And in that regard: find a powerlifting fan FIRST and we’ll go from there.
Like, seriously: find me someone that pays to go WATCH a powerlifting meet. One they aren’t competing in, nor have a member of their gym/team competing in. Just someone that legit likes to go out on a Saturday to go watch a powerlifting meet.
Powerlifting will always be my first love, as far as ironsports go. I owe it a lot. But HOLY F**K it is not a sport to watch.
I have been to the arnold classic 3 times and the mr olympia in orlando in 2021
the best part was the powerlifting and strongman competitions…i have alot of respect for the women that participated in the events
You are an interesting cat to enjoy watching a powerlifting meet.
But I am a fan of watching strongman, absolutely.
Watching WSM on Christmas with my dad is what first got me interested in lifting. I wanted to be as strong as those guys. I was still too young to really lift serious, but I think it was influential.
That being said, I think a lot of people (probably most) would think strongman is boring.
Definitely depends on the show.
And that’s the thing: it’s a show. It’s always been a show. It’s SUPPOSED to be a show. But you’ll have promoters that pick easy to execute events, rather than fun to watch ones, and you end up with a competition that’s just front holds and max barbell deadlift.
In that regard: the current iteration is just plain awful. Too much focus on max lifts. Bring back the Mariusz era where athletes looked like goddamn super heroes because the weights were a little lighter so you had to have reps and cardio.
Also enjoyed watching the arm wrestling competition, saw Devon Larrett in action, that to me is more fun than the bodybuilding shows
Well when you put it up against stiff competition like THAT, haha.
Manfred Hoeberl isn’t a well known name anymore in strongman. Dude was huge, I suspect he might have had some synthol in his arms though.
Mariusz, was the polish guy that was ripped?
Yes.
It appears arms that big make it hard to drive!
The fella was amazing, all the others guy had bellies, 
…maybe they were pregnant men, 
IIRC, he was in two near fatal accidents. First one took him out of strongman for awhile. He broke a lot of bones. He did return to competition.
Second was a head on crash with a truck while he was on a motorcycle at high speed. He is lucky to survive.
The guys like Jesse Marune, Derek Poundstone, Jon Andersen, Oli Thompson, Kevin Nee, Arlid Haugen, Travis Ortmeyer, Robert Szymanski…you sure?
It was a different era man. That’s what I’m saying. It rewarded that kind of build.
Yeah, tongue was in cheek on that comment, but absolutely a wild story. Not the typical one you hear for strongman of that era.
I like watching powerlifting too, but his point is accurate for the majority of people. My wife loves meets, but just to chit chat with people. If I wasn’t lifting I don’t think she’d care.
How would you respond? What response is there in that situation? “Hey, please don’t call me that, it hurts my feelings.” ? That’s the kindest way to reply but who would take you seriously?
That’s a proper and direct response, just gotta control the tone of your voice if you want to sound firm about it.
To add to the general conversation. I just got back from the Arnold Classic and the setup and production were very entertaining. They also had the men and women on the same stage alternating on the same events. Great to watch in person and I actually kinda think I enjoyed watching the Woman more. With alternating men/women on the same stuff it made the down time between events far more tolerable too. It worked really well having the convention to walk between events.
Tom Stoltman had six pack abs and was middle of the pack in various finals. Then he got a professional “nutritionist”, a giant belly, and now holds 2 WSM titles. Still sucks in the Arnold though because his max static strength is not top tier at 6’ 8" tall; he moves well though, and has albatross arms for atlas stones.
Thor is the only super tall giant with that type of static strength.