Strongman Holds Back GT500

Off Topic
1

See for yourself: Strong Man Holds Back Stampeding Mustang GT500

Hope it’s not a repost.

Soon as the car gets grip, it’s over.

2

I hate those bullshit shows. “…Franz held back a peak force of 1375lbs. That’s more than any Olympic medalist has ever lifted in competition.” No shit? I guess I missed the part where holding a weight steady with a close-grip row handle is comparable to any of the Olympic lifts. Aside from looking dramatic to idiots, what was the point of peeling out at the start? I’m sure my roommate’s old Tercel could have pulled the guy just as easily.

3

Utterly moronic that anyone put any effort to this.

The maximum force that he can actually hold back is limited by the quite small values allowed by:

  1. The fact that it is only that part of his bodyweight that is behind his feet keeping him from tipping forwards as the car pulls him. No matter how strong he is, it’s not going to take more than roughly a couple of hundred pounds of force to overcome the tipping effect of his bodyweight being leaned backwards.

  2. The fact that his shoes won’t have any remarkably high coefficient of friction – say they will be about 1.0 – so the total force his feet can resist is about equal to his bodyweight.

I expect he released the grip and acted as if his strength gave out because he felt himself tipping forward or beginning to slide and wished to create the illusion that there was an awesome battle of strength that had been going on.

The measured larger value of force could only have been a transient shock.

As to why the peel-out at the start: if it had been a contest of static friction of the car’s tires with all the weight of the car’s rear end on them vs the static friction of his shoes with only his weight on them (and also versus the tipping aspect) there wouldn’t have even been the illusion of him being able to hold the car back for an instant.

4

This seems like something dumb from Spike rather than National Geographic.

5
6

I hated that Sport Testing show on discovery or whatever it was called. They had one guy jump a car TUCKING his legs to his chest then going on saying he had a 40-45" vertical.

7

[quote]Fuzzyapple wrote:
I hated that Sport Testing show on discovery or whatever it was called. They had one guy jump a car TUCKING his legs to his chest then going on saying he had a 40-45" vertical.[/quote]

Sports Science on FSN if we’re thinking of the same thing. They were actually pretty careful about how they said things; you may have gotten tripped up in the language. I never heard them say anything that was untrue, though it was obviously sensationalized for TV. It was pretty funny when Jenny Finch broke the force plate they were using.

8

This guy had straps on too. That may have been a nice piece of info to add in the video.

9

I’d like to see him try that again w/o the restraining belt and a pair of skis on.

10

Where do they get the idea that it could hold it back for even one second? Bill puts it way better than I can, but holding back 500 horsepower? Come on. Even the slightest bit of gas and the strongman would lose.

11

[quote]Ronsauce wrote:
I hate those bullshit shows. “…Franz held back a peak force of 1375lbs. That’s more than any Olympic medalist has ever lifted in competition.” No shit? I guess I missed the part where holding a weight steady with a close-grip row handle is comparable to any of the Olympic lifts. Aside from looking dramatic to idiots, what was the point of peeling out at the start? I’m sure my roommate’s old Tercel could have pulled the guy just as easily.[/quote]

X2, There’s no comparison.

Yet, people keep saying shit like that.

12

Do they really think regular people are dumb enough to miss the part where they are spinning the tires right of the bat, which means it has no grip or traction what so ever. If they would set him up again and just put the car in drive and not hit the gas he couldn’t have held the fucking car, I hate this sensationalized bullshit.

13

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
Utterly moronic that anyone put any effort to this.

The maximum force that he can actually hold back is limited by the quite small values allowed by:

  1. The fact that it is only that part of his bodyweight that is behind his feet keeping him from tipping forwards as the car pulls him. No matter how strong he is, it’s not going to take more than roughly a couple of hundred pounds of force to overcome the tipping effect of his bodyweight being leaned backwards.
    [/quote]

I saw a more convincing display on TV years ago where a guy tried to hold back two jets. He was between them with a cable from each jet looped around his bent elbows and his hand gripping a yoke in front of him. Basically a most muscular pose, but with the hands closing a loop. I don’t know how hard the jets were attempting to take off, but they were skidding around laterally on the runway as if there was some lift being generated. He held it for a few seconds, after which the jets shot off.

I think it was the same guy who pulled Concorde: - YouTube

14

Yeah this shit is stupid, it’s just a bunch of big machines, and the show finds a way to tweak it in the person’s favor, just to give the impression of it being this amazing feat of strength.