The Strongest Man in the World
“Inch was an early-twentieth-century British strongman famous for his grip. His dumbbell, made of cast iron, weighed a hundred and seventy-two pounds and had a handle as thick as a tin can, difficult to grasp. In his stage shows, Inch would offer a prize of more than twenty thousand dollars in today’s currency to anyone who could lift the dumbbell off the floor with one hand. For more than fifty years, no one but Inch managed it, and only a few dozen have done so in the half century since. “A thousand people will try to lift it in a weekend, and a thousand won’t lift it,” Sorin told me. “A lot of strong people have left with their tails between their legs.” It came as something of a shock, therefore, to see Shaw reach over and pick up the dumbbell as if it were a paperweight. “He was just standing there with a blank look on his face,” Sorin said. “It was, like, What’s so very hard about this?”
