It’s the final day of the 2023 World’s Strongest Man (WSM) competition — and the penultimate event has arrived. The Vehicle Pull challenged the nine finalists to pull a 51,000-pound bus down a 25-meter course in the fastest possible time within the 75-second time cap.
The event occurred in the late morning on the streets paralleling Myrtle Beach, SC, just before the sun climbed to its bird’s eye view of the competition. Below are the results:
2023 World’s Strongest Man Vehicle Pull Results
- Mitchell Hooper — 30.24 seconds
- Tom Stoltman — 32.27 seconds (T-second)
- Evan Singleton — 32.27 seconds (T-second)
- Pavlo Kordiyaka — 32.46 seconds
- Trey Mitchell — 32.49 seconds
- Brian Shaw — 32.65 seconds
- Luke Stoltman — 32.83 seconds
- Oleksii Novikov — 33.35 seconds
- Mathew Ragg — 36.29 seconds
- Jaco Schoonwinkel — withdrew
[Related: 2023 World’s Strongest Man Results and Leaderboard]
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Mathew Ragg was the first athlete to the street after Mateusz Kieliszkowski took two practice runs to make sure the bus was pullable. Ragg continued to impress in his WSM Final debut with a time of just over 36 seconds.
Although Brian Shaw entered the event without a path to the podium in the final WSM appearance of his career, he still pulled the bus to the appraisal of the crowd in Myrtle Beach. The momentum of the bus was enough to cross the finish line in just under 33 seconds.
Trey Mitchell was third to harness in for the bus pull. He needed a top finish in this event to keep his podium potential alive. Phone cameras in the crowd flew up in unison to capture footage of the Texan’s runtime that was a hair faster than Shaw’s.
Luke Stoltman was fourth to pull. Like Shaw and Ragg, there wasn’t a chance of reaching the podium, but that didn’t deter him from putting forth his best effort — and what an effort it was. By the end, he was within a second of Shaw and Mitchell.
Pavlo Kordiyaka was the middleman of the event. As the lightest athlete in the field, fans were curious how he’d fare in a heavy man’s event. Turns out, Kordiyaka doesn’t care about those details and just pulled faster than all the previous times.
Oleksii Novikov pulled the bus right after his fellow Ukrainian and knew he needed a top time to minimize the gap between him and Hooper on the overall leaderboard. Unfortunately, a time above 32 seconds meant Novikov would be relegated to, at best, a bronze-medal finish. However, anything could happen with the other podium contenders — Hooper and Tom Stoltman — still to come.
Tom Stoltman knew Novikov’s slightly slower time meant he could jump him on the overall leaderboard if he posted a monster time before Hooper. The defending champ did champ things and scored the fastest time of the day, ensuring he’d stay within striking distance of a title defense with his best event — the Atlas Stones — still to come.
With Novikov effectively out of contention for the WSM title, Hooper needed to play defense with his four-point lead overall on Tom Stoltman. A year of practice on his vehicle pulled him the fastest time of the day by nearly two seconds. With a substantial lead overall and one event to go, the 2023 WSM title is Hooper’s to lose.
Evan Singleton closed out the bus pull, and podium-finish overall in his WSM debut was very much on the table. He blitzed the event, scoring the exact same time as Tom Stoltman. Shaving another half-point away from the defending champ further solidified the likelihood of Canada seeing their man wear the crown.
Featured image courtesy of World’s Strongest Man.
