I used to root for Brian Shaw. But he’s off the list now, because if you follow him for long enough you will realize that he always has a “reason” (translation: excuse) for not winning, and never gives credit to his opponents for beating him. A very subtle sore loser, so, not a fan.
Even in his latest head to head loss against Martins in Santa Monica, he almost tried to bring up some kind of cold as an excuse, but then stopped because he remembered that Martins had a lingering nerve issue that affected his pressing. Now in his latest video, he’s got some vague mumbo jumbo about the scoring…the fricking scoring??? -sore loser. Thumbs down.
Shaw is also saying that 4x WSM trumps anything that could ever be accomplished in the Arnold. And of course, he is in no way diminishing the Arnold…yeah, right. Possibly, could it be because Thor (barring injury) will be winning his 3rd consecutive Arnold this year, tying Shaw’s 3 Arnold wins?..while Thor only has one WSM, and quite likely will not win 4 given his age and all the young bucks nipping at his heels?
Someone needs to tell Shaw that even if he sells his soul to the devil for the 5th WSM, Big Z is still the greatest strongman of their era.
And a career longer than anyone. He fell and landed on his back with the number 3 stone on his chest at his first WSM appearance, IIRC. And didn’t get back for a couple of years, and still managed to do what he did.
I was about to post this video here. I think he’s gonna beat that 500 kg mark this year. I’m in no way a fan boy but he’s looking bigger this year and stronger and I enjoy seeing him compete. And he pulled 1063 last year.
It would be good to see 500 go down but the deadlift is the fourth event. It’s first on day two but on day 1 are two of the more brutal events out there so I think that will stop records going down.
Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but as someone who was a good athlete in two different sports (swimming, throwing), trained with several excellent athletes, and had a privilege of training a few really great athletes, I don’t know know too many of them that are “good losers.” Most of them that experienced the level of dominance that Shaw experienced for a significant period of time (to the point that their entire identities revolved around that dominance) walk away talking smack in their heads and making excuses for what happened. You may not like Shaw talking about his mental process openly, but most champions I knew have the same mental process. I find it kind of refreshing when athletes are that honest, as most of the champions I knew said one thing out loud (“my opponent was just too much for my today”) and expressed their true feelings later on to their confidantes.
I don’t know your athletic background, but if you cannot understand the mentality of someone who still has the same competitive spirit, still feels young enough to compete, still remembers what it was like to dominate everyone else - someone whose whole identity revolves around being an elite athlete - that’s on you, not Shaw.
But it’s been years of “it was my hamstring”, “it was the TV show detracting from my training”, and the last LOL “it was the strange scoring that I didn’t understand”. Come on.
