Celeste Bonin Biography

Celeste Beryl Bonin was born on October 7, 1986 in Houston, Texas. Celeste is best known for working for the World Wrestling Entertainment, under the name Kaitlyn.

Before Wrestling, Celeste pursued a career in fitness modelling. Celeste Bonin began her fitness modelling career in 2006. At 19, she competed in the 2006 NPC John Sherman Classic Bodybuilding, Figure & Fitness Championships. The following year, she placed number one in 2007 NPC John Sherman Classic for Figure Class D. The following year, she competed in the 2008 Arnold Classic, coming in 5th Place for Figure Class D. She continued to compete in competitions, and in 2010, she was signed to WWE developmental contract, and send to work in Florida Championship Wrestling. In FCW, she worked as "Ricki Vaughn."

Vickie Guerrero and Kaitlyn on WWE NXT
Photo © WWE

On the December 3, 2010 airing of WWE SmackDown, she told Vickie Guerrero and Doplh Ziggler that SmackDown General Manager Theodore Long signed her to the Smackdown brand. She went on to appear in numerous segments, and compete in matches into 2011. In May of that year, she formed a tag-team with AJ Lee, and they were known as The Chickbusters. Later in the year, she appeared and wrestled regularly on NXT Redemption, where she was featured primarily. This led into 2012. Kaitlyn found herself feuding with fellow NXT Season 3 contestant Maxine. The latter had been romantically involved with Derrick Bateman, with whom she struck up a friendship. Kaitlyn felt that the couple’s relationship was not healthy and attempted to get involved. Maxine took exception to this and the two had several matches, including one in February that was the main event of the show. When Derrick Bateman split from Maxine, he entered a relationship with Kaitlyn. This was quietly dropped when all storylines ceased on NXT.

Things soon feel apart with her and AJ Lee... Daniel Bryan dumped AJ for costing him the World Heavyweight title at WrestleMania 28, and told her he wished she’d never been born. She attempted to comfort AJ after this but AJ attacked her instead. Their friendship officially ended when the two had a match on Smackdown, which AJ won (May 11, 2013). Afterwards, Kaitlyn mainly competed on Superstars and NXT – as well as appearing in backstage segments. Over the summer she approached the new Smackdown GM Booker T about a job as his assistant – a position which Eve Torres also wanted. Although she was victorious over Eve in a tag team match, she lost a singles match to decide which of them would get the assistant job (August 17, 2013 WWE Smackdown). Days later, on the August 20, 2012 airing of WWE Raw, Kaitlyn surprise everyone by winning a battle royal to determine the new #1 contender for Layla’s Divas title. She and Layla remained on good terms, and both of them were suspicious of Eve Torres, who claimed to take a personal interest in their match. At Night of Champions 2012, Eve found Kaitlyn attacked backstage. She was the declared unfit to compete due to an ankle injury. Eve replaced her and defeated Layla to win the title.

Kaitlyn reappeared two weeks after the Pay per view to reveal that she had seen the security footage from Night of Champions. Although she could not identify her attacker’s face, she could confirm that the woman was a blonde. Beth Phoenix was initially suspected but she was revealed not to have done it. She received her title match against Eve on the October 8 airing of WWE Raw, but competed with her ankle still in bad condition. She lost as a result, but was awarded a triple threat championship match at Hell In A Cell 2012, also including Layla. Before the Pay per view, Aksana told Kaitlyn that she had found a blonde wig in Eve’s luggage. After investigating further, she and Layla discovered an e-mail sent from Eve’s iPad. The message was ordering Aksana to attack Kaitlyn, revealing that Aksana was the mystery attacker.

Although she lost the triple threat match, she scored a pinfall win over Eve in a tag team match in the UK. As a result she got another title shot at Eve at the Survivor Series. Before the match she was attacked yet again by Aksana – disguised by the blonde wig. She was able to compete in the match but lost to Eve. She did manage to get revenge on Aksana though, defeating her in two singles matches. She later competed in a #1 contender’s battle royal on the TLC pre-show with Eve at ringside. Eve interfered in the match and caused her to be eliminated, costing her a title shot. The next night on Raw, she defeated Eve in a non-title match. She won the eventual title match on Smackdown, albeit by disqualification when Eve attacked the referee. She received another title match but Eve fled the arena, giving her the count-out win. This led to a special title match on the Raw 20th Anniversary show – which took place in Kaitlyn’s hometown of Houston, Texas. The stipulation stated that Eve would lose the title if she were counted out or disqualified. Celeste Bonin debut the spear as a finisher and defeated Eve to win the WWE Divas Championship (January 14, 2013). Her first challenger for the title was Tamina Snuka. The two faced off at Raw Roulette (January 28, 2013) in a Lumberjill match that went to a no-contest. Tamina challenged for the title at the Elimination Chamber 2013 PPV, but Kaitlyn successfully retained. Soon, tension reignited between her and AJ. On March 25, 2013 airing of WWE Raw, AJ overheard her calling her “crazy” to Kane and Daniel Bryan, and brutally attacked her. This led to a non-title match which AJ won by count-out. She later gained some measure of revenge by pinning AJ in a mixed tag match on Smackdown, in which she teamed up with Daniel Bryan and AJ with Dolph Ziggler (March 29, 2013).