Oleksii Novikov doesn’t stroll into the room. He turns sideways, and shuffles by the doorway like somebody navigating a very busy bar.
At 6ft 1in and 300lb of stable muscle, Novikov has shoulders which might be three and a half toes vast. His palms, completely curled from years of lifting actually heavy stuff, are like bear paws, his wrists as thick as some folks’s biceps. He’s sporting an XXXXL T-shirt.
“My drawback, it’s simply my measurement. I'm so small for a strongman,” Novikov says.
We meet in Sacramento, California, earlier than the 2022 World’s Strongest Man competitors. Novikov took the title in 2020 – however this time, he's competing after an unimaginably onerous few months.
Novikov is Ukrainian and was in his residence city of Kyiv as Russia launched its invasion on 24 February.
Drafted into the navy, Novikov educated alongside his countrymen – together with sniper and common firearms coaching – however was given depart to enter Europe’s Strongest Man competitors in April. Having been compelled to neglect his coaching, other than the bodily train he did within the navy, Novikov gained the yr’s competitors anyway.
After pals died and he was compelled to shelter underground as Russian forces shelled Kiev, the struggle in Ukraine has offered Novikov with additional motivation.
“Regardless of the nation that wins this competitors, its folks would be the strongest nation,” he says. “Ukraine wants this win. It is going to assist our military and the boys who defend our nation. It’s crucial. It means loads.”
This yr’s strongman competitors was held on the Capitol Mall, in entrance of the looming white dome of the California state capitol constructing. It was a sexy location however an unforgiving one, with the athletes competing on an uncovered strip of land. The sporadic palm bushes lining the mall provided little respite from the belting solar and scorching temperatures, which reached 97F (36C) on the primary two days.
By 8am on Tuesday 24 Could, a whole bunch of spectators had gathered, many sporting tank tops and T-shirts bearing the names of favourite strongmen, some waving indicators, others armed with Sharpies and cellphones, hoping to gather signatures and selfies.
The primary glimpse of the towering athletes was met with lusty applause, a number of the strongmen elevating big arms in response.
They had been right here for the “loading race”, a fan favourite and the opening occasion of this yr’s contest. The occasion entails athletes racing to carry 5 heavy issues – a giant stone ball, a 275lb anvil, a beer barrel and two sandbags – off the bottom, and carry every of them, operating about 20ft earlier than dumping them on a four-and-a-half-foot-high platform.
The strongmen, sporting sweat-soaked T-shirts and huge lifting belts round their waists, heaved and sprinted and heaved once more, slumping over the platform after lifting the ultimate object. Acutely aware of the warmth, the competitors’s crew ran over to the athletes with ice and hand followers, dumping water over their backs like trainers do with racehorses.
Because the strongmen competed, the gang predictably went wild, with hysterical shouting and screaming. However as soon as the athletes had completed, this gave solution to quiet contemplation and evaluation because the course was reset.
Spectators recalled previous performances, as folks tried to foretell how nicely every of the 30 people would fare. Novikov, it was generally accepted, ought to do nicely within the loading race. He walked as much as the beginning line with a glance of steely dedication, and proceeded to do very nicely certainly, shifting the 5 gadgets – which had a cumulative weight of greater than half a ton – in 37.25 seconds.
For the spectator, it was apparent from the purple faces, bulging veins and gasps for air that the athletes had been lifting plenty of weight – however the actual quantities can really feel slightly summary when watching on TV. Not everybody can instantly perceive what it's like to lift 400lb above your head.
A very good illustration, although, is how a lot effort it takes the crew to return the implements as soon as the strongmen have completed. It took three large males practically 5 minutes to return the 5 gadgets to the beginning line. And that was utilizing a loading trolley.
On the second day, when the athletes had been tasked with carrying a Volkswagen Beetle down a 20ft monitor – one other good occasion for Novikov – the crew used forklift vans to shift the 950lb vehicles whence they got here.
Strongman goes skilled
The World’s Strongest Man competitors started in 1977 as a little bit of a sideshow. Very massive males had been recruited from sports activities reminiscent of power-lifting and shotput, and tasked with bending metal bars, operating round with fridges on their backs, and pushing automobile engines up a hill.
It was an endearingly amateurish manufacturing put collectively, basically, as a novelty occasion for TV. Within the UK, the tone of the printed was normally wry and irreverent, with vaudeville piano music monitoring over footage of the hefty opponents.
Today, the boys are simply as large as earlier than. However in contrast to a few of their predecessors, who seemed like they’d been dragged from a neighborhood bar, the modern-day opponents are match, too.
Strongman, as the game is understood to lovers, has gone skilled, with worldwide occasions now filling arenas all year long, whereas the highest athletes have hundreds of thousands of followers on social media, and hundreds of thousands within the financial institution.
It’s a far cry from the strongman of a few a long time in the past, when even probably the most profitable opponents had been little recognized outdoors of weightlifting communities, or these with significantly area of interest pursuits. At this time, the highest athletes do that full-time. They earn a residing by prize cash, sponsorships and, steadily, from the a whole bunch of hundreds of YouTube views they entice every month.
Social media, particularly, has pushed the game’s visibility, enabling followers to get their strongman repair any time, quite than wait to attend a present or watch a sporadic competitors on TV. It has additionally allowed these hulking opponents to alter stereotypes about what large, robust males are like, and the way they behave.
Rob Kearney, an American based mostly in Massachusetts, is among the many hottest. He's the primary out homosexual strongman, and on Instagram goes by the identify “world’s strongest homosexual”.
His 2in-tall mohawk is steadily dyed in vibrant colours, and Kearney, 29, shares images and movies that present not simply his coaching but additionally his relationship along with his husband, Joey. Kearney has develop into revered by followers, a task mannequin not only for his mighty energy however for his determination to come back out in 2014, changing into considered one of a only a few skilled male athletes to have accomplished so.
In 2022, Kearney is hoping to make up for misplaced time, after a wretched couple of years. He ruptured his triceps in 2020 whereas making an attempt a log-lift file. The muscle has been surgically reattached, but it surely’s not fairly the identical, and considered one of his strongest occasions has develop into, if not a weak spot, then actually much less of a energy. After recovering from that career-threatening damage, in 2021 Kearney was identified with testicular most cancers, which additionally required surgical procedure.
“Each occurred three weeks earlier than World’s Strongest Man that yr,” Kearney says. “So three weeks out from this yr was an anxiety-ridden week. I wished to ensure I bought by good and wholesome. Happily, I did.”
Kearney was talking a day earlier than World’s Strongest Man was resulting from begin. He’s alternatively amusing – when he talks about coming useless final in his first strongman competitors, aged 17 – targeted, and intensely passionate as he talks about difficult homophobic stereotypes.
“I had lived a really heteronormative life. I used to be in a relationship with a woman for a yr and a half and type of awoke someday and realized that this wasn’t the life for me.
“To be sincere, I used to be drained. I used to be bored with having to get up day-after-day and fake to be anyone I wasn’t,” Kearney says.
“Every time I put up an image of Joey and I, it’s met with an honest quantity of hate and negativity. And it’s as a result of the LGBTQ group has simply been hypersexualized for thus lengthy, the place once they see an image of my husband and I, they don’t see love, they see intercourse.
“And that’s simply actually been the narrative we try to alter: that our love is not any completely different than yours. We simply need to have the ability to present it, such as you guys can.”
Kearney is brief for a modern-day strongman, at 5ft 10in, however he has used this to his benefit. He's extra agile than lots of his opponents, which is useful for occasions that require carrying issues at velocity. He gained the Arnold Professional Strongman in Australia in 2019 – he and Joey bought married there a day later – and has been to World’s Strongest Man 3 times, in 2017, 2018 and 2019.
In Sacramento, Kearney emerged to participate within the loading race, the place Novikov had excelled, to cheers and cries of “Go Rob!”
It was a rousing welcome, but it surely couldn’t coax a successful efficiency. Kearney picked up the massive ball as if it had been stuffed with helium and bolted down the course, however he was a bit lax as he dumped it on to the platform. As Kearney sprinted again to gather one other merchandise, the ball agonizingly rolled off the platform, to widespread groans from the gang. Kearney needed to decide it up once more.
It value him priceless seconds and meant he got here fifth in his group, on considered one of his higher occasions. It wasn’t a great omen. Opponents want to complete within the prime two of their group to advance to the 10-man last, held on the finish of the week, and Kearney would in the end fail to advance.
Lately, a number of the strongmen have damaged by to develop into bona fide celebrities. Iceland’s Hafþór Björnsson might be the most effective recognized, having juggled competing with taking part in the Mountain in Sport of Thrones earlier than retiring in 2020.
Eddie Corridor, a retired Brit who gained World’s Strongest Man in 2017 – and who not too long ago fought Björnsson in a boxing match – has greater than 3 million followers on Instagram, and his YouTube movies are watched by a whole bunch of hundreds.
More and more the strongmen are manufacturers. Corridor has a “Beast” vary of clothes and a meals line. Brian Shaw, a four-time World’s Strongest Man winner, has his personal “Shaw Energy” vary of merchandise.
Luke and Tom Stoltman, Scotsmen who invoice themselves as “the world’s strongest brothers”, have constructed the same following, each by aggressive success and thru their on-line movies.
Their YouTube content material, like that of all strongmen, options movies of them in coaching, sharing how they're getting ready for tournaments.
However in addition to being large, robust males, their content material has additionally addressed psychological well being points. Luke has spoken about his struggles after his mom died. Final yr, they put out a documentary about psychological well being. Individually, they've addressed the challenges Tom, who's autistic, confronted in school and in competitors.
The Stoltmans aren’t the one ones to deal with this. Corridor has talked about his personal experiences, most not too long ago throughout psychological well being consciousness week. Whereas athletes in different sports activities are more and more discussing their experiences with psychological well being, Strongman feels forward of the curve.
Partly it's because strongman could be such an remoted sport. Lots of the athletes have coaches, however they aren’t with them day-after-day, like in different particular person sports activities, reminiscent of boxing or tennis. A few of the coaching is following weightlifting applications, alone, within the gymnasium.
The shared expertise has fostered an actual sense of group among the many opponents. On the athletes’ resort, the day earlier than competitors, the commonest sight was these gigantic opponents hugging and laughing with one another as they renewed outdated acquaintances. Kearney counts the Stoltmans and Martins Licis, an American who gained World’s Strongest Man in 2019, amongst his closest pals.
“This is without doubt one of the few sports activities the place you’re competing towards anyone and cheering for them on the identical time,” Kearney says.
“And I believe it comes all the way down to the truth that all of us notice how a lot onerous work and sacrifice it takes to get to this stage.”
That camaraderie was there within the Eighties and 90s, however today strict diets and even stricter exercise plans have changed mid-competition ingesting classes and night-time revelry.
Probably the most profitable strongmen make use of coaches, nutritionists and masseuses, a step in direction of professionalism that Magnús Ver Magnússon, an Icelander who gained World’s Strongest Man 4 instances within the Nineties, says has been made potential by social media.
“I want I'd have had that,” he says. “It might have given me an even bigger alternative to earn greater cash and you understand, plenty of these guys are actually just about counting on that, that sponsorship this or that, and it permits them to focus fully on their sport.”
Against this, Magnússon labored as a ship mechanic all through his strongman profession. And whereas at the moment nearly each competitor could have entry to gyms the place they will use yokes or anvils, Magnússon was basically turning up blind.
“I by no means educated on the gear. I simply confirmed up at competitions and competed,” he says.
The accessibility of athletes previous and current in Sacramento is an indication that the game isn’t fairly mainstream but. The opponents stroll previous the gang on their solution to the competitors space and stagger again the identical manner as soon as they’re accomplished. Regardless of their seen exhaustion – some had been limping as they walked away from a “deadlift ladder” – most stopped to pose for images and chat.
There have been younger folks within the crowd, however for all the game’s newfound recognition, nostalgia is a giant draw. Colin Bryce, the larger-than-life match director who can also be concerned in Giants Dwell strongman exhibits which have stuffed the Royal Albert Corridor, stated knowledge confirmed their typical attendee for British exhibits was a 48-year-old girl residing outdoors of London.
“It’s such a standard story: ‘I watched this with my dad at Christmas, and I need to cross it on to my children,’” Bryce says.
The competitors that demographic witnesses at the moment gained’t fairly be the identical as that of their youth. Strongman has lastly advanced from what Terry Hollands, a Brit whose strongman profession spanned from the early 2000s to 2021, describes as “slightly little bit of a circus present”, however the fundamental draw stays the identical because it ever was: seeing enormous males carry unbelievably heavy issues.
For Novikov, it wasn’t meant to be. He led the ultimate on the finish of the primary day, setting the quickest time within the truck pull and deadlifting a automobile till blood began gushing from his nostril.
Within the penultimate occasion, nonetheless, Novikov struggled, and he was overtaken within the leaderboard by the 6ft 8in, 400lb Tom Stoltman.
Stoltman went on to win, Licis got here second, and Novikov took third place.
“I'm completely happy, though I'm drained and my physique hurts, but it surely was a struggle of very excessive stage athletes,” Novikov wrote on Instagram.
Novikov has extra competitions scheduled. However first, he'll return to Ukraine, the place he hopes to rejoin the navy group he educated with earlier this yr.
“For me it's a vacation,” Novikov stated of his week competing within the California solar. The extra vital work will begin once more quickly.
This text was amended on 1 June 2022 to right the burden of the Volkswagen Beetles the athletes carried.
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