World’s strongest men defy stereotypes, spread love

Eddie Williams is a schoolteacher from Monday to Friday and a wedding singer on weekends.

- PAULA RAMON

In his spare time, he lifts enormously heavy weights as he competes to be the world’s strongest man.

Some people think weightlifters are “a lot of angry people who just like to throw weight around”, the 190kg Australian said, but “I can be, you know, a happy person, and still be able to lift heavy weights”.

Dripping with sweat after a Stone Medley — that is lifting very heavy stones — Williams insisted there is no contradiction between strength and likability. His wife Hannah agreed.

“They’re these gentle giants that are just so lovely, such beautiful human beings that are caring, and they're all cheering for each other,” she said.

They were in the California capital Sacramento for the World’s Strongest Man competition, taking place earlier this month.

Human colossuses like Williams, with sculpted backs, impossibly muscled arms and rippling thighs, compete by lifting objects up to twice their own weight — or more.

Mitchell Hooper, a 29-year-old former champion who has a master’s degree in clinical exercise physiology, agreed that people have a mistaken idea about competitive weightlifters.