Strongman

Strongman is a competitive strength sport that tests athletes' physical strength and endurance through a variety of heavy lifts and events. Strongman competitions are known for their intensity, pushing athletes to their physical and mental limits. In modern strongman, athletes compete to score points based on their relative position in an event. An athlete who engages in the sport of strongman is also called a 'strongman'. They are often regarded as some of the strongest men of the world.

Etymology

Many sources state that strongman is a man who performs remarkable feats possessing enormous amounts of strength. In the 19th century, the term strongman referred to an exhibitor of strength during circus performances.

History

Modern strongman generally credits its origins to circus strongmen who became popular in the 19th and 20th centuries. In the first half of the 20th century, strongmen performed various feats of strength such as the bent press, supporting large amounts of weight held overhead at arm's length, steel bending, chain breaking, etc. They needed to have large amounts of wrist, hand, and tendon strength for these feats, as well as prodigious oblique strength. Athletes including Louis Cyr, Apollon, Donald Dinnie, and Arthur Saxon are credited as major innovators in the sport. Many events today, including the Cyr dumbbell, Apollon's axle clean-and-press, Dinnie stones, and Saxon bar deadlift bear their names.
In the late 20th century, the term strongman evolved to describe one who competes in strength athletics – a more modern eclectic strength competition in which competitors display their raw functional strength through exercises such as deadlifts, squats, overhead log lifts, lifting stones, toting refrigerators, pulling heavy vehicles and tossing or loading weights. With the advent of the World's Strongest Man competition, strongman began to be formalized as a competitive sport rather than a non-competitive spectacle. Since the advent of the modern sport, competitions including Arnold Strongman Classic, Europe's Strongest Man, Strongman Champions League, World's Ultimate Strongman, World's Strongest Viking, World Muscle Power Classic, Fortissimus, Pure Strength, Rogue Invitational, Shaw Classic, Giants Live, IFSA World Championships, Strongman Super Series, World Strongman Challenge and Siberian Power Show have adopted a standardized format based on the original World's Strongest Man.
More than 30 countries also hold national-level strongman competitions. Local competitions featuring amateur athletes are also common.

Modern format

In its modern format, a strongman competition will typically consist of several events testing different aspects of strength. These may include static lifts such as a deadlift, overhead press, or squat or a dynamic event involving moving with weight. Athletes may, for example, pick up a heavy apparatus and carry it for a certain distance or drag a vehicle attached by a harness.
Strongman competitions score competitors by comparing their relative place in an event and awarding more points to competitors with better finishes. Typically, first place in an event will receive a number of points equal to the number of competitors. For example, if an athlete finishes first in the deadlift in a competition with 10 competitors, they will receive 10 points, with second receiving nine, and so on, until last place receives only one point.
Most competitions award zero points if an athlete could not complete a lift or start the event--if, for example, an athlete could not pick up a stone in a stone-carrying event, they would be awarded zero points. Competitions will also normally split points based on ties, adding up the combined points for their places and averaging them out. For example, if two athletes finish tied for first in a 10-athlete competition, the scores for first and second will be added up and divided by two, resulting in each athlete being awarded 9.5 points.

Training

Training for strongman involves building overall strength in the gym and training with competition implements to gain familiarity. In the gym, it is necessary to train the entire body for strength, especially with variants of the squat, deadlift, and overhead press. Explosive power is also important, which is developed by weightlifting style lifts and cardiovascular conditioning. Additionally, grip strength must be developed and it is also imperative to improve mental toughness and pain tolerance.
Although you can do general strength training, at a typical gym, training with a strongman regimen requires equipment not typically found in a gym. Some equipment used in a strongman competition would have to be found custom-made or at a strongman gym. Some of these equipment includes natural stones, tree trunk logs, farmers walk frames, yokes, kegs and various sorts of vehicles.
Another part of a strongman's training is its intense diet regime. The biggest strongman competitors would need to ingest around 8,000 - 10,000 calories a day.

Events

Though competitive strongman events are ever-changing, there are a number of staples that frequently appear on the international stage, including:

Notable strongmen

Traditional strongmen

The strongmen are listed according to the chronological order of their birth.

Modern strongmen

The following 78 strongmen have reached the podium of World's Strongest Man since 1977 and/or World Muscle Power Classic from 1985 to 2004 and/or Arnold Strongman Classic since 2002 and/or World's Ultimate Strongman from 2018 to 2021 and/or Rogue Invitational since 2021 and or Strongest Man on Earth since 2023. They are listed according to the chronological order of their podium appearance.
25 of them have won the World's Strongest Man, 11 have won the World Muscle Power Classic, 9 have won the Arnold Strongman Classic, 3 have won the World's Ultimate Strongman, 3 have won the Rogue Invitational and 3 have won the Strongest Man on Earth.
7 men have won both WSM & WMPC. 5 men have won both WSM & ASC. 2 men have won both WSM & WUS. 3 men have won both WSM & RI. 2 men have won WSM, ASC & RI. 1 man has won WSM, WUS & RI. 1 man has won WSM, ASC, RI & SMOE.
Additionally, the following 53 strongmen have reached either 4th or 5th places of World's Strongest Man and/or World Muscle Power Classic and/or Arnold Strongman Classic and/or World's Ultimate Strongman and/or Rogue Invitational and or Strongest Man on Earth:

International accolades

The table below summarizes the most decorated strongmen in modern history with the most number of international wins in their careers.

#	Name	Country	Active	Competitions	Wins	Win %
1	Žydrūnas Savickas		1996–2022	147	79
2	Mariusz Pudzianowski		2000–2009	61	43
3	Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson		2010–	72	32
4	Aivars Šmaukstelis		2014–2025	86	28
5	Brian Shaw		2007–2023	65	27
6	Krzysztof Radzikowski		2005–2019	112	24
7	Ervin Katona		2003–2015	100	18
8	Mitchell Hooper		2022–	27	16
9	Matjaž Belšak		2014–2025	71	16
10	Hugo Girard		1998–2008	37	15
11	Dainis Zageris		2009–2022	87	15
12	Riku Kiri		1986–1999	28	14
13	Jón Páll Sigmarsson		1982–1992	29	13
14	Magnus Samuelsson		1995–2008	64	13
15	Jouko Ahola		1994–2003	25	12
16	Mateusz Kieliszkowski		2014–	48	12
17	Magnús Ver Magnússon		1987–2005	55	12
18	Oleksii Novikov		2016–	46	11
19	Mikhail Koklyaev		2005–2014	50	11
20	Svend Karlsen		1996–2006	69	10
21	JF Caron		2007–2023	73	10
22	Rayno Nel		2023–	12	9
23	Geoff Capes		1979–1988	20	9
24	Čestmír Šíma		2012–2021	26	9
25	Bill Kazmaier		1979–1990	18	8
26	Derek Poundstone		2006–2017	22	8
27	Martins Licis		2015–	24	8
28	Vytautas Lalas		2007–2018	30	8
29	Kelvin de Ruiter		2011–	43	8
30	Janne Virtanen		1998–2009	50	8
31	Kostyantyn Ilin		2007–2020	54	8
32	Laurence Shahlaei		2007–2021	58	8
33	Evan Singleton		2018–	34	7
34	Travis Ortmayer		2005–2023	51	7
35	Manfred Hoeberl		1990–1996	18	6
36	Adam Roszkowski		2021–	27	6
37	Vasyl Virastyuk		2002–2008	28	6
38	Didzis Zariņš		2011–	32	6
39	Andrus Murumets		2003–2009	40	6
40	Stojan Todorchev		2005–2017	46	6
41	Mikhail Shivlyakov		2011–2025	47	6
42	Oskar Ziółkowski		2020–	18	5
43	Flemming Rasmussen		1995–2001	19	5
44	Mike Burke		2011–2015	21	5
45	Gerrit Badenhorst		1992–2002	24	5
45	Mykhailo Starov		2004–2006	24	5
47	Juha-Matti Räsänen		1996–2006	26	5
48	Gary Taylor		1990–1997	29	5
49	Pavlo Kordiyaka		2017–	32	5
50	Glenn Ross		1997–2011	36	5
51	Johannes Årsjö		2007–2017	39	5
52	Jamie Reeves		1988–1999	41	5
53	Raivis Vidzis		2002–2009	44	5
54	Jarek Dymek		2000–2010	46	5
55	Heinz Ollesch		1994–2006	49	5
56	Jarno Hams		1999–2015	56	5
57	Rauno Heinla		2009–	60	5
58	Martin Wildauer		2008–2017	68	5
59	Tarmo Mitt		2001–2019	70	5

- As of 1 January 2026