Mark Henry


Mark Jerrold Henry is an American former powerlifter, Olympic weightlifter, strongman, and retired professional wrestler currently signed to WWE under a Legends contract.
Henry is a two-time Olympian and a gold, silver, and bronze medalist at the Pan American Games in 1995. As a powerlifter, he was WDFPF World Champion and a two-time U.S. National Champion and once held an American record in the deadlift. He still holds the WDFPF world records in the squat, deadlift and total.
In weightlifting, Henry was a three-time U.S. National Weightlifting Champion, an American Open winner, a two-time U.S. Olympic Festival Champion and a NACAC champion. He held all three Senior US American weightlifting records in 1993–1997.
In strongman, Henry won the inaugural Arnold Strongman Classic in 2002.
Since joining the World Wrestling Federation in 1996, he became a one-time WWF European Champion and a two-time world champion, having held the ECW Championship in 2008, and WWE's World Heavyweight Championship in 2011. First winning the ECW Championship, he became only the fourth black world champion in WWE history.
In April 2018, Henry was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame Class of 2018.

Early life

Henry was born in the small town of Silsbee in East Texas, 90 miles northeast of Houston. As a child, he was a big wrestling fan and André the Giant was his favorite wrestler. While attending a wrestling show in Beaumont, Texas, young Henry tried to touch André as he was walking down the aisle, but tripped over the barricade. André picked him up out of the crowd and put him back behind the barricade. When Henry was 12 years old, his father, Ernest, died of complications from diabetes. When he was 14 years old, Henry was diagnosed with dyslexia.
Henry comes from a family in which almost all of the men are larger than average, especially his great uncle Chudd, who was 6 ft 7 in, weighed approximately, never had a pair of manufactured shoes, and was known as the strongest man in the Piney Woods of East Texas.
Henry played football in high school until his senior year, when he strained ligaments in his wrist during the first game of the year and scored below 700 on the SAT.

Powerlifting career

By the time Mark Henry was in the fourth grade, he was and weighed. His mother bought a set of weights for him when he was ten years old. During Henry's freshman year at Silsbee High School, he was already able to squat, which was well over the school record. As an 18-year-old high school senior, Henry was called "the world's strongest teenager" by the Los Angeles Times, and made it into the headlines in early 1990 for winning the National High School Powerlifting Championships and setting teenage lifting world records in the squat and total. By the time Henry finished high school, he was a three-time Texas state champion with state and national records in all four powerlifting categories—the squat at, bench press at and deadlift at as well as the total at.
At the Texas High School Powerlifting Championships in April 1990, Terry Todd, a professor of kinesiology at the University of Texas at Austin and former weightlifter, spotted Henry and persuaded him to go to Austin after he graduated to train in the Olympic style of weightlifting. In July 1990 at the USPF Senior National Powerlifting Championships, 19-year-old Henry came second only to the legendary six-time World Powerlifting Champion Kirk Karwoski. While powerlifting relies primarily on brute strength and power, which Henry obviously possessed, Olympic weightlifting is considered more sophisticated, involving more agility, timing, flexibility and technique. There have been few lifters in history who have been able to be successful in both lifting disciplines. Mastering the technique of weightlifting usually takes many years of practice, but Henry broke four national junior records in weightlifting after only eight months of training. In April 1991, he won the United States National Junior Championships; 20 days later he placed fourth at the U.S. Senior National Championships, and finished sixth at the Junior World Weightlifting Championships in Germany two months later. Only a few weeks afterwards, he became 1991's International Junior Champion in Powerlifiting as well. In Henry's first year in competitive weightlifting, he broke all three junior American records 12 times, and became the United States' top Superheavyweight, surpassing Mario Martinez.
At the age of 19, Henry had already managed to qualify for the weightlifting competition at the 1992 Summer Olympics, where he finished tenth in the Super- Heavyweight class. Ten months before the 1992 Olympics, Henry had begun training with Dragomir Cioroslan, a bronze medalist at the 1984 Summer Olympics, who said that he had "never seen anyone with Mark's raw talent". After the Olympics, Henry became more determined to focus on weightlifting and began competing all over the world. In late 1992 he took the win at the USA Weightlifting American Open and further proved his dominance on American soil by winning not only the U.S. National Weightlifting Championships, but also the U.S. Olympic Festival Championships in 1993 and 1994. At the 1995 Pan American Games Henry won a gold, silver and bronze medal.
Henry won the ADFPA U.S. National Powerlifting Championships in 1995 with a raw Powerlifting Total. Despite competing without supportive equipment in contrast to the other competitors, Henry managed to outclass the lifter in second place by, defeating not only five-time IPF World Powerlifting Champion and 12 time USAPL National Powerlifting Champion Brad Gillingham, but also America's Strongest Man of 1997 Mark Philippi. In the process he set all-time world records in the raw deadlift at and the squat without a squat suit at as well as the all-time drug tested raw total at. Later that same year in October, he competed in the drug-free Powerlifting World Championships and won again, even though he trained on the powerlifts only sparingly—due his main focus still being on the two Olympic lifts. He not only become World Champion by winning the competition but also bettered his previous all-time squat world record to and his all-time drug tested world record total to.
In 1996 Henry became the North America, Central America, Caribbean Islands Champion. He earned the right to compete at the Olympics by winning the U.S. National Weightlifting Championships in the Spring of 1996 for a third time. During his victory Henry became Senior US American record holder in the Snatch at, Clean and jerk at, and Total at, improving all of his three previous personal bests. No one in the history of the sports had ever lifted as much as him in the five competitive lifts—the snatch and the clean and jerk in weightlifting—the squat, bench press and deadlift in powerlifting.
In the months prior to the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia, Henry received more attention and publicity than any lifter in recent United States history. He guested at Jay Leno, Conan O'Brien and The Oprah Winfrey Show and was featured on HBO Inside Sports and The Today Show. He was also featured in dozens of magazines including U.S. News & World Report, People Vanity Fair, ESPN The Magazine and Life where he was photographed nude by famed artist Annie Lebowitz. During this period he connected with WWE owner Vince McMahon for the first time, which led to him signing a 10-year deal as professional wrestler.
Henry improved his lifts to in the snatch and in the clean-and-jerk during his final eight weeks of preparation for the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Henry at 6-foot-4-inches tall and bodyweight, became the largest athlete in Olympic history and was voted captain of the Olympic weightlifting team. He suffered a back injury during the competition and was unable to approach his normal performance level. Due to the injury he had to drop out after his first clean and jerk attempt and finished with a disappointing 14th place. His appearance at the Olympics proved to be his last official competition in Olympic weightlifting, as he retired from weightlifting, vowing never to return unless the sport is "cleaned up" of anabolic steroid use.
Since his career start as a professional wrestler shortly after the Olympics, he broke his leg in the fall of 1996. But by the summer of the following year he had rehabilitated enough to be able to compete at the USAPL National Powerlifting Championships 1997, where he won the competition to become the U.S. National Powerlifting Champion in the Super Heavyweight class again. He had planned to continue heavy training in powerlifting, although his travel schedule as a professional wrestler with the WWF made sustained training difficult. Mark's WWF contract was unique in many ways, allowing him at least three months off each year from wrestling, so he could train for the national and world championships in weightlifting or powerlifting. Barring injury, Mark had originally hoped to return to the platform in late 1998, to lift for many more years, and to eventually squat at least without a "squat suit" and to deadlift.
Although in early 1998 he was still able to do five repetitions in the bench press with, three repetitions in the squat with , and three repetitions in the standing press with in training, while traveling with the World Wrestling Federation, he never returned to compete again in official championships in favor of his wrestling career. He weighed at that time, and his right upper arm was measured at 24" by Terry Todd.: When asked in September 2003, who the strongest man in the world was, Bill Kazmaier, considered by many to be the greatest strongman of all time, stated: "It would have to be Mark Henry. I think he's one of the strongest men in the history of the world, without a doubt."

Personal records

Official Records

Powerlifting:
Done in official Powerlifting meets
  • Squat – raw with knee wraps
  • Bench Press –
  • Deadlift – raw
  • Powerlifting Total –
Weightlifting:
done in official competition
  • Snatch:
  • Clean and jerk:
  • Weightlifting Total: – snatch: / clean&jerk:
Strongman:
done in official competition and during exhibitions
  • Apollon's wheels: x 3 reps
  • Deadlift: x 2 reps oil filled plates
  • Hummer push: for 12 meters
  • Timber carry: for 11 meters on an inclined ramp
  • Inch dumbbell:
Combined official records:
  • Combined official Supertotal :
  • Career aggregate Supertotal :