Talk:Strongman

Ivan Poddubniy
I have a question. In the list of famous strongmen, how come Ivan Poddubniy, the famous Russian wrestler and strongman in the beginning of 20th Century, who worked out with a barbell that weighted 125 kg, and could stop a horse-drawn wagon by grabbing onto the back wheel, and was seen wrestling bulls to the ground by their horns, is not included? --SergeiXXX 01:25, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Don't you worry about it, Sergei; he allready is on the list. 84.87.138.105 12:51, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Use of the word "grassroots"
i think the use of the word grassroots is a bit weird, i would think such evenements would rather be organised by horeca then politics. when it's meant to mean locally, why not just use local, or perhaps use community, when it is meant to mean that, or regionally if what is meant is the subnational aspect. i think a serious term that tells a lot about more ideal or political movements should not be used for random party's or evenements, since some grassroots developments (most actually) are still part of a serious debate. could be i am oversensitive here, or that the initial writers of this article are from a region where such a use of the word is common, for me personally i have never seen it used worse, altho perhaps one or two times in a somewhat dubious context.24.132.171.225 (talk) 10:42, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Merge from Strength athlete
Strength athlete is a duplicate stub of this article. Suggesting: 10:42, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Merging contents of Strength athlete into Strongman (strength athlete)
 * Turning Strength athlete into a #REDIRECT Strongman (strength athlete)


 * Strongly Disagree. This article explicitly addresses only historical "strongman" competitions; there is far more duplication between Strongman (strength athlete) and Strength athletics (the latter of which deserves a more specific primary name)—I suggest merging those two articles. Strength athlete is still a stub, however it clearly describes a term that extends beyond strongman competitions: there are far more American football, rugby, and track and field competitors who consider themselves "strength athletes" than there are people who compete in strongman competitions. Rvcx (talk) 12:00, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I also disagree with the merge as Strength athlete clearly refers to strong sportspeople in general rather than anything to do with competitions or feats based on strength alone. I'm removing the merge tags now. Sillyfolkboy (talk) (edits) Join WikiProject Athletics!  12:10, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Also disagree with the merging. Instead weed out (and merge into there ->) what is circus strongman events (like the teeth pulling picture) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.226.238.167 (talk) 12:28, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
 * This discussion was ignored, or to be charitable, unknown, to the small group of editors who just deleted Category:Strongman and upmerged it into Category:Strength athletes, a case-in-point of editors with no knowledge of the topic deciding to change categories to suit guidelines, they claim, without any actual reference to or knowledge of the material in question.Skookum1 (talk) 05:42, 5 July 2014 (UTC)


 * Oppose per discussion above. -- CFCF  🍌 (email) 12:54, 5 July 2014 (UTC)


 * So I think we have had some confusion on this point between editors. Strongman is a huge article talking about the history of strongmen. Strength Athletics is a huge article talking about strength competitions. These articles are probably too massive to be merged. Strength athlete is a worthless article and I believe was the original target of the merge discussion. So I'm going to redirect Strength athlete to Strongman which seams appropriate. I think the article Strength athletics should be renamed to "Strongman (competitions)" and Strongman should be renamed "Strongman (history)" but I'm not doing name changes without consensus. StarHOG (Talk) 14:55, 25 May 2023 (UTC)

Evidence of subjectivity
Under the Events section, the first sentence appears to be very subjective and thus deviates from WP:NPOV. Could someone please correct this? Thanks, Rubik&#39;s Maniac (talk) 05:43, 26 January 2013 (UTC)

Error 404 link removed
I removed a link to http://www.worldstrongmanfederation.org/ as the site does not exist. Last time I did that a self appointed "God", (his user name was "Dia") took me to task, for removing a link,(even though it didn't exist). So here is a heads up. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kurtdriver (talk • contribs) 03:38, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

Requested move 3 March 2022

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: All moved (non-admin closure) Spekkios (talk) 03:05, 8 April 2022 (UTC)

– The athlete is primary topic by longterm significance, and the political usage, which is based on the athletic usage, can be naturally disambiguated. Therefore, this is not a WP:NOPRIMARY situation. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 16:26, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
 * Strongman (strength athlete) → Strongman
 * Strongman (politics) → Political strongman
 * Strongman → Strongman (disambiguation)
 * Support the primary topic move; neutral on the politician move. Even with the politician topic included, the athlete appears to be primary by usage, having as many views as all other topics combined: massviews here.&#32;-- Fyrael (talk) 21:43, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
 * Support as per nominator. 14.2.195.135 (talk) 09:49, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
 * Support. Very clear primary topic. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:10, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
 * Oppose primary topic move (no opinion on the proposed alternative disambiguation for the political strongmen). I don't believe I can see the athlete as having greater long-term significance, and there is visibly no primary topic with respect to usage: among the readers who land on the dab page, those who click on the link this article make up 52–61%. – Uanfala (talk) 00:06, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
 * could you link to the tool where you're seeing that? Also, 52-61% means that it's "more likely than all the other topics combined", which is (part of) the suggested threshold for being primary by usage. Right?&#32;-- Fyrael (talk) 04:57, 10 March 2022 (UTC)
 * Ah, sorry. That's Wikinav: it visualises the clickstream dataset, so when evaluating outgoing traffic, you need to take into account the fact the percentages shown (60.71% for the athlete) are relative to the total traffic that's made it into the dataset, which excludes (for privacy reasons) destinations with fewer than 10 clicks for the month. If you count the number of links on the dab page that are thus excluded, and allow that the clicks for them can range between 0 and 9, and then recalculate, you'll arrive at the the above range. Yes, the proposed primary article gets more than half of the traffic, but not significantly more: some people would see that as indicative of a primary topic, but I don't believe most of us would. – Uanfala (talk) 15:42, 10 March 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Removal of "Best Win/ Accolade" column in international accolades tables.
@Nir007H Thought it'd be good to discuss the removal of the "Best Win/ Accolade" column from the international accolades table as I just dont think it really makes sense to be there. I think its way too subjective as to what is someone's "best win" some might think that it's winning an Arnold's some might thinks it's winning World's Strongest Man and I dont think anyone would really see Pudz'/Ver Magnusson's/Sigmarsson's best accolade as being in the hall of fame over their WSM wins.

I'm not even quite sure what events "Multiple times world champion" is including, I'm assuming it's both Arnolds and WSM but thats again subjective to say someone who wins the arnolds is a world champion and just overall confusing honestly. Hopefully you can kinda see what I'm getting at. Brandon Downes (talk) 04:03, 22 August 2023 (UTC)


 * @Brandon Downes Hello, I insist we should keep it. Here are my reasons: It clearly differentiates those who won major international titles (where it's marked bold) vs minor international titles (not bolded). Take Krzysztof Radzikowski, Aivars Šmaukstelis and Ervin Katona for example. They have won more international titles than Jón Páll Sigmarsson, Magnús Ver Magnússon and Magnus Samuelsson; BUT none of them have won a major international title. The reasons for WSM, WMPC, ASC to stand above: These three comps are the longest running and the top 2 of their eras: WSM and WMPC before 2004 and WSM and ASC since 2002. Whoever has won two of the three has tagged 'Multiple times World Champion' who are also bolded in 'Modern Strongmen' subsection.
 * But as you say, I agree with World's Strongest Man Hall of Famer might create confusion (the reason why I included it was the impression that it would add more value than merely saying World's Strongest Man). Therefore, with refer to Mariusz Pudzianowski, Jón Páll Sigmarsson, Magnús Ver Magnússon, Magnus Samuelsson, Bill Kazmaier, Svend Karlsen, I suggest we will add 'Multiple times World Champion' except for Magnus Samuelsson who has neither won both WSM & WMPC, or WSM & ASC or WSM multiple times. (Other five belongs to at least one of the three above circumstances hence are entitled for Multiple times World Champion).
 * Hope you agree, so we'll make the amendment. Nir007H (talk) 05:43, 22 August 2023 (UTC)
 * See the problem is you've made a personal decision on what is and what isnt a major or minor international title when there is no official framework for that and you've made the personal decision that someone who wins the Arnold's is a "world champion". You've somehow decided that ESM a competition that has been going since 1980 in the strongest region for strongmen which can be seen from the fact that 37/50 top strongmen for accolades are European is somehow a minor title.
 * Also I just dont see how you can say people like Thor/Martins/Hooper are "Multiple times world champions" as this immediately causes confusion for people who dont follow the sport reiligiously as the competition they are most likely to know is World's Strongest Man so to them they are going to believe that they have won WSM multiple times when they haven't.
 * At the end of the day it comes down to is there a factual basis to definitively say what is someones "best win/accolade" and I dont think that there is. Brandon Downes (talk) 18:12, 22 August 2023 (UTC)
 * @Brandon Downes There is no universal federation to govern strongman, that is the biggest issue here. However, like in every other sport there are major titles or competitions to win.
 * The top 2 comps for the eras is not my personal decision. H.J. Lutcher Stark Center (with numerous resource persons involved) implies that back in the day WSM and WMPC were the most prestigious titles of the sport and moving forward to the 21st century, it is WSM and ASC. The Arnold Sports Festival infact is the largest multi-sport festival on earth; being even bigger than the Olympics. Moving forward I personally predict WSM, ASC, RI and SC (SMOE) would be the 4 main titles, however that is only speculation for the time being. Agree that ESM was going on from 80, but when you miss athletes from US, how can you really consider it in the league of WSM or ASC (both which includes the top athletes covering all continents)? In my opinion, Fortissimus, World's Ultimate Strongman, Rogue Invitational and Shaw Classic has a better athlete coverage than ESM simply because they all involve the top athletes from all over the world. Something we might overlook is that IFSA and WSM during the split years also didn't contain the top athletes in any of the two since the athletes were divided between the two comps. Collins Dictionary defines a world champion as someone who has won a competition open to people throughout the whole world. As for multiple, Cambridge Dictionary defines multiple as very many of the same type, or of different types. Encyclopedia Britannica defines multiple as more than one. Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines multiple as something in units of more than one or two.
 * Therefore it is very reasonable and justifiable to say those who have won more than one title of WSM and/or WMPC and/or ASC at any combination, as a Multiple times World Champion. Those who have won one of the three titles at least once can be given the name of the title. Above two circumstances to be bolded to separate them from those who have won only minor title/s. For example, take Strongman Champions League which organize so many comps without the participation of the top athletes. Because of this reason, a differentiation of Major titles should be there because eventhough Krzysztof Radzikowski, Aivars Šmaukstelis, Ervin Katona etc, are placed ahead of Jón Páll Sigmarsson, Magnús Ver Magnússon, Magnus Samuelsson etc, based on the number of international titles they won, the latter group is more renowned for their major title wins. Leaving that column out does not justify above. Or else we need to have two separate tables: first the list who have won major titles and next those who have not won a mojor title. The column should be there and it should indicate what their major win/wins are.
 * Note: Shall do the change with refer to replacing WSM HOF with the title/s. Also please don't forget to tag me when you reply so I will get the notification. Nir007H (talk) 06:41, 23 August 2023 (UTC)
 * @Nir007H The Collins dictionary defines a world champion as someone who has won a competition open to people throughout the world... Fortissimus/WUS/Rogue Invitational/Shaw Classic/Giants live events are competitions open to people throughout the world. So are we saying they are now world championships? People who win gold in the olympics have won a championship in a competition open to people throughout the world but they are not known as world champions as that is a title given out in the world championships.
 * Your point about Aivars/Krzysztof/Katona is irrelevant, the purpose of the table is to list the number of international accolades it doesn't matter if they have more than people who have won what you deem to be more prestigious events.
 * As an example look at Tennis players with most titles in the Open Era all you have is a list of players with most titles, they havent stated what they believe are the best titles whether that be major/minor titles as that is not the tables purpose and thats in a sport that does have specific framework to count majors/minor titles. Strongman doesnt even have that framework but you've taken it upon yourself to decide what is and what isnt someone's best win and also to only specifically grant ASC "world championship" status alongside WSM which is obvious given its name and also it being the most popular strongman event gloablly, when by the definition you have provided many competitions meet this criteria some which you dont even deem to be major titles.
 * Once again there is no official framework and that column is not based in fact but opinion. Brandon Downes (talk) 22:36, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

Removal of "Best Win/Accolade" column
As the discussion above has seemingly stagnated I have gone ahead and removed the "Best Win/Accolade" column due to it being based on subjective opinion and not in fact. The table is for international accolades, there is no official governing body for strongman and no consensus on what makes an event win better than any other event win and also the decision to chose 3 events without consensus to garner the title of world champion is also a personal opinion and not based in any official consensus or fact. Brandon Downes (talk) 14:26, 10 September 2023 (UTC)