by Ben Hanson

Early last year, I published the beginning of a multiple part piece entitled "It started with a picture" detailing the process my dad and I went through to get a strongman contest up and running at our county fair.

While the conclusion to the piece is still forthcoming, we have continued promoting the contest, making it into one of the centerpieces of the fair. Recently, a reporter from the local news paper called me to do an interview regarding the upcoming contest. It's a really good article and you can read the original here.

WASECA -- Ever try pulling a 23,000 pound semi truck?

Of course not.

Ask someone like Ben Hanson and he'll say 'of course'.

In fact, Hanson, a 32-year-old weight lifter from Waseca, will perform that unorthodox method of mass movement Saturday as a competitor of the North American Strong Man Contest, which will be held at 10:30 a.m. at the Waseca County Free Fair.

"It's the contest I most look forward to each year," said Hanson, who competes in roughly half a dozen contests each year.

And pulling semis is just scratching the surface of the Strongman.

Lifters such as Hanson will also man the tasks of dead-lifting weight, pressing kegs overhead, hauling oxen yoke and loading concrete stones.

Naturally, all these events incorporate an astounding amount of weight.

The semi truck is 23,000 pounds worth of pulling. Following that event is the dead-lift, which starts at 405 pounds and continues to climb until the last man standing succeeds. Next in line is the keg press, requiring men to lift four kegs (ranging from 160-240 pounds) of increasing weight overhead as quickly as they can. Following is the Super Yoke, where lifters burden 750 pounds (650 for lightweights) over a 75 foot course, one Hanson called "spine-wrenching." Capping of the contest is the Atlas Stones, calling for competitors to pick up spherical stones (240-370 pounds) off of the ground and load them onto a four-inch platform.

"The Atlas Stones have become a mainstay at the fair," Hanson noted, "and will again put an exclamation point on what's sure to be a very close race."

And if you ever wondered what one thinks about when all of the weight is being controlled by muscles and exoskeletons, Hanson can probably answer for everybody.

"Not screwing up," he said. "One mistake can negate the gains of weeks of hard training. One bad event can mean the difference between going home a winner and just going home."

When those initial 'don't-screw-up' thoughts subside, Hanson, however, says that he thinks about "Absolutely nothing," adding, "my mind is blank."

That kind of focus enabled Hanson to take second place behind Atilla Gabrielli last year at the fair in the lightweight division, just like he had two years ago. This summer, Gabrielli bowed out of the contest due to a broken ankle.

"I only have on goal in mind," Hanson said.

Whether Hanson wins or not, as long as he places in the top three he, among others, will earn an invitation in September to the North American Strongman national championship in Salt Lake City, Utah.
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But first and foremost he is looking forward to Waseca County Free Fair's Strongman.

"It's special for me," Hanson said. "My dad does so much to make this contest possible and I want to make him proud. The county fair gives us a great stage and it's definitely a boost so see so many fans each year."

by Ben Hanson

We were southbound on I-25, battling fierce winds and driving rain, trying to make the last 40 miles from Deadwood, SD to Cheyenne, WY when my cell phone rang. It was my dad.

"Where are you right now?" he said.
"About half hour north of Cheyenne. Why?"
"I just heard that Windsor, Colorado was hit hard by a tornado. Wasn't that where you were supposed to be competing this weekend?"

I thanked my dad and hung up to concentrate on driving As we approached the northern outskirts of Cheyenne, my girlfriend turned on the radio. The first clear station the seek button found informed us that a tornado had just touched down on the southern edge of Cheyenne. Cheyenne isn't a very large city and I took the next exit to seek refuge in a convenience store.

The next hour was spent staring out a plate glass window and listening to weather report after weather report while waiting for the storms to pass so we could finish the last five miles of our journey.

When we finally made it into Chyenne, my first call was to North American Strongman, Inc president, Willie Wessels. Not only hadn't he heard if the contest was still a go, he hadn't even heard there was a tornado! He thanked me for calling him and let me know that he'd try contacting the contest promoter and let me know what he found out. Around 8:00 pm, the power went out, so we went outside to enjoy the view from the wrap-around deck on our cabin and this is what we saw.

When we awoke the next morning, we turned on the news to find that another tornado had hit Cheyenne just about the time the power went out. Still unsure of whether or not the contest was going to be held, we checked out of our cabin and headed to Rocky Mountain National Park en route to our hotel near the contest site. I was worried about making weight and I was starving, so I called a few friends to see if they knew anything about the status of the contest. The bathroom scale I'd brought weighed me in at 230 lbs on the nuts, which is much too close for comfort. If the contest was going to be canceled, I wanted to partake in the bounty of ham sandwiches, summer sausage, and wine that we packed while viewing the majesty of the Rocky Mountains.

On the way from the mountains to our hotel, I got the message that I'd been waiting for: The contest was still on. Instead of being held at the original location in Windsor, however, it was being held in nearby Loveland. After checking into the hotel, we decided to drive by the address we were given to see if it was the right place. After all, the address we were given looked to be residential. When we arrived at 1702 W. 8th Street, all we saw was an older home with a gravel driveway and a pair of RVs in their rather small back yard. Double and triple checking the address (at least the one I'd written down) confirmed that we were at the right house.

Continue reading "Windsor Colorado Contest Report"

by Mike Gill

Many people have asked me to write more about why I cut nearly 50 lbs and how I did it. Deciding to change weights was a mental struggle for me for a number of reasons. I had invested a lot of money, time and training into becoming big and I liked it. To me, being big and powerful was something I admired since I was a kid. So cutting felt like I was moving backwards. Plus in this sport, smaller is almost always equated with weaker and my goal has always been to be the strongest I could be.

Much has changed though at how we look at training and nutrition and I hoped that if I did things correctly, my progress lost would be minimal. I also felt that the trade off of less bodyweight would also lead to increased health. Even though I was lean and my blood pressure, cholesterol and other health indicators seemed to be good being that heavy was talking a toll on my body.

I was eating about 6,000 calories a day to keep my weight up. I was constantly full and my stomach was regularly distended. The arthritis in had gotten worse since adding the weight. I'm on my feet 12-14 hours a day at the gym and the additional stress of 50lbs was adding up. Health wise, cutting seemed like a smart move.

As far as competing goes, I was holding my own as a heavy. I had won or placed second at a number of regional contests and regularly beat guys much larger than me. But after 2 years of local contests I went to nationals and had a poor showing. I didn't put in the effort necessary to be ready like I should have. Perhaps more important however, was for the first time I had a look into where my weaknesses lay and where I needed improvement. I felt that if I wanted to turn pro as a heavy, I would need another two years of serious strength, endurance and speed training. I'll be 36 this November and not getting my card until I was 38 was not appealing.

On Saturdays I train with two lightweight professionals; Glenn Kaifas and Kevin Nowak. At 280lbs my ability ran close to theirs. I was slower than them on some of the medleys and equal on stones and tire flipping. But on pressing events I had an advantage. I knew that I was holding 10-15lbs of bloat that would not affect my strength if I dropped it and I was also carrying some "extra muscle" that was not doing me much good either.

I knew some of my muscle was, in scientific terms, caused by sarcoplasmic hypertrophy. What this means is the muscle has gotten bigger by increasing the amount of fluild they hold without increasing my strength. This useless muscle could be shed and not impact my lifts. I estimated that between those two factors I could lose about 30lbs and maintain most of my current strength while getting faster. This would put me at 245-250lbs; 15-20lbs over the weight class limit. If necessary I could cut water the last few days of the contest and make weight.

Continue reading "Making the Cut"

by Ben Hanson

On Friday, June 20 2008, the world lost my friend and teammate, Mike Lundberg. While I'm fully aware that most people reading this never knew Mike, he's one of those men whose words and actions will inspire his friends far beyond the athletic arena and into the depths of real life. To not share his story would be selfish.

When the members of the St Paul Pigs rugby club first met Mike, he was a scrappy, 190 lb ball of fire fresh out of college. He didn't know shit about rugby, but he was a gamer, and we knew that by the time he finished his first practice. As long as I've been playing rugby, there have very few rookies I,ve felt comfortable playing aside. Mikey was one of the guys I never worried about. In his first match, we told him to go out there and bust some heads. Despite being behind by a sizeable margin, he'd busted more heads than the rest of us and he was the one who gave the halftime pep talk, and he was a rookie!

From that day on, we knew we had a Piggie for life. Through the good times and bad, and believe me, there were a lot more bad than good, Mikey was the one who kept it all together. As much as most athletes will deny it, it's really easy to play half-assed when you're down by 30 points in the second half, but Mike was the one who never let us give up. No matter how many points we trailed by, Mikey was the one always going balls-out, forcing us to keep up. No matter how much the coach yelled at us, Mikey led by example (and obnoxious words at half-time). We had no choice but to follow his example or look bad.

At the end of the 2003 fall season, we said our goodbyes and made our plans to come back as a better Pigs team in 2004, only there was one major hurdle: On Christmas Eve, 2003, Mike was diagnosed with Leukemia. While we all knew it was some sort of cancer, most of us didn't realize it's severity until the first time we went to visit him in the hospital.

The first night we all went to see him, we all knew he was going to recover and be back with us by the fall. He was too much of a badass not to. We all met at Hubert's Bar a few blocks from the hospital because we'd never had any friends with cancer before. When we worked up the courage to walk up to the hospital room to see him, he was just like he always was, except he was wearing a mask over his mouth and lying on a bed. He said he might miss the spring season because chemo is a bitch, but he promised us he'd be back out for the league season in the fall of 2004.

Continue reading "A Tribute to Mike Lundburg"

by Mike Gill

After a big breakfast we arrived at the contest site in Mercer County park. The Masters division competitors were hitting it hard when we got there and I saw a few familiar faces on the floor. Mike Ambrose and Mike Westerling were kicking some ass. After I checked in I weighed myself again and was up to 240. That is a weight I had been feeling my best at during training and I was happy to be back there. I had some friends (Mark and Corinne) come out to support me and they arrived just before we got started. Corinne agreed to video tape us for the day and that would be a big help. I drew the seventh starting position out of twenty four competitors and Glenn and Josh would be competing as heavies.

First up was a six keg loading medley. We typically know the events in advance of the contest and I had been practicing all of them for the last 8 weeks. The kegs are placed in groups of two, twenty feet away from a five foot tall loading platform. The object is to get them all loaded in the shortest amount of time possible. Out of the six strongmen ahead of me only one had successfully loaded all of the kegs in the allotted time. I felt good going in to this event and I was going to do my best to make a statement.

Willie the head judge told me to place my hands on the keg and wait for his go. I took my position and when he blew his whistle my day was underway. The first keg of 180 lbs felt light as air. I ripped it off the ground with one arm, cradled it and ran to the platform. I loaded it with ease. The second keg at 200lbs felt just as light. I ripped though the series knowing I was setting a very good pace. I never slowed on any of the kegs. The final keg of 290 lbs went up just as quickly as the others with just a slight extra push needed for the final load. I finished in 53 seconds about twenty seconds faster than the other competitor who had loaded all six. Now I just had to sit back and wait. And waiting it out in first place is much easier than knowing I have points to make up.

Only one other athlete completed the keg load and I bested his time as well, putting me in first for the event. I felt great after and had plenty of time to hydrate and get a granola bar in me. By now it was after 1pm and 90 degrees outside. The humidity was unbearable and everyone was working hard to stay cool. I iced myself down and warmed up for the log press which was the second event.

Continue reading "Turning Pro, Part II"

by Ben Corman

Photo Credit: Michael Ambrose

by Mike Gill

When I started training for strongman contests in March of 2006, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. This blog has detailed my ups and downs until mid last year when I simply ran out of time to get my thoughts on paper. After a mid-summer win in my weight class of Western New York's Strongest Man I put my sights on Nationals.

Nationals took place in November during the week of my 35th birthday in Las Vegas. I felt I was ready to challenge the best amateurs in the nation. I had put everything into my training up to this point and continued to train hard to get ready for this contest when something bigger presented itself. My friend and training partner approached me with an opportunity open a state of the art fitness center with him. I accepted and we began working to get the place open for the beginning of December.

Because of this, I let my training slide and when I got to nationals, it showed. I was slow, tired and average in my performance. It was the first real disappointment in a contest since I'd first decided that strongman is what I want to do with my life. Glenn worked tirelessly while I was gone and we got the gym opened on time and it has been a great success for us.

The beating I took in Vegas stayed with me and when I returned, I questioned my approach to becoming a professional strongman. I was pushing hard to be a heavyweight. In 2 years I had taken my weight from 240lbs to 280lbs. I was lean and strong at that weight but I was constantly eating and if I did too much conditioning training I lost weight very quickly. I was forcing myself to be big, and if you want to be good as a heavyweight you have to be naturally big. Almost bigger than life.

The only strongman the the public ever sees is what is presented to them on ESPN: The unlimited weight class of the Worlds Strongest Man. But there is another side to the sport made up of some the most agile, well conditioned athletes on the planet: The 231lbs class of strongmen. With the weights lifted in competition running nearly parallel to the super heavies, the lightweights must make weight the day before the contest to compete. Although this group of competitors is just as impressive as the heavies (if not more so) the public wants to see the most massive men lifting the biggest objects possible, so that is what TV presents. I took some time to consider my options: Get bigger and faster to be more competitive as a heavy or cut nearly 50lbs of hard earned muscle to make lightweights.

Several things played into my final decision. At 35 years old my body has been subjected to vigorous training for nearly 20 years. I've wrestled, trained Brazilian Jui Jitsu, done multiple triathlons and duathalons, mountain biked, and squatted thousands upon thousands of reps. Both knees have stage III arthritis and I have a heart murmur. The most I ever weighed before training for strongman was 245 lbs. It was a weight where I looked and felt good. So after much consideration the obvious choice was to make the big cut. There was a contest in New Jersey that was scheduled for mid June. The winner would become a pro light weight and recieve an invite to pro nationals all at once. I circled June 14th on my calender.

In Mid January I packed up the carbohydrates and began the Anabolic Diet. By eating large amounts of fats and proteins you can force your body to burn body fat at a very rapid pace. In just a few weeks I was down 20 lbs and by March I was 255. During this cut, I had maintained most of my strength but it was in irregular and unpredictable waves. Some days I was as strong as ever while other days I could barely hit my openers.

To say I was frustrated was an understatement. I began talking with Glenn about what I was doing wrong. I had not changed my training style (I was doing very little conditioning work) and I was getting frustrated. Glenn is also a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist. Now, I think I'm one hell of trainer but my problem was not my knowledge. It was with myself and a with recognizing where my weaknesses lie. I asked Glenn to take over my diet and training and he gladly accepted with one caveat; I would do exactly what he told me without question. I agreed and he began to get to work on me.

He added more carbohydrates into my diet to stabilize my energy levels and reduced the amounts of fat which caused me to begin to lose muscle. He stopped me from doing any exercise over 5 reps and swapped them out for Olympic lifts and strongman events. I dropped more muscle and fat. He ran my ass off. I got lean. We added flexibility, Yoga, and ART (Active Release Therapy) sessions in to my training and my balance and range of motion improved. By the beginning of May I was 245 pounds and began setting weekly Personal Records (PR's) in the gym which made me feel like I was on the right path again. I was barely touching a weight lifting bar during the week, but I was all over the tires, chains, kegs and logs. The implements began to feel like extensions of my body. I knew exactly what I was going to do with them from the very second I picked one up. It was never a surprise to me anymore when I hit a new number with one. My confidence level began to build and internally I felt like was stronger than ever. Stronger than I was at 280.

Besides revamping my entire approach, Glenn pushed me like race card driver pushes his vehicle. If he thought I was dogging it, he would get in my ear and scream at me. He would remind me why I was doing what I was doing and that everyone else wanted to win as badly as I did. If he didn't like what I put on my training plate he would make me eat something else. He not only began to transform my skills but my mindset as well.

Two weeks away from the contest I was just 238 pounds at 7% body fat. I hit 3 PR's in training and felt that I was ready to make my mark as a lightweight.

Glenn and I rented a car with our good friend and fellow competitor Josh Cybart and headed 400 miles east to Trenton, NJ. At weigh in I was 231.4; the max allowed weight. I wore a sauna suit for the last two hours of the drive just to lose that last couple of pounds and it worked perfectly. We ate, went food shopping and got to bed early to get ready to tame The North East Beast the following morning.