The 2020 Victory Road was a professional wrestling event produced by Impact Wrestling. The event took place on October 3, 2020 at the Skyway Studios in Nashville, Tennessee, and aired exclusively on Impact Plus. It was the 11th event in the Victory Road chronology.
Nine matches were contested at the event. In the main event, Eric Young successfully defended the Impact World Championship against Eddie Edwards. In other prominent matches, Deonna Purrazzo successfully defended the Impact Knockouts Championship against Susie, while Rohit Raju lost by count out against Willie Mack to retain the Impact X Division Championship.
Production
Background
Victory Road is an annual professional wrestling event produced by Impact Wrestling (then known as Total Nonstop Action Wrestling). The first one was held in November 2004, but was replaced by Unbreakable in 2005. Victory Road continued to be a regular monthly pay-per-view event for TNA until 2012, when the promotion discontinued most of its monthly pay-per-views in 2013 in favor of the new pre-recorded One Night Only events. It was revived in 2014 as a "One Night Only" event, a special episode of Impact's weekly television series in 2017, and in 2019 as a monthly special for Impact Plus. On September 23, 2020, Impact announced that Victory Road would return as an Impact Plus Monthly Special on October 3.
Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic
As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, Impact had to present the majority of its programming from a behind closed doors set at Skyway Studios in Nashville, Tennessee beginning in April.
Storylines
The event featured professional wrestling matches that involved different wrestlers from pre-existing scripted feuds and storylines. Wrestlers portrayed villains, heroes, or less distinguishable characters in scripted events that build tension and culminate in a wrestling match or series of matches.
On the September 15 episode of Impact!, Impact Executive Vice President Scott D'Amore announced that Eric Young, who defeated Eddie Edwards during the September 1 episode to win the Impact World Championship for a second time, would defend the title against Rich Swann, who Young severely injured during a Five-way elimination match for the title at Slammiversary and caused him to announce his (kayfabe) retirement, at Bound for Glory. During the following episode, an irate Young randomly attacked The Deaners (Cody Deaner and Cousin Jake) whilst they were making their way to the ring. During the attack, D'Amore came to the ring to plead with Young to stop, only to get pushed into a turnbuckle by Young. As Young had D'Amore pinned in the corner of the ring, Edwards, who was limping as a result of a submission move performed during his defeat, attacked Young, forcing him to flee the ring. After the attack, an angry Edwards confronted D'Amore backstage asking why Swann was getting a title shot over him. D'Amore then announced that Edwards would challenge Young for the title at Victory Road, meaning the winner would defend the title against Swann at Bound for Glory.
On August 18, during Night 1 of Emergence, Rohit Raju defeated Chris Bey and TJP in a three-way match to win the Impact X Division Championship. On the September 15 episode of Impact!, he had Bey, TJP and Trey compete in a three-way match next week to determine who will face him for the X Division Championship immediately afterwards, which Trey won but Raju quickly defeated him in his first title defense. On the September 29 episode of Impact!, Raju announced that he will start the Defeat Rohit Challenge at Victory Road, giving the opportunity to anyone he has not defeated before.
On July 18, at Slammiversary, Kylie Rae won a Gauntlet for the Gold match to become number one contender for the Impact Knockouts Championship, and on that same night, Deonna Purrazzo defeated Jordynne Grace to win said Knockouts title for the first time. On the September 22 episode of Impact!, Rae announced that she was challenging Purrazzo for the Knockouts Championship at Bound for Glory. The following week, Purrazzo was told that she was going to defend her title against Susie at Victory Road. During that same episode, Susie was concerned that her friend Rae would be mad if she won the Knockouts Championship, but Rae said she would rather face her for the title at Bound for Glory than a bully like Purrazzo.