Abismo Negro

Andrés Alejandro Palomeque González (July 1, 1971 – March 22, 2009) was a Mexican luchador (Spanish for "masked professional wrestler").

He is best known for appearing under the stage name Abismo Negro, which is Spanish for "Black Abyss", in the Asistencia Asesoría y Administración (AAA) promotion.

Before appearing under the ring name Abismo Negro, Palomeque worked for five years under the alias "[the] Winners" and before that also wrestled as the characters "Alex Dinamo", "Pequeño Samurai", and "Furor" for short periods.

Palomeque owned and operated the Gimnasio Abismo Negro, a wrestling school where individuals were trained to become professional wrestlers.

In his professional wrestling career, Palomeque worked for the two most prominent professional wrestling promotions in Mexico: Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL) and AAA.

Andrés Alejandro Palomeque González was born July 1, 1971, in Villahermosa, Tabasco, Mexico.

Palomeque started to get interested in professional wrestling at the age of nine when his father, Juan Francisco Palomeque Torres, took him to his first wrestling event.

Later the Palomeque Family moved to Poza Rica where a young Palomeque took up Pentathlon (long jump, high jump, 110 metres hurdles run, shot put, 1500 metres run) in school.

He and his brother, César Palomeque, had an interest in Martial Arts and trained together for years.

When Palomeque was thirteen years old he began working in a gymnasium where professional wrestlers were trained, initially he paid for the use of the gymnasium by cleaning it after hours.

When the family moved back to the Tabasco region he began training under Don Nerio Soto, who worked under the ring name El Noruego (the Norwegian), and his brother Delio Soto to become a luchador, or professional wrestler.

Professional wrestlers perform in a non-competitive sport based on simulated fighting with storylines written by creative teams and matches with predetermined results.

Don Soto later recollects how he and his family took the young man in and made him part of their family, practically adopting him while he was enrolled in Soto's wrestling school and later as he worked on the local wrestling circuit.

Palomeque made his professional wrestling debut in 1987, at the age of 16, under the ring name "Alex Dinamo".

Palomeque received further training from famous Mexican wrestling coaches Diablo Velasco and Ray Mendoza before changing his character and ring name to "Pequeño Samurai"—a masked persona patterned after the Japanese Samurai tradition.

In 1991, Palomeque began working for Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL; Spanish for "World Wrestling Council"), the biggest wrestling promotion in Mexico at that time.

In CMLL, he worked as Furor, another masked ring persona.

While working as Furor, Palomeque won his first Luchas de apuestas, or "bet match" when he defeated his mentor El Noruego in a match where Noruego's hair and Palomeque's mask was at stake.

In 1992 CMLL head writer Antonio Peña left the company to create his own wrestling promotion Asistencia Asesoría y Administración (AAA; Spanish for "Assistance, Consulting and Administration") promotion; Palomeque was one of the many young wrestlers who left CMLL to work for the newly formed AAA.

In AAA, his ring personal was changed and he became "Winners" (sometimes written Winner's), a fan favorite character (known as a Técnico in Lucha Libre) who wore a silver bodysuit and mask.

Palomeques work as "Winners" earned him a match on the very first Triplemanía where he teamed with Super Caló and El Salsero to defeat the team of May Flowers, Rudy Reyna, and Baby Sharon in a Six Man Tag Team match.

The following year at Triplemanía II-A he teamed up with Rey Misterio and Rey Misterio Jr. to defeat the team known as Los Destructores (Tony Arce, Vulcano, and Rocco Valente).

In 1995, Winners participated in a Relevos Suicidas Tag Team match, in which the losing team members have a match of their own, with the loser of that encounter being forced to unmask.

Winners team won the match, keeping him from having to defend his mask in a match.

Eight days later at Triplemanía III-B, Winners' mask was on the line in a match against Marabunta; Winners defeated Marabunta in a Luchas de Apuestas, Mask vs. Mask match.

On June 30, 1995, at Triplemanía III-C, Winners participated in another "mask vs. mask" match, his third in three weeks.

This time, Winners was not successful, as he lost to Super Caló and was forced to unmask.

The loss of the mask did not hurt Winners' popularity, on the contrary it intensified as the hansome Palomeque became even more popular with the female fans.

Despite losing his mask to Super Caló the two continued to work together as a team.

On June 15, 1996, Winners and Caló teamed up with Rey Misterio Jr. and Oro Jr.. to defeat the team of Perro Silva, Halloween, Kraken, and Mosco de la Merced at Triplemanía IV-B.

A month later, Winners, Caló, La Parka and El Mexicano defeated Jerry Estrada, Fishman, Villano IV, and May Flowers in one of the featured matches of Triplemanía IV-C.

He also worked for the North American–based promotions the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) and Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) due to talent exchange programs between AAA and WWF in 1997 and TNA in 2004, as well as making appearances for the Michinoku Pro and Pro Wrestling Noah promotions in Japan.

In January 1997, Palomeque's character was changed from that of the quintessential heroic ladies' man known as "Winners", to that of a cheating villain (referred to as a Rudo) known as "Abismo Negro".

Part of his new routine as Abismo Negro was a flamethrower display, created by using a lighter and an Aerosol spray can.

Palomeque would regularly use this during his entrance and on occasion during a match as when he worked as "Abismo Negro" character.

As part of his Rudo act Palomeque began using the Marinete — a wrestling move known as a Piledriver where he simulates driving the top of his opponents' head into the mat — the Marinete is "banned" Mexican wrestling, which means that it can lead to a disqualification if used during the match.

The Marinete became such a signature move for the Abismo Negro character that he earned the nickname El Rey del Martinete (The King of the Piledriver).

On March 22, 2009, Palomeque was found dead in a river near El Rosario, Sinaloa; the official cause of death was listed as drowning.

On the night before, a wrestler using the Abismo Negro outfit worked an AAA show pretending to be Palomeque; this incident caused the promoter to be barred from promoting shows for two years.

Palomeque was inducted into the AAA Hall of Fame in June 2013.