The Strongest Man That Ever Lived

Find more similar titles and get a free catalog at www.StrongmanBooks.com The Strongest Man that Ever Lived was written about Louis Cyr by the well-known strength author, George F. Jowett. Here is my review of this book. First off it's obvious from the title that Jowett believed Cyr was genuinely the strongest of the strong and in fact could claim the title of the strongest man ever. This book then backs up this claim with story after story and feat of strength after feat. And at what Louis Cyr did there is ample evidence that he was the strongest then, and with some feats that are still unbroken today, could still be called by that title. Here's just a couple of his feats listed in the book: "No less that twenty-seven times was counted as he pressed a solid dumb bell of one hundred and nine pounds to arms' length in a series of repetition lifts." "Grasping a barrel of cement by the chines, using only one hand, he rocked it on the thigh, and from there up on his shoulder and then walked away with it. The barrel weighed three hundred and fourteen pounds, a feat which always stuck his opponents." The book is a biography covering the work and exploits of Louis Cyr. As many of the others it is light on specific training information, but you can still gain some ideas by reading between the lines. Much of the book details contest after contest that Cyr engaged in with people like Cyclops, Johnson, Pennell and others. Of course he won in all of these. And because of his reputation people like Sandow avoided ever testing their strength against his, simply because they knew they would loose. Speaking of these contests: "No man ever has accomplished such wonderful lifting over so many consecutive lifts as Cyr did night after night. No wonder Johnson said, "I can out-lift any man in the world, but it is impossible for any man to out-lift that elephant." (referring to Louis Cyr)And some more details on contests I found intriguing:"They came together that same year and measured their strength against each other in Quebec, but not with bar bells or dumb bells as became the vogue later on in the French province. Rocks were the vehicles of resistance on this occasion, as they had been with their Gaulish ancestors." "The most singular thing to me is why the French Canadian athletes retain the affection for separate dumb bell lifting, even up to the present time. They are more awkward to handle than a bar bell and require greater effort to raise overhead. Probably it is this practice which makes them so efficient when they come to handle barbells, which it later did for Cyr." "Matches in those dawning days of strongmanism were not conducted as the matches of today. Each man selected a set of his own pet lifts, and each had to follow the other through his routine." "The circumference of his powerful legs was beyond the belief of men who had never seen him...The enormous legs of the Montrealer were the secret of his strength...Try and imagine a thirty-three inch thigh and twenty-eight inch calf!" "Many people do not believe that this is possible, and many students of strength disbelieve that any human being can thus break a coin into halves. I suppose because men whom they have known to be accredited with such finger strength were not able to do the feat when put to the test. Yet there have been such men capable of taking a coin between the fingers and breaking it through the center. I have witnessed this feat done twice during my lifetime, and I can quite understand the reason for disbelief, as men of that caliber are rare. Bienkowski, or Cyclops I should better call him, was one of them."