| Championshipname: | NWA World Junior Heavyweight Championship |
| Currentholder: | Seiki Yoshioka |
| Won: | March 3, 2024 |
| Promotion: | Pro Wrestling Zero1 New Wrestling Alliance |
| Created: | September 20, 2011 |
| Mostreigns: | Jason Lee and Takuya Sugawara (2 reigns) |
| Firstchamp: | Craig Classic |
| Shortestreign: | Mineo Fujita (days) |
| Longestreign: | Shinjiro Otani (days) |
| Oldest: | Tsuyoshi Kikuchi (47 years, days) |
| Youngest: | Jason Lee (21 years, days) |
| Heaviest: | Shinjiro Otani (107kg (236lb))[1] |
| Lightest: | Jonathan Gresham (73kg (161lb)) |
| Pastnames: | NWA Junior Heavyweight Championship |
The NWA World Junior Heavyweight Championship is a professional wrestling championship owned by the Japanese Pro Wrestling Zero1 (Zero1) promotion. The title is meant for wrestlers under the weight limit of 100kg (200lb), referred to as "junior heavyweights" in Japan.[2]
On July 11, 2011, then-NWA World Junior Heavyweight Champion Craig Classic announced that he was relinquishing his title in protest over the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) stripping The Sheik of the NWA World Heavyweight Championship.[3] However, on September 20, NWA affiliate Pro Wrestling Zero1 announced that they still recognized Classic as the NWA World Junior Heavyweight Champion. When Classic returned to the promotion on October 2, he was still in possession of the NWA title belt (which was the belt worn by the original Tiger Mask, Satoru Sayama, in the 1980s), which he went on to successfully defend against Munenori Sawa.[4] [5] Despite this being the first appearance of the new version of the title, Zero1 went as far as adopting the original title's history, referring to Classic as the 108th champion and his defense against Sawa as his 22nd successful defense. Meanwhile, NWA crowned their own NWA World Junior Heavyweight Champion, Kevin Douglas, on October 7, meaning that there now were two champions supposedly holding the same title.[6] That same month, Zero1 quit the NWA and renamed all of their National Wrestling Alliance championships "New Wrestling Alliance" championships.[7]
Like most professional wrestling championships, the title is won as a result of a scripted match. There have been a total of twenty-three reigns shared among tewnty different wrestlers. The current champion is Seiki Yoshioka who is in his first reign.
As of,
| † | Indicates the current champion | |
| ¤ | The exact length of at least one title reign is uncertain, so the shortest length is considered. |
|---|
| Rank | Wrestler | No. of reigns | Combined defenses | Combined days |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 6 | 483 | |
| 2 | 1 | 3 | 481 | |
| 3 | 2 | 3 | 421 | |
| 4 | Craig Classic | 1 | 17 | 421 |
| 5 | Sugi | 1 | 3 | 403 |
| 6 | El Lindaman | 1 | 1 | 310 |
| 7 | 1 | 2 | 266 | |
| 8 | Kotaro Suzuki | 1 | 3 | 265 |
| 9 | 2 | 3 | 257 | |
| 10 | Isami Kodaka | 1 | 2 | ¤242 |
| 11 | 1 | 2 | 232 | |
| 12 | Minoru Tanaka | 1 | 3 | 224 |
| 13 | Fuminori Abe | 1 | 5 | 213 |
| 14 | 1 | 4 | 195 | |
| 15 | Jonathan Gresham | 1 | 1 | 132 |
| 16 | Sean Guinness | 1 | 1 | 129 |
| 17 | Seiki Yoshioka † | 1 | 1 | + |
| 18 | 1 | 0 | 61 | |
| 19 | 1 | 0 | 58 | |
| 20 | 1 | 1 | 45 | |