The Deadly Sleep Disorder Common Among Strongmen

What events do you really shine in? Log Press is my bread and butter as we talked about. Then there's the yoke walk, which is the crossbar with stains, pick it up on your back and walk with it. That's one event that I'm really well known for as well, and that's one that Martins tends to struggle at. Why are you so good at that? What's the deal? People call me Fred Flintstone of Strongman. I just move my feet really, really quick. I don't know. I don't know. For some reason, I just like feeling super heavy weight on my back and moving quick with it. World's Strongest Man, we had 1,350 pounds on that thing. Oh, God. Damn, that's so much weight. Yeah, it was a bitch. That's so much weight. And that was actually at the end of a medley, so we had a farmer's walk that was 330 pounds per hand, and then we had to pick up a 1,000-pound yoke and then the 1,350-pound yoke. Oh, my God. Yeah, and I was the only one in my group to actually finish that event, which was pretty wild. Damn, at the end of something like that, all your tissues must be so torn apart. Yeah. It was like, I mean, you talk about cranial pressure. I felt like my eyes were purple. Just from all the blood in your head. It was wild. Oh, yeah, I would imagine, right? That kind of cream. Have you ever... Do you know what happens when you fly in a jet that's going like... The G-forces instead of... Yeah, yeah, yeah. They call it hooking, where you hold onto the handle. You got to go like this. And then you're forcing blood. That's pretty much what we're doing when we do it. Because with Strongman, when you have 1,300 pounds on your back, you're not going to breathe that well. You can't really expand your lungs and your ribs to breathe properly. So you're almost holding your breath. So, and that's with most of our stuff. I hold my breath whenever I do moving events, and I just try to exhale and inhale as short and as small as possible, just to get enough so I don't pass out pretty much. Does anybody pass out? Oh, all the time. One of my good friends at World's Strongest Man in the Philippines in 2018, we were carrying like a 330-pound sandbag. And the way he carried it was just like resting right on his diaphragm, and he didn't pick it up high enough to go onto the platform. So he just ran into the platform, fell backwards, and was just out cold. And Magnus Vermagnesen is standing right next to him. Another awesome name. Great name. Didn't twitch, didn't move a muscle. He just goes, that's all he did. He just crazy is like, oh, he's dumb. He must have died. So it was just like, I mean, passing out is kind of like a normal part of what we do. I can only imagine. It doesn't sound good when I'm saying it out loud, but... Well, it makes sense though. I mean, the fucking exertion. Does anybody have heart attacks? Not typically. It has happened. How often does it happen? The only person that comes to mind is a guy, I can't remember what year, his name was Jesse Mirunde. And he did have a heart attack in the gym when he was training. And that's how he passed away. And he was only, I believe he was only 28 or 29 years old. It happens in jujitsu. Yeah. Guys get heart attacks training. And then, you know, I mean, another thing is like sleep apnea because the guys are so big. So that caused a lot of stress on the heart. Do you use a CPAP machine or anything? I don't. I don't need one. You know, I'm pretty fortunate that I don't have that issue when I sleep. You know, but a previous coach of mine, Mike Jenkins, he passed away in 2013 because of sleep apnea and, you know, just the strain on his heart. So it's not good. It's basically like not sleeping. Yeah. I mean, you're suffocating yourself. Yeah. It's crazy. So a lot of the guys at this level do, but I mean, but that's mainly like because of their size. I have it. Really? Yeah. Yeah. I have a fat tongue and my neck. It's just all. Well, that's all. But that's all the years of fighting. Like with that neck musculature and all that development there. Yeah. For some reason, like I've kind of, you know, got lucky. Most football players have it. For sure. Power lifters have it. I think when you want, once you get around that 300 pound body weight, like, do you snore? Not terribly. Hmm. Interesting. On planes I do, but that's because my fucking fat mouth just opens up. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Planes. Planes asleep. No. Or just sit in general when you're near 300 pounds.