Welcome to our Icons Of Strength, we have compiled a list of some of our favorite strength athletes including old school circus strongmen to current day monsters.
George Zottman
George Zottman was born in 1867 Philadelphia a renowned strongman in his day with huge forearms and pressing power.
He went on to set numerous records, some still stand to this day! He holds the record for seated dumbbell clean with a monstrous 175 lbs / kgs, that is seriously impressive, give it a go next time you’re in the gym if you are feeling brave enough..
He was one of the strongest men in the United States during the 1890’s and had an impressive physique to go with it. Back then it was rare for someone to have such huge arms, his shoulder width was 24” with 19” biceps and 15” forearms.
One of his secrets to these huge forearms was a curl he created, the Zottman curl which is still one of the best forearm builders to this day, apparently he used to curl 50lbs / 22.5kgs for easy reps! George Zottman is a true legend of strength in our eyes and makes it into the Icons Of Strength!
Mark Felix
Mark Felix is not only is he unbelievable strongman he is also has insanely good grip strength.
A 10 times world strongest man competitor just goes to show how strong he is. Known for being one of the greatest deadlifters of all time, the most notable of all when he lifted 1,128 lb (512 kg) on the Hummer Tire Strongman Deadlift.
Along with his strongman career he was very competitive in the grip scene, once holding the Rolling Thunder deadlift world record at 301lbs / 136.5kg on his way to winning the 2008 Rolling Thunder World Championships, to which he successfully defended the year after.
A couple of years later in 2012 he again broke his own world record by over 20lbs taking it to 323.5lbs / 147kgs. This was broken by Alexey Tyukalov the year after and has remained since at an unbelievable 332lbs / 150.5kg He has also competed in many other grip competitions blowing away everyone else with his raw grip power.
Mark is a true great of strength training and has a great persona to go with it which means he easily makes it into our Icons of Strength.
Magnus Samuelsson
The man the myth the legend! Magnus Samuelsson, as far as idols go this guy has to be my number one. One of only 5 guys to ever close the #4 Captains of Crush Gripper he is a true Grip God.
Son of a former Swedish arm wrestling champion, Magnus has been ranked as not only a World’s Strongest Man champion and 10 time finalist but as one of the best arm wrestlers in the world once being the European Arm Wrestling champion.
During his strongman career he amassed a total of 31 podium finishes making him one of the all-time greats of the sport.
He is more famously known for accidentally breaking the arm of Australian wrestler Nathan Jones’ arm during the heats of World Strongest man in the Bahamas 1995.
Magnus features in the Worlds Strongest Arms DVD which takes you through some of his previous experiences and training techniques. Some of these I have been using and seen great results.
