If you’ve heard breaking news out of the strongman world in the past couple of years, chances are it came from one of two sources: BarBend.com, or someone named Matt Rhodes. Matt has the inside track to the highest levels of strongman competition and often gets news about athletes and events before, well, almost anyone else. We talk about how a love of strongman turned into a growing media footprint that includes interviews with champions, breaking news, and frank discussions a lot of interviewers are scared to dive into. If you’re a fan of grassroots sports coverage — especially when it comes to strength — Matt’s story is one you won’t want to miss.
On this episode of The BarBend Podcast, host David Tao talks to Matt Rhodes about:
- How Matt fell in love with the sport of strongman (1:30)
- When fans could meet and interact with the top professionals in strongman — even at the local bar (4:30)
- Traveling the world to cover strongman (8:00)
- The biggest upsets and surprises in strongman history (10:30)
- Many of today’s top strongman professionals still work full-time jobs outside the sport (13:00)
- How can we grow strongwoman? (17:00)
- Why growing this sport and less-popular divisions has no perfect answer (20:18)
- How to promote more fairness in strongman competition (22:10)
Relevant links and further reading:
