Shinsuke Nakamura has worked in Japan for nearly his entire professional wrestling career from 2002 – 2015. He also had five MMA fights, the first being on New Year’s Eve in 2002 and his last fights coming in 2004. He is a three-time IWGP Heavyweight Champion for New Japan Pro-Wrestling, including being the youngest champion ever for the company at 23 years old in November 2003. He has also won the 2011 G1 Climax and the 2014 New Japan Cup as well as being a five-time IWGP Intercontinental Champion (which was a record at the time but has since been broken by many Tetsuya Naito in 2020). Nakamura was the final IWGP Third Belt Champion and NWF Heavyweight Champion as well as a founding member and the original leader of the iconic Stable Chaos.
Nakamura left NJPW in 2016 as he had signed with WWE. He debuted in WWE’s developmental territory NXT at NXT Takeover: Dallas on April 1 in a match – defeating Sami Zayn. He won the NXT Championship twice, although Shinsuke never held the title for more than three months. Nakamura became one of only three men in history to hold the NXT title more than once (Samoa Joe and Finn Balor are the other two) and he debuted on the main roster for WWE right after WrestleMania 33 in 2017, defeating Dolph Ziggler in his debut match at Backlash.
Shinsuke won the Royal Rumble in 2018 and is elected to challenge AJ Styles for the WWE Championship at WrestleMania 34 in New Orleans – he was unsuccessful and turned heel in the process. He ultimately became United States Champion, Intercontinental Champion, and a tag team champion in WWE in the years that followed and is the second wrestler behind Chris Jericho to hold the Intercontinental title in WWE and NJPW.
Shinsuke Nakamura has been very blessed in his wrestling career to spend his entire 18-year career working for only two different companies – New Japan Pro-Wrestling and WWE. Most people bounce around between many different companies during their careers. It says something about his character as a human being that the two companies he has worked for are that loyal to him. Maybe this has something to do with the fact that Nakamura enjoys surfing so much – because it is a little bit like meditating if one reflects.