move requires her co-operation, which means it doesn’t really make sense to talk about a possible escape at all.

Rating: a mildly efficient move, the slingshot is used to soften up the victim. It is not a decisive move, though if properly executed it can look rather spectacular.