How Strong Was Mark Henry Really?

[Music] hi and welcome to today's video at the height of his strength career Mark Henry was widely considered to be the strongest man in the world and some even believe he may be the strongest man of all time but was he really Mark Henry was born in Silsby Texas on the 12th of June 1971. he quickly outgrew other children of his age and by the fourth grade he already stood five feet and five inches tall and weighed 220 pounds it was around the same time that Mark's mother purchased a set of Weights in the hope that it would keep Mark and his older brother Patrick out of trouble the boys trained with this set adding additional weight to the bar with blocks of cement when Mark strolled into Silsbee high school as a freshman in 1986 he quickly found the weight room in one of his first workouts he loaded the bar to 315 pounds for a warm-up before adding two plates after each successful squat with approximately 600 pounds on the bar he performed several repetitions prior to being stopped by his coach in his sophomore year Henry weighed 350 pounds and lettered in football and basketball Silsbee High also formed its first power lifting team he won his first Texas State High School powerlifting championship in the super heavyweight division as a sophomore in 1988 a title he would win again for the following two years consecutively by the time he graduated Henry had broken the state records in all three power lifts with a 832 pound squat a 525 pound bench press and an 815 pound deadlift [Music] following this state meet in April of 1990 Henry competed in the National High School powerlifting championships where he set new National records in all three lifts to achieve a 2033 pound National Record total according to the LA Times his total was the eighth best in the world regardless of age at that time in 1990 while winning his third state championship Henry met former powerlifters Jan and Terry Todd after watching Henry lift Terry asked Mark if he had ever considered Olympic weightlifting to Terry's surprise Mark replied that the Russian Olympic champion vasili alexiv was one of his great Heroes following this meeting Jan and Terry Todd were excited by this young man's potential and so they agreed to bring him to Austin Texas great tryout with an Olympic lifting expert in the early summer of 1990 Mark and his mother traveled to Austin where he demonstrated that he had the ability and desire to become a great Olympic weightlifter most of this was done in the gym but Terry also witnessed that despite his huge size Mark could easily dunk a basketball his unusual combination of explosiveness flexibility and strength were unparalleled the still-growing Leviathan was invited to move in with the Todds at summer and began training under Terry's supervision on the Olympic lifts Mark's debut in Olympic lifting came just seven months later at a weightlifting tournament in Louisiana although his technique was far from perfect He Set four Junior National records at that mate the U.S weightlifting head coach Lynn Jones told Sports Illustrated after seeing Henry's debut performance he considered him the greatest natural Talent he'd ever seen with the 1992 Olympic Games less than a year away the U.S weightlifting Federation agreed to make room for Henry at the U.S Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs The Hope was that if Mark could nail the technique he would be in the running for an Olympic medal in April 1991 Mark won the United States National Junior Championships 20 days later he placed fourth at the U.S Senior national championships and finished sixth at the junior World weightlifting championship in Henry's first year in competitive weightlifting he broke all three Junior American records 12 times and became the United States top Super heavyweight at the age of 19 Henry had already managed to qualify for the 1992 Olympics where he finished 10th in the super heavyweight class after the Olympics Henry became more determined to focus on weightlifting and began competing all over the world in late 1992 he took the win at the USA weightlifting American open and further proved his dominance on the American soil by winning not only the U.S national weightlifting championships but also the U.S Olympic Festival championships in 1993 and 1994. at the 1995 Pan-American games Henry won a gold silver and bronze medal after several years living at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs it became apparent that Henry's progress had become stagnant this prompted Henry to return to Texas and Terry Todd book in his sole coach in the lead-up to the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta as Henry continued to train for Olympic weightlifting he and Todd began to blend in some powerlifting too and it strengthened the power lifts quickly grew Mark returned to competition at the 1995 U.S national powerlifting championships where he dominated the event with a 947 pound squat and a 903 pound deadlift that deadlift was the first over 900 pound ever made in a drug tested mate three months later Mark won the world powerlifting championships setting an all-time world record in the squad at 953 pounds and a drug tested world record totals 2 337 pounds this impressive powerlifting performance added to his Olympic lifting records began a discussion in many quarters of whether Mark Henry might be the greatest overall lifter in history in the spring of 1996 Mark earned the right to compete at the Olympics by winning the U.S national weightlifting championships for a third time during his victory Henry set an American record in the snatch at 397 pounds and clean and jerk at 485 pounds and re-improved his lifts to 407 pounds in the snatch and 507 pounds in the clean and jerk during his final eight weeks of preparation the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta Henry at 414 pounds in bodyweight became the largest athlete in Olympic history and was voted captain of the Olympic weightlifting team unfortunately he suffered a back injury during the competition and had to drop out resulting in Henry finishing in a disappointing 14th Place following the 1996 Olympic Games Henry retired from weightlifting vowing never to return unless the sport was clean of anabolic steroids Henry then signed a 10-year multi-million dollar contract with a WWE for whom he debuted on September 22nd 1996 as Henry's wrestling career developed he continued to train and perform impressive Feats of Strength and was billed as a world's strongest man on the basis of his five lift total in 2002 Henry took a Hiatus from the WWE to train and compete in the first iteration of the Arnold strongman classic called that year the Arnold strength Summit Henry trained for the competition under the guidance and tutelage of Terry Todd for four months practicing the events that included the clean and press of a replica of the famous apollon's wheels of the competition Henry weighed in at 410 pounds his event training paid dividend after he recorded three repetitions with the apollon's wheels to become the first man in history to achieve more than a single rep with a 360 pound weight this win helped him to claim a definitive victory over an international field of the world's best strongman to win the inaugural Arnold strongman classic following the Arnold strongman classic Mark vowed to become the first man in history to clean and press the 172 pound Thomas inch dumbbell with one hand and so after three months of training before a crowd at the association of old-time Bible and strong men dinner Mark lifted and pressed the unliftable dumbbell Henry would go on to become one of only a handful of people to deadlift the 238 pound Millennial dumbbell something also achieved more recently by Brian Shaw and Kiron sarichev [Music] [Laughter] now married and a father of two Mark Henry has a long career as a pro wrestler and was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2018. the main reasons behind some experts believe that Mark Henry may be the strongest man to ever live is the fact that he has strongly opposed the use of any performance-enhancing drugs and has only ever competed in fully drug tested competitions Henry's five-left total made up of a 180 kilogram snatch 220 kilogram clean and jerk 432.5 kilogram squat with wraps 235 kilogram bench press and finally 410 kilogram deadlift provide a super total of 1460 kilograms or 3219 pounds that is claimed to be the all-time highest combined weightlifting slash powerlifting total in history until recently Mark Henry was also the only tested power lifter the squad and dead left more than 900 pounds raw in a single competition Mark's best lifts outside of competitions include a squat of 1006 pounds bench press of 585 pounds a deadlift of 925 pounds and in weightlifting a snatch of 407 pounds and a clean and jerk of 507 pounds as well as these lifts Mark also recorded a front squat with 770 pounds and a behind the neck press of 400 pounds while these lifts are incredibly impressive given the lack of athletes who have competed in both powerlifting and weightlifting is a combined super total of these Sports really a viable way to come to the conclusion that Mark Henry was the strongest man to ever live that's it from me but thank you for watching if you enjoyed the video please take a moment to hit like share the video and subscribe for more thank you [Music]

Channel: Strength Universe

Views: 595,248

Keywords: squat, bench, deadlift, Strongman, strong, greatest of all time, olympics, wwe, henrie, marc

Id: 7FF3yucLqyQ

Length: 10min 11sec (611 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 25 2023