5 of the best #1 v. #2 entrants in Royal Rumble history
When the calendar turns to January, the action in the WWE starts to heat up as the Road To WrestleMania officially kicks off with the Royal Rumble. With the exception of the first Rumble in 1988 and the 40-man Rumble in 2011.
The Royal Rumble Match was a creation from the brilliant mind of the first-ever WWE Intercontinental Champion, Pat Patterson. There was a special on the USA Network in 1988 and Vince McMahon wanted a unique match type for the show and the rest was history.
Since 1993, the winner of the Royal Rumble match was granted a WWE Championship opportunity at the biggest stage of them all, WrestleMania. In those 22 chances, the record of the Royal Rumble winner is 13-9 after Randy Orton successfully won the WWE Championship last year.
As any wrestling fan knows, the Royal Rumble Match starts with two competitors and then another one enters the match roughly every two minutes. Over the course of this match, some very interesting pairings were drawn for entrants #1 and #2.
This article is going to take a look at five of those who were unlucky (or in most of these cases lucky) to draw one of the first two numbers. Each of these five pairings has an interesting story to tell, and let's take a look at the first one below!
#5 Triple H & Rey Mysterio (2006)
In terms of performance, there may not be a better #1 / #2 combination than Triple H and Rey Mysterio in 2006. They are the only pair to kick off the Royal Rumble Match to BOTH last an hour.
Considering only six men have lasted over an hour in Royal Rumble history, what Triple H and Rey did in this match is truly astonishing. Though both lasted over 60 minutes, they weren't the last two standing.
Triple H was the 28th participant to be thrown over the top rope by Mysterio; which left Rey with "The Viper" Randy Orton as the final two.
The 62:12 mark by Mysterio broke the previous record of 61:31 by Chris Benoit in 2004, a record that still stands today.