Leilani Kai

    Born in 1960, in Tampa, Florida, Leilani Kai is a true legend of women’s professional wrestling. What’s that? Wasn’t Leilani Kai even born in Hawaii? No, she wasn’t, in fact her real name is Patricia Schroeder and she has little to do with Hawaii in any respect. The name "Leilani Kai" was her ring-name, given to her by Fabulous Moolah early in her career.
Leilani Kai was born for the squared circle. In fact, she got into the sport extremely early, straight out of school actually. In 1975, immediately following her high-school graduation, she joined Fabulous Moolah’s wrestling school. Moolah figured she looked Hawaiian, so she gave her the name which would later grow equivalent to one of the greatest lady wrestlers ever to step through the ropes.
During her early career, fellow wrestlers nicknamed her the "Hawaiian Princess". She’s also wrestled as Patty Stonegrinder, but "Leilani Kai" was the name destined to earn her greatness and immortality in the Halls of Fame of professional wrestling.

Having started wrestling in 1975, Leilani Kai never really felt she needed any sort of a ring gimmick. She was a straightforward no-nonsense wrestler, who would occasionally resort to the bending of the rules whenever she felt it best served her interests.
5’7" and 134 lbs (early in her career) Leilani Kai could brawl with the best of them and she did indeed take on all the "name" lady wrestlers of the ‘70s/early ‘80s, before the match which saw her burst onto the scene of world fame. She dished out punishment tasting victory and suffering defeat at the hands of wrestlers like Kitty Adams, Vicky Williams, Vivian Saint John, Winona Little Heart, Judy and Joyce Grable, Candy Malloy and Suzette Ferreira up until 1980, when she first began going up against the Queen of the Ring, Wendi Richter. The first singles match between the two occurred on August 4, 1980, in West Palm Beach, Florida, and it was a match that Richter won.
Although she began wrestling for the WWF as early as 1977, it wasn’t until 1984 that Leilani Kai earned a true shot at glory: on February 18, she defeated Wendi Richter at The War to Settle the Score, winning the championship with Moolah in her corner and with millions of TV-viewers looking on. Wendi Richter got the title back later, but Kai had already become a fame-monster by then. Perhaps even more impressively, she proceeded to beat Richter in 5 consecutive WWF House shows in 1985, virtually dominating the best and most popular ladies champion ever for a brief stretch. In response to that, Richter then defeated her 17 consecutive times. That stretch of late 1985 wasn’t exactly a good one for Kai: she was defeated by Desiree Peterson in a televised match and she lost to Susan Starr and Winona Little Heart as well.

In 1986, she teamed up with Judy Martin for the first time to form one of the best and most famous ladies’ wrestling tag teams of all time: the Glamour Girls. As a member of the Glamour Girls, she began racking up victories, although a losing streak at the hands of the Fabulous Moolah somewhat overshadowed the fact that she picked up the Women’s Tag Team title that year. Later in 1986, she traveled to Japan where she won the All Japan Women’s Pro Wrestling All Pacific title, defeating Chigusa Nagayo. Nagayo won the title back soon thereafter. 1987 was the year when the duo of Kai and Martin were named "the Glamour Girls" and they went under radical image changes which saw Kai bleach her hair platinum blonde. From ‘87 till ‘89, they dominated the ladies tag team scene in the WWF feuding with the Jumping Bomb Angels (Noriyo Tateno and Yamazaki Itsuki) and swapping the title back and forth a few times.
In 1989, the WWF dropped the women’s division, and Kai and Martin joined the LPWA where they managed to win the Tag Team title in 1991, by defeating Heidi Lee Morgan and Misty Blue Simms’ Team America. They successfully defended the title against capable tag teams like Bambi and Malia Hosaka, before the promotion went under in 1992.

In 1991, she returned to the WWF and later the WCW, where Madusa (sometimes under the name Alundra Blayze) pretty much owned her, handing her about 20 losses. She also had another Japanese stint in 1994.
From 2000, she has been wrestling for various Indy promotions and training female wrestlers like Amber O’Neal.

Leilani Kai views the emergence of T&A and the fading-away of classic old-school ladies pro wrestling as the biggest loss of her career. She is therefore bent on training ladies in the fine art of technical wrestling, sharing her expertise to preserve this wonderful pro wrestling style.
She is currently semi-retired, still working actual matches here and there every now and then.

Leilani Kai gets her opponent in a headlock


Leilani Kai with her Glamour Girl tag team partner Judy Martin