Hafthor is a 460kg squatter (he did 380 for 5, paused). Sebastian is a 400kg squatter (he did 370 for 2, paused). Mitchell is a 392.5kg squatter (he did 375 for 2, but it was without any pauses) Lawrence is a 380kg squatter. I rest my case.
Thor usually trains at about 80% of what he is gonna be capable on competition day, give or take some percentage. Mitch on the other hand is consistent with his strength in a monthly basis, he is at about 90-95 or even 100% when he trains. What i mean is, if Thor deadlifts 1k on trainning and you can bet he can put about 1040-1050 with little effort on the comp day; whereas Mitch deadlifts 1k and that is gonna be on comp day too. That been said, barring injury or extenuation, I don´t see how Thor can lose this event at all to Mitch. Recently he did 380x5 paused squats, Mitch did 363x5 and Thor´s clearly looked better. On the day, if Shaw goes for 383KG on the squat... i don´t see many guys getting even one lol, but also, the top score gonna be about 5 wich Thor can do, and maybe Mitch, but i definetly can see Thor going for one or two more than Mitch.
Thor will win squat and idk if Hooper is getting second. I will be closer fight for second between Bobby, Hatton, Hooper & Novikov than it will be between Thor and Hooper IMO.
@@spokeen6249 Agree. His 5x 380kg pause reps moved much easier than Mitch's 5x 360kg reps. No one is likely beating him, but it not being a max squat helps the others slightly
This is yet another reason why SMOE is the true strength competition. How can you claim "strongest in the world" because you did some endurance meddly but can't even squat. Xant wait to see this in person this weekend!
@BigLozOfficial I think people just pointing out a obvious overlook in training , hoopers training is much more comparable to Lucas then thor , I believe the debate is , will mitch get 2nd or 3rd , then agian you are matches coach and know things we don't,, but going of training it's Clearly thor first and mitch and Lucas for second But yes you are allowed to have a opinion differing from ours 🤣
We as fans don't see everything the Athletes do in training, but with what the athletes have put out, I don't see anyone beating Thor. If you compare Thors 380kg x 5, with Mitchs 363kg x5, Thor looked better.
I think you're underestimating Thor's leg strength. Could Mitch squat 460kg, walked out with 5 weeks of training for it & having already peaked for 4 major shows? I highly doubt it. In fact I'm not even sure Z & Eddie could do that. Thor's squat is genuinely freakish
@curvinh6289 Well Mitch has his fitness going for him and he's a big grinder. In terms of pure max strength Thor would smash him, but this isnt max strength. It's reps on a machine.
@@davidkosiba624 100% agree. Tom is definitely the King of Stones but Thor is easily #2. And Thor definitely has brought his squat up to huge numbers recently. And clearly Thor will win Deads. So I think it will come down to what Thor can Press this year. But I genuinely have Thor winning SMOE.
@scottkain8977 agreed all on Thor's press. Any kink in the press armour then Mitch will take the title. But if Thor's press is back then he will be unbeatable
@@walk-york The thing will be how many people will squeeze between Thor and Mitch in the pressing events. Because i dont see Mitch lose that many points in the other events.
lol exactly. I have Thor winning SMOE this year hands down. He's going to easily win deads and squats.. he's also right there with Tom with stones.. and basically let's see what Thor presses this year. But I have him winning overall.
@@ben1ben2ben1 Actually is best lift is hands down the deadlift. However yes is keg toss is #1 as well. However the reason I don't give it his #1 lift is because Brian Shaw is amazing at it as well and he pushed Thor more in the keg toss than the deadlift all throughout their rivalry.
I agree, but if I were to play devil’s advocate for competition planners not putting a squat in, I would say that maybe there’s some hesitancy to put a super heavy squat and a super heavy deadlift in the same competition because the athlete’s legs would be too fatigued for overhead and carry events like Loz says in the video, and if you gotta choose one or the other most competitions choose the deadlift
@zanderrose I mean whilst that's true mate, certain comps are quite posterior chain dominant. It wouldn't be the first time and they have had both in competition before without problems.
I think it's more for the reason they said. It's tough to judge. Without doing a pin squat, depth is really tricky. It's also tough to set up. Nobody really wants to haul a whole rack out plus the bars to make it a pin squat. Sometimes you see a car squat similar to a car deadlift, but there's a lot of flex and bounce in the mechanism and certain athletes get a lot of benefit, plus depth is a while lot harder with it with varying heights... It's just logistically challenging.
I agree, let's make the squat a thing again. Maybe this machine Brian has rigged up will alleviate the issue of it taking 5 hours for a squat event. Other comps could take notes. We don't need deadlift in every single comp. Although I'd rather have either of those over a bench, thankfully that's not much of a thing in strongman.
I think its also a huge pain in the ass to set up and it takes forever. Gotta get everyone's hight and constantly changing things and on and on. The competitions I help with I am very happy they don't have a squat haha. Would absolutely love to compete in one with it though 😂
I am inclined to agree with you. But never underestimate Mitch. The guy is wayyy stronger than he looks. And he looks freakishly strong. On a very good day he could winn if Hafthor only has a good day. Possibly.
The toughest and most impressive squat is just a bar, with plates. I love strongman, but I think that over-engineered squat-lift apparatus (same as for chest - not overhead - pressing) just looks to me like a safety precaution...which it probably is.
@@kellypitts8481 Indeed. But maybe there are some movements for which the razzmatazz of strongman DOESN'T make it more visually arresting. I think this may be one.
@@kellypitts8481 That is a poor excuse, we have regular deadlifts and is our more popular strength challengue. The only difference is straps. If things should be more "strongman" then what the Arnolds´ did is the way to go, give´em a new coller bar (T-Bar) and let them go for it, even the axel set up of WSM, wich like the guy above said is pretty much a bar with plates, or weights. Don´t get me wrong, this event is exciting with the shaw format, but bar+plates squating is more impressive.
Smith machine can be restrictive for some lifters as it won't allow for the differences they may have in their movement and will struggle with their positioning?
Just because he’s doing his own wraps and train in a commercial gym he’s stronger?😂Mitch struggled with 390 while Hafthor had more in the tank after 380*5 paused. Hafthors 400kg also flew up.
Loz before that said “he terrifies me” then went into how he’s doing everything on his own without a support team. I think he was more focusing on how things can go wrong doing everything yourself (makes me think of Trey loading his own plates for the WUS FOS 2020) and also lends to his endurance of loading/ unloading, wrapping, and walking out the bar as opposed to just simply squatting it. Loz is one of the fairest analysts out there, and has given Mitch a lot of grief over his training style and decisions during competition. I didnt take Loz’s comment here as favoritism or gassing up Mitch, on the contrary i think it was him lightly bashing Mitch’s squat training setup
@@danielkelleher7246 He was using the fact that Mitch squats alone as something to take into consideration when deciding who will win the Squat, but I don't get why that is
@danielkelleher7246 Nah, Loz is 💯 biased over Mitch on many occasions which is difficult not to be because Mitch is a freak. But I think Loz is wrong here. Every time we've seen Thor squat there's an issue. No suit 14, injuries 17 and 19. This could finally be when we see him do what we know he can do.
Got to agree with Liz, as soon as I saw it in Brian's video I thought "that's basically an overengineered Smith machine". Can't really get very excited about it as a result. Same with the vertical chest press last year and the car leg press previously - they just felt like glorified weight machines and ended up being underwhelming. Still, will be interesting to see how it goes - can't see past Thor for the win.
My dad taught me in the late 90s to a2g so I got really good at squatting. I could do that with a pause with 405 on the bottom no belt nothing no knee sleeves. But I didn’t start deadlifting until about 20 years after that. And I’m a complete novice in it still. Still over 5 but for my size should be a lot more. I guess that will come in time. But I look at these shorter powerlifters low bar squatting and the ROM looks even less than a sumo deadlift…I’m like how is this a measure of strength? Even just squatting to parallel doesn’t make sense to me, if you do any other exercise are you only shooting for half rom?
Saw that even when Shaw was testing it, the apparatus still made quite a racket despite it being under reasonable control. Just hope the judging does not ruin the event. I'm sure he's got it under control.
Brian will dial it in. He's just very open about the trial and error process. He's an expert and any (valid) critique people have had I'm sure he's already noticed and addressed.
I think, based on watching the video, that everyone will need to lower it until it bottoms out for it to count. They will set the bar height for each individual athlete because it has a lot of adjustment holes. So judging won't be if they think it was to depth, but literally as easy as the machine bottomed out.
@@hulkslayer626 Yes! Although the machine is ALSO supposed to measure how hard the athletes bottom the machine out. It will be a failed rep if they bounce too hard off the bottom.
😂 😂😂😂 and sadly, with hindsight and the comp done, we see why the squat isn’t tested as often. Complicated process and ultimately far too dependent on subjective measures. Load up the bar, put pins a few inches above their belly button and be done with it. Make it simple. It won’t be fair but it will be measurable.
Ive lapsed catching up on strongman the last couple months. Is it being streamed the day after again or live or what? Couldnt actually find anything on shaw strength
I’m definitely looking forward to this. The one thing that really has me worried is the whole thing where he’s going to disallow reps that come down too hard. I think that might be confusing from the viewer perspective and potentially detract from the viewing experience.
380kg for reps on squat is out of this world. Thats so impressiv. Lets see who wins this... 10 reps with 380kg.. have you lost your mind? I think the winner of this event could do 6reps
The maschine could make the squat easier and Thor already did 5 reps with 380kg in training, with a slight pause. IMO he could do 8 when he peaks, with a normal squat, if the maschine does make it easier, he could possible do 10
@@Hesher93 I would love to see it. But it's crazy to think 380x10... how often have we seen an amazing prep of an athlet with amazing gymlifts on instagram and at the day it doesn't do well?
@@worldclassdeerhunter It really depends if the maschine makes the squat easier or not. But this never happened to Thor, he always performed better in comp then in training.
@@antoniocenteno1483 I now, but with Thors 5 kimda paused reps, I think he could do 7-8 reps on a normal squat when he Peaks for the Show, so with the Additional 2-3 reps he could do 10
I think the biggest factor in Thor vs Mitch winning the squat is also that Thor will almost certainly do better on the stones and therefore go after Mitch on the squat. If Mitch would either have to go 100% all out on the squat or risk losing points, where Thor will likely know what exactly he has to do to win the event. Also a big advantage to Tom with one of his weaker events coming after the stones. I think it’ll really help him to know how many reps he needs to do damage control here, and likely will be going last in the squat
I think it depends how many reps we get to. Thor can almost certainly sqaut the highest weight. But Mitch has insane endurance. Remember he hit 238kg for 24 reps a while back. So I think if we get to more than 8 reps Mitch takes it. But since Thor is after him he is gonna have to blow out his legs if he wants to guarantee a win on this, and I think Mitch is too smart to do that. This event is what's going to lose Tom the show
2017 and 2019 squat for reps at WSM, 3 years ago the Squat for max at the Arnold’s. WSM used to the globe squat and keg squat more often than in recent times. It’s difficult to have the squat and deadlift in the finals of WSM when they have 12 events over 4 days.
Eddie did 317.5 for 15, but Big Z did 329 for 15 in 2014. However both of them were in suits. Thor's 380 for 5, paused reps was without a suit/ raw. Don't think Eddie or Big Z can do that. Anyways, we will see Thor's power at SMOE, cannot wait!
WSM had some epic squat machines in the 2000's. The Tractor Tire machine in 2002, and the barrell loaded machines from 2004-2009! They whould bring them back I think
Tom is definitely the King of Stones but Thor is easily #2. And Thor definitely has brought his squat up to huge numbers recently. And clearly Thor will win Deads. So I think it will come down to what Thor can Press this year. But I genuinely have Thor winning SMOE.
Its probably a huge difference between fans who trwin and potential fans who don't but Id much rather see the guys just lifting the bar. I feel like the big pieces of kit sometimes take away from that. Would rather watch the the Giants live deadlift championship set up than Rogues tower of power.
Looking forward to watching the Shaw Classic/SMOE It's going to be between Mitch and Thor both are looking incredibly strong right now. Would probably give the edge to Mitch because of his endurance. Hope the machine works out. Would love to see Jesus Olivares as a guest and test that machine out. Can't wait to watch
I always liked the keg loading squat lift event they had at old WSMs so I'm quite excited to see Shaw's barrel squat apparatus in action. Hope it's dialed in right for the show.
I think all squat events but Arnolds have been enjoyable. 2014 and those huge barbells have been my favorite thus far. I would love to see squatting in competitions more often.
Really excited for this comp. Probably the most excited I’ve been. Great events. The squat apparatus hopefully goes well , and in my opinion will be more fun to watch compared to the car leg press ( I do applaud Brian for trying new things though !) Great Athletes and even though there are favorites I feel it could be anyone’s competition to win.
Loz needs to stop being favorites with Mitch. He needs to tell it as if he was not his coach, but he won't. Thor got this win with ease. Mark this comment and wait and see
@BigLozOfficial I watched both. You are biased. You can say you are not, but you won't admit it. Thor wins stone easy over Mitch and deadlift, so I'm not sure what you meant by posting. Did I watch the deadlift and stone video, or was this a comment for me. By the way, I love the channel either way. 👊
By looks...............Luke Stoltman should be one of the greatest squatters of all time. Weird how stuff often doesn't equate the way we would imagine.
i thinks Aivars had the right idea about testing equiment with about 300kg to get the feet placement , a few guys are going to get this wrong and get pinned. Feet i different place they might get it. This will be a great show
Do you think the frame may put some guys off? I personally have never liked trying to sqaut in the smith machine its always much more natural with a free bar i think.
Brian and his red iron mad scientist are creating some very fun contraptions. I always look forward to seeing them. This might be the best show ever. You have all the TOP dogs (how many WSM champs?) lifting massive farm equipment and barrels and logs and the largest stones..it's legit. No groups and stone-offs and running through these events. Anyone think Brian will attempt a stone? I'm hoping he has a fun bonus grip challenge comp..grip gantlet.
I think, the squat is a great indicator of strength, but neitjer very interesting to watch not easy to judge. I am pretty sure, Brian Shaw 's apparatur will help making the judging easier, and probably the lift safer as well, and I sincerely hope, it works well. Whether or not it will be spectacular... time will tell. I wish all the strongmen a nice, safe and well judged competition 👍👍. May the strongest man win!
I love Big B’s comment to you. Plus I love the fact that some guys will zero out possibly on this event. This is a true Strongman Competion!!! Also looking forward to Uncle Loz and hoping you are color commentating
I'll never not have a smile and chuckle when Brian just humbly says the weight should be good for these events and in the past time of shaw classic 😂😂. Next year will be a 100kilo keg toss and brian will just say. It's a good weight to toss no? I do it for reps 😂
I like the idea of the squat but they have to do it right, which by all accounts it sounds like they are doing. The max squat event at the 2022 Arnolds (I think it was that contest) was the most boring strong man event I've ever watched. There was way, way, way too much time between lifts. It was a knee wrapping event that happened to be broken up by squats occasionally. I've been a fan of a sport for 25 years now and they never do max squat and I was really excited for that event. And then it was so poorly executed that it sort of made me not care about whether or not they do squatting events at shows.
I think Hooper just needs more back, more mass. If he can stabilize/hold the bar without the weight crushing him he can definitely win the squat events.
