Our Honest Opinion of the 2023 Rogue Invitational Strongman Competition 

Love this channel. Not afraid to talk the truth. No bs . Total respect .

The Lalas Brothers have quickly become my favourite place to talk about strongman. Actually speaks their opinion and that's the opinion of an Arnold's winner and one of the strongest to never win WSM. Thank you for staying involved in Strongman.

Hope Trey makes full recovery. Hes a beast. Great job guys.

This is the realest strongman channel now

Not to mention that so many athletes just dropped the log when they heard the whistle. Mateusz had the log getting ready to go in the air with an easy last rep and dropped it because he heard the whistle while Hooper just takes his sweet time. Dumb rule.

Long time Canadian strongman fan here... I thought i would be super pumped on a Canadian champ, but man, not like this, not on weak garbage. Those judges need training or replacing ASAP. Like and share the video guys

Problem with mitch log attempts is the reff giving a down signal instantly where mitch isnt even done finishing the rep and has no balance. While others were holdong the rep for 2-3 seconds waiting for a down command. Refs have been screwing the strongman events over and over. Need a flat ruling for basic things as lockouts and duration you need for a "complete rep"

Hooper’s standing bench press technique is what caused the Olympic clean and press to removed from the Olympics in 1972!!

Rogue Invitational 2022 was one of my favourite shows last year so I was very excited for this years show. Sadly it flattered to deceive. The Iron Bull sled pull was a farce, removing axle lift was a poor decision (would have made things a bit more exciting as an event you don't see all that often) and The Duel was just... boring as a final event and very anticlimactic. As a spectacle The Tower Power and Rogue-a-Coaster are amazing bits of kit... but we've seen them before at Rogue. From what I'm led to believe Rogue didn't even bother showing the Strongman trophy presentation, maybe they're more geared for the Crossfit crowd.

Spot on about the reffing. I've just wrapped up my 7th Static Monsters and my ref was shouting instructions at the lifters to get them to finish the rep fully before giving them the down signal. In the Statics Worlds that I ran in July, I had a side ref to make sure athletes were fully upright under the log or dumbbell and knees were locked on the deadlift. Standards have to be higher at the biggest competitions and athletes have to not only be held to a higher standard, but need to hold themselves to a higher standard too so there can be no doubt.

What needs to be considered is that this isn't supposed to be an amateur show. This is a show with a massive prize pool and the TOP international strongmen. We shouldn't accept settling for less just because we're trying to be positive. This was a colossal fumble by Rogue in all of the ways you (Lalas Brothers) addressed in the video and more. I've seen so many comments saying that people are being harsh or being haters because their favorite athlete didn't win. Since when do we not care about inconsistent ruling, terrible planning, and questionable compromises? This passiveness and acceptance of less is what allows these mistakes to happen in the first place. Do better Rogue, and do better as fans of Strongman! (I'm talking to you, reader)

Agree with everyone's feedback on the show. Planning a comp like this, you have to have contingency plans in place and not at the last minute. Why wouldn't they test the Iron Bull event much earlier than the day before?? The other issue with the reffing was in the duel when the ref said "Go" before the buzzer went off and some waited for the buzzer. There was no reason for the ref to say "Go". You don't do things like that in a pro comp.

I was sitting parallel to the log at the Shaw Classic in the 1st row on the floor. I made the same comment about Hooper’s log press as Big Z…it was an impressive bench (I said inline) press. The problem I see is he never brings his head and shoulders fully through. There needs to be a side judge on overhead.

The non bias, honest of this strongman channel is top notch

Fantastic and accurate commentary. Compared to previous years i was really let down by the show.

Credit to big Lalas, great strongman that is qualified to comment on the refs, only one who calls them out on it. 👍

You guys are fantastic. Completely unbiased EXPERT opinion. While this competition had huge prize money, The Rogue, perhaps, needs to get back to Strongman Roots instead of Flashy (but faulty) equipment. 1. The Iron Bull was set up indoors because of the weather. It was brought in from a very humid outside into an air-conditioned area. Fine. However, the first person had an advantage. The slightest bit of condensation on the tracks reduced friction, it also dried the track while expanding the end grain wood fibre on the sled holding the Bull increasing the friction on each further attempt. 2. The Roguer-Coaster. I am positive that the apparatus jammed for Luke Stoltman 4 feet from the end. There was no way Luke ran out of Gas, I reckon if he had another couple of seconds he would have stretched OR BROKE the rope. But he couldn't move the sled an inch???? 3. Luke also had the log to his lap, then chest on his 9th rep but was timed out, even 'tho the rules stated that if the log was ON the competitors lap (never mind chest) the lift could be attempted. Mitch, by my reckoning, got three "Good" reps and had about 15 extra seconds to finish the ninth. 4. I'm not sure about what happened with the points in "The Duel" at the end. No times or points were given during the live stream (I waited and waited). I do know that Mitch was well away from the start before the "GO" signal. Lots of lessons to be learned but, at least one huge business is giving Strongman more coverage, so it's not all bad.

I understand (to an extent) removing certain events or changing things because of the weather, but what I didn't understand is why they couldn't do the axle indoors and chose to do a log for reps that none of them trained for, and that is in almost every other comp.

Great video guys! Good to hear a truly objective opinion on things and showing footage like Trey's injury and how it happened...good insight! Marine Mike 🇺🇸 💪

Thank you! Mitch is full of shit when he says he can't put his head through, he's just trying to cheat the rules like always because he thinks he's smarter than everyone else.

Completely agree with hoopers lockout/holding situation. I reckon a heavier log would also make “rushing” through reps less of an issue.

i definitely never think Mitch Hoopers log lifts look right not so much the hold at the top but he never gets his his head through to finish the lift....

That’s what annoys me about Mitch’s log reps, all the other guys are working their arses off to do fully controlled reps with their heads through and hold it and he just flaps it up with his head about 5 inches behind the log. And then all the other strongmen just accept it? They need to speak up and challenge it

I had the same two issues as most others - Mitch's 9th rep shouldn't have stood and Mitch was too quick to go on the last event. Tom probably could've got first place, especially if there'd been a 6th event.

I had a bad feeling about the bull sled pull after watching Shaws video testing it and a bad feeling about the entire event after watching it

Loving this channel guys, please keep it going 💪

Great review guys, I think that all referreing should be standard across all competitions.

Great video guys! Totally agree about the reffing and especially in the log lift there was a number of soft reps given and most of those belonged to Mitch. When it comes to the sled pull I was kind of perplexed about the whole situation, there are in my mind 2 different questions here: 1. about the sled moving easily the first 10-15 feet and then becoming much harder to pull and 2. about the sled maybe becoming harder to pull as the attempts went on. 1. to me is undeniable and there are I think 2 possible reasons for this, either the ground was uneven and the track went from decline/flat to incline/flat or the tracks changed somehow, like there was a joint at 15 ft which increased friction or the track became slightly more narrow or something. 2. to me is less certain but if it was the case its either something to do with the wood changing slightly due to a change in temperatur/moisture as you talked about or some kind of wear between the sled and the track that changed the friction. Needless to say that event needs to go back to the drawing board.

If you are refereeing the logpress or any other press event you need to position yourself to the side. When you are straight ahead from the competitor you will not see if he is falling forward as Tom Evans do at1:58and You might also have a hard time seeing if the lockout is correct. Or at least take a two second count in your head to make sure its a good rep.

THANK GOD for this Vid.... What we ALL thought watching Rogue this year..

I think mateuz is so good because he does a lot of his movement work uphill, so momentum becomes less of a factor, and he is able to work at a higher intensity for longer.

True everything! Hope more people involved in organization/referiing will pay attention to your channel.

Clear and well thought insights& commentary. Good stuff. I was also really disappointed in this show overall. And the refereeing... Always the same thing that the refs decide are influenced by the crowd etc. Sad to see.

Very detailed and impartial video guys! Thank you

When Mitch first came on to the scene even Loz commented that he has an ability to bend his body in away to bench the log up, and even back then they were not discounted.

You bring up another reason why strongman needs to create uniform rules across all promoters and harmonize the season. Currently there is no rule book that I’m aware of. To grow as a sport this will have to happen. The athletes should demand it and referee standards should be implemented. Especially if you implement gambling like in a fight or an arm wrestle. Let’s grow the sport. Great content fellas.

Wow I thought I was the only one that thought Mitchel should not have gotten many reps, especially rep 7.

First time finding this channel. Great quality

You guys are spot on. This event was a disaster.

They need to get Big Z to be the lead reference. They need stricter more consistent referees. And they shouldn’t have gotten rid of axle. They should have moved it indoors

Superb channel with honest opinion!

Thanks for the honest feedback. Needs to be heard

Great video. Appreciate your honest analysis of this and other competitions.

I watched Strongman events for many years, they are nearly always fantastic and very enjoyable to watch throughout, even 2017 WSM was good it was more of a Thor being a bit triggered rather than the rules being off. The only event that really left a sour taste and left me fuming was the 1990 WSM where OD Wilson was completely robbed. That was until this Rogue invitational during the log lift, it wasnt as bad but it was similar, its strange because in Strongman I dont root against anyone I cheer all the athletes its amazing to see great feats of strength that are superhuman, but it made me dislike what Mitch was doing. There have been times where I didnt like Rob Kearneys log press, anyone that watches Olympic lifting knows athletes can lift significantly more with the split jerk compared to a strict press, that being said when he did lock out it was fair, and the log is not like an Olympic bar, I was more confused with why is nobody else doing it like that than thinking of someone cheating. With Mitch it was completely different, I had just seen Evan Singleton have a rep disallowed so youd expect the same rules to apply to everyone, and of course all the other athletes had lifted very well, Mitch needed 9 to effectively win and 8 wouldve had him share points with many others, 7 wouldve got him about 4 points. To be honest I didnt even notice the first rep being bad but I saw the rest where his arms were at 2 o clock and the lift was not straight, what made it worse is to my memory he did have a couple of lifts that were upright and good lifts proving he could do it properly, it seemed like he was trying to get away with the least amount of effort possible and he wouldve known it wasnt a proper lockout, control and in upright position, thats poor sportsmanship because if he saw someone else do that against him and take 75k away from his finish he might have something to say, I think at least 3 of his lifts wouldve been made good with a bit of extra effort and of course you have to blame the referee who kept giving him down signals, the referee who had just given Evan a no rep. By the time he managed 8 lifts the chat was already calling BS and it really exacerbated the new rule that allowed an athlete to finish a rep in their own time after the time had run out, personally that rule undermines the time limit in the first place, its nonsense , but to have Mitch the only athlete to benefit from it and also giving him 2nd place instead of tied with 3-4 others with a bad rep it made it worse than it shouldve been especially as he wouldve definitely run out of time without the new rule before even attempting the overhead. The sheer weight of all the people saying Mitch wasnt locking out properly wasnt just a few it was 95% there were thousands in the chat and nobody was trolling beforehand there were not some small amount of Mitch haters proliferating it there were simply happy Strongman fans before that event, the vast majority of the audience were saying he shouldve had between 6 and 7 reps, so it wasnt just about one rep, a fair amount were saying 5. 8 reps wouldve seen Mitch finish 2nd overall and 75k prize money difference, it even brought about people speculating whether the event was fixed for Mitch to win with such a difference in the refereeing compared to the athlete that had gone before him. I can understand from watching the crossfit referees they let far too much go and a few athletes in crossfit were definitely not doing good reps to conserve energy and not being punished for it, clearly exploiting the rules, but a Strongman event should be reviewed afterwards and if a rep is not good the result should be changed, referees make mistakes and it shouldnt be on their head all the time and it would make athletes do the reps properly knowing that if they cheat a few they would be taken away after the fact. Mitch is a great strongman but he definitely exploited that loglift, and its not like everyone else can just do the same like in crossfit, other athletes were getting no reps for the same thing. Also a review system where results can change after the event would ensure that any referee that has been paid off cant influence results unfairly, Id hate to think that would ever take place in Strongman but it clearly does in other sports so it makes sense to have something in place to prevent that kind of control. I dont know shit about Strongman despite watching it since the late 1980s , its great to hear what real competitors think and when they think something was wrong it really needs a review for the future because it has the potential to overtake things like the UFC in popularity especially with CTE awareness becoming more mainstream, being a 300lb+ strongman and tragic early deaths of athletes from enhancements (PEDs) and heavy stress on the body was a warning sign but nowadays enhancements can be done quite safely and its actually a really safe sport compared to things with head trauma or risk of serious injury like motorsports,a lot of athletes like Odd Haugen are living to an old age happily and still strong as hell and from that future generations will have confidence to aspire to be Strongmen, but the rules need to be rules for a sport to be taken seriously and have a platform to grow big.

Brian and Keven Faires could not move it at all when they first started testing. Brian said to lighten it.

Great analysis guys. This years Rogue can in no way class itself as one of the top shows. Giants live in Glasgow - 5 events in one night v 5 events over 2 days? Thats a training session in comparison!. Very poor planning by Rogue.

Totally agree with Lalas. There’s no smoke without fire. Don’t hate the player, hate the game. Something needs to be done about the rule booking and refing especially now strongman is as big as it is and the money being what it is. The rogue this year as terrible. No back up plan for rain when the comp is outside?! Really

Your's opinions are correct some things didn't look good at this competition 🎉

Mitch he's very strong and very clever. He reminds me of Magnus Ver back in the day.

The tower deadlift is basically a smith machine deadlift and that kind of a event belongs to Shaw classic, the worst way to make a deadlift event. Ref's with Mitch "no rep" Pooper did rob a decent amount money from Tom in my opinion. I hope rogue make's big changes to next year's strongman contest so that it would not feel like a afterthought of a crossfit contest...

Great show guys

I surprised no one talked about or to the group of guys pushing the iron bull sled back into place between athletes. Unless something on the implement was hooking in one direction, that group should have noticed a difference each time they pushed it back to confirm if it was indeed getting harder each time.

Big loz hasn’t done a video yet with his thoughts on the show. Is he worried about what ppl will say about his boy?

If Mitch Hooper is this allowed two reps during the log lift, Tom Stoltman is your champion, rightfully so

Max reps should have a lot longer time to finish. IMO

Tower deadlift- B- Bull Pull- F Coaster- A+ Log Lift with soft time cap- A 15 second sandbag race- F Canceling a strongman event instead of pushing one of 200 crossfit events back one day- F- Overall- D-

really goes to show why the Shaw Classic is the best show out there and this is the BEST strongman channel out there.

I don't want to sound like a hater, but I feel like hoopers world strongest man win and this rouge invitational win is thanks to lockout monster dumb bell/log lift...

It was not a great show, a bit of a let down. Due to weather. Tower of Power good. Log Lift Good, Rogueacoaster good the rest poor. Nice that it was free to watch. Rogue put a of hard work and money into it. I bet that next year will be better. Outdoor show worked OK for CrossFit which to be honest is the main event. It was nice to see Big Loz beat The Moose at record breakers😂 A rule book for what is a good lift would help with consistency over different shows. If the ref gives the down signal the lifter can not be blamed.

When I was watching it live I remember thinking there were 2 of the 9 reps that I thought were questionable and seriously thought they may take at leasr 1 away from him, which would have put Tom back into contention and change the whole competition results with the points being what they were at that time and a bunch of dudes hitting the same number of reps. I do also.get why it s/b a rule to put your head thru the log at lockout otherwise the guy could keep it in a standing incline bench the whole movement. I did not think most of his reps were bad reps though. Just me. Marine Mike 🇺🇸 💪

Bringing Mitch into the sport was a great decision (new athlete, explosive rookie year, etc). But by now, it seems a bit like history repeats itself and favoritism is involved. It seems like the refs give him good lifts when they should force him to hold (clearly the case on his log attempts)... I'm glad Tom has stepped up and I agree that he should come back next year to "take back what's his." Back in the early days of the sport (70s/80s), there were some odd ref calls, lots of the pulling events had the equipment lock up (e.g. the driver puts the brakes on conveniently whenever Kazmaier stepped up)... Rogue must have hired some new quote-unquote "talent" to design and orchestrate events, because the lack of mechanical expertise, forethought, and planning didn't make sense. Plus, they didn't spotlight the Strongman awards. I'm going to call Mitch a Paper Champion on this one...

Well said bros 🎉

I'm convinced that Mitch Hooper purposefully bends the rules as much as he can. He purposefully doesn't do good reps on overhead. His goal isn't good reps. The goal is making referee's think he's done good reps. He purposefully left early on the loading event. It's a shame we don't have judges that hold him accountable for that stuff. Bending the rules and manipulating referees has made him a rich man.

mateusz is just that good

I have waited for this :D

I think there were definitely issues with the show, but I think Rogue did the best they could with the weather to keep the athletes safe. As for the Bull, it is a new piece of equipment. Should it have been tested more? Absolutely. But Brian did a good bit of tweaking to the car leg press between it’s first and second appearance. Rogue is out here giving the Strongman athletes the biggest prize purse and a bigger audience. I really think people need to cut them some slack. I am sure they are aware of all the issues this year and will work to resolve them.

Great critic as usual, keep up the great work.

I thought instantly about Hoopers reps on the log, lots of questionable reps but that’s on the refs. So happy to see Mateusz back and looking strong, he’s only going to get better and stronger. The train pull thing was weird and needs changing, I liked uncle Loz’s idea of setting it like a train track and having bars on the floor rather than rope to pull. Hopefully the feedback improves the competition for next year.

There is too many exuses for mitch since he won the wsm

I had hardly heard of it 5 years ago but now love strongman and I think it’s rapid growth needs to be caught up by the rule book, refereeing, qualification requirements etc. Also given the risk of injury and crowd size, all top comps should be held in indoor arenas where the variability of the weather is removed and the time schedule can be stuck to.

After the first 2 shows, it felt like Rogue handed this part of their franchise over to someone on a silver platter. And that person doesn't seem to be interested in Strongman.

In reference to the worry about the rain with the loading race. I think we should remember in at least two WSM (1992 & 2010)the athletes were in water to do their loading race. In 2010 where the implements were the water was knee high.

This is why a end-all be-all "federation" or "association" for Strongman should exist where all promoters have to follow the same rules for the entire Strongman calendar. Now, if there's a very "Strongman-style" event where there's little standardization in movement, like types of loading, awkward presses, vehicle pulls, brand-new events, etc. then it's ok to come up with a set of standards for it right then, but otherwise, for deadlift, squat, overhead, Cyr Dumbbell, Frame, Farmer's, Yoke, etc., more frequented staple events, then there needs to be an across-the-board standard for every athlete and promoter to follow. Also, refs need to be "checked" every so often to keep up their abilities or to switch refs out for certain promoters (Magnus for Giant's Live and WSM for example for someone like Zydrunas or even Dave, the other main GL ref, the one who did WDC 2016 and who reffed Eddie's 500). Judging for sure wasn't the main problem, it was Rogue's inability to adapt, and their panic-mode of changing and completely removing events to suit their schedule and shove them in-between Crossfit events. Fix everything but the judging, and honestly, it wouldn't be that bad.

Brian Shaw testing the Iron Bull, well, he is also one of the best pullers. I saw a video where someone mentioned that at one contest they had Terry Hollands to test the pull, and he finished it easily, but at the comp, noone finished. You can't really have someone who is really great, even among the best in the world, test an event.

do i get the feeling the strongman community don't like Mitch?

The ref is a good friend of hooper's trainer

Well overall this was the worst Rogue Invitational. Bad refereering, events changed and taken out. Final evet ( bag loading) so poor, basicly 5 second event even without running with bag in hands. Just throwing them in box. Very very bad 🤦Gutted for Mateusz, man is monster but everything went to Mitchs favor!

the Bull should've had a lattice instead of rope

I have an issue with the lack of coverage of results after events, unofficial results still don’t know results if sandbags as Tom took a point off Mitch somehow. I feel the weather really threw rogue off this weekend

Agreed

I know this is strongman and not powerlifting but the same rule of reffing applies , the refs can't tell you what you're doing while you're performing the rep although PL is a single rep and then you're awarded the lift if completed correctly after you've done the attempt. The ref shouldn't have to tell you what you're doing wrong. That's on the athlete

Like that you are telling the truth no matter what. I agree with all of this. The incosistent judging they really need to fix. Evan was disallowed a rep that was longer locked out than Hooper. The main issue I have is the judging, the bull being fucking dumb and the last event being the most lame shit i've ever seen. Its a loading medley for like 2m ?

The show was a bit of a disappointment, but not terrible. Mitch didnt control the weight, the other guys did, so make of that what you will. Hopefully at the ASC, Mateusz wins

Big Z needs to be the ref for all log events, Even Magnus gave questionable down calls at WSM

Everything you guys said is true af!! Best channel for strongman

Hope you adress the lack of lockout, and i mean the upright position. Lean backning isnt a lockout even tho the elbows are

I don't think the bag start issue was Hooper's fault. Apparently there was a miscommunication by the Rogue team on what the go signal was supposed to be. Also, Hooper isn't going to change the way he lifts logs if every single ref gives him the down call. Ultimately, people may disagree with his technique but you can't point the finger at Hooper.

it's bad if you also know your not locking out properly , hooper knows what a lockout is ,

Coach Mateus on deadlift please.

Just sent this to Steve slater,he might be able to adress these issues with Rouge & few other organizations.

It was such a disappointment, but for the money offered, it didn't seem worth it to watch. Bull Pull was poorly put together. What was pathetic was that they didn't test it until a few days before the event. It should have been a month before the event. reffing was poor for the log, but that wasn't Mitchs fault, but if Big Z was reffing, it would be super strict, making you hold for longer. The sandbag loading was over within 5 seconds, which was bad getting rid of Max Axle Press was poor could easily been done inside like Log for Reps. Deadlift and Arm over Arm not really events you can mess up. To me Rogue seem to focus on making an event look like nice rather than make it work properly

Do you think the sled would have gone better if there was a ladder on the ground to climb? Less problems with footwear and surface

Change in events, log rep ref, the fact Rogue didn’t even bother to show the strongman award ceremony

You guys are like the Sika Strength for strongman lol

With the log press, I’d argue if you have to go so quick that reps come into question then the log is too light

Who won?

I love that the strongman are getting paid more than ever but the show was garbage.

Why on day 1 did they go by the usual rules of where you come in the previous event is where you start in the following event hence why Kieliszkowski went first on the bull pull, to switching it on the second day? Had they stuck to that then Mitch finished 4th on the RogueaCoaster and would then have not had the opportunity to know what he had to do on the log press. Plus are we going to talk about the false start in the duel? Had Mitch gone at the same time as the rest he would have been chasing Tom and that’s when mistakes are made just as they were in Glasgow. That said this is on the referees not Mitch, they should have stopped them immediately (like any normal race) and started again. Congrats to Mitch and Tom I think they will battle it out for many years to come. Overall Rogue wasn’t at its best this year, a lot of disruption to the competitors, events cancelled that could have been done inside, a rope added to the Bull pull which no one had trained for, and some dubious refereeing. Would we have seen the same result if things had been different who knows. Mitch as well as being an exceptional athlete is very clever and calculated., Tom is brute strength sometimes Brains over Braun wins out. Looking forward to the Arnold’s and WSM 2024

Maybe...just maybe they wanted to rig the game in favor of current wsm, just for better revenue with partnerships and sponsorships? But it's just a conspiracy. (Hello Luke's leaked audio)

They have some events with „side“ Refs why not make them count more…Or on all events