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Sarah Furman: Finding Unconventional Strength

Written by David Tao
Last updated on November 11th, 2024

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David TaoSarah Furman is a figure competitor turned strongman athlete who has witnessed firsthand the sport’s massive growth in the United States. We talk training for looks versus performance, the factors attracting more women to strongman competition, and what event organizers need to do to keep competitions fresh and spectator-friendly. 

In this episode of The BarBend Podcast, guest Sarah Furman and host David Thomas Tao discuss:

  • Sarah’s background in bikini competition, and why she eventually transitioned to strongman (2:30)
  • Shifting an athlete’s mindset from appearance to performance, and how Sarah adapted to that turning point (4:55)
  • Training bikini out of a strongman gym! (7:40)
  • Difficulty in finding strongman training equipment (9:30)
  • A strongman athlete’s competition schedule in the United States (11:50)
  • The sport’s growth domestically, and what it still needs (14:30)
  • “Strongman” vs. “Strongwoman” (14:50)
  • What brings more women to the sport (15:58)
  • Overusing strongman events and how organizers can keep things fresh (19:45)
  • Which is more impactful: Lack of equipment, or lack of knowledge? (21:40)
  • Advice for beginners and starting points (22:40)
  • Sarah’s secret talent (26:35)
  • Least favorite strongman events (29:00)

Relevant links and further reading:

Transcription

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Other women seeing a variety of body types, like maybe a body type closer to theirs is doing strongman, is helpful. I’ve had many people reach out to me with the long lanky body type and they’re like, “You inspire me. I never thought I’d be able to do things like this, and I see you doing it, and it gives me hope.”

David TaoDavid Tao

Welcome to the “BarBend Podcast.” We talk to the smartest athletes, coaches, and minds from around the world of strength. I’m your host, David Thomas Tau, and this podcast is presented by barbend.com

Today, I’m talking to strongman, athlete and strength coach, Sarah Furman. When we first recorded this conversation, I initially thought it was going to focus on Sarah’s daily training and nutrition to compete on the national stage, but the chat definitely opened up on a range of topics.

Sarah’s transition from figure athlete to strongman athlete, finding places to train and connecting with the broader strongman community, and misconceptions surrounding the sport, especially when it comes to size and gender in strongman. Just so you know, there’s a lot more to it than 400-pound behemoth men.

I walked away from this recording with a new perspective on where the sport is today and its potential for a broader base of athletes and fans. Just a quick note — we’re incredibly thankful that you listen to this podcast. If you haven’t already, be sure to leave a rating and review of the BarBend Podcast in your app of choice.

Every month, we give away a box full of BarBend swag to one of our listeners who leaves a rating and review.

Sarah Furman, thanks so much for joining us on this episode of the BarBend Podcast. You are a multi-talented strength athlete to say the least. I’m really excited to dive in today. For those listeners who might not be familiar with you and what you do, if you wouldn’t mind, give us the elevator pitch.

Who is Sarah Furman? What do you do in the world of athletics? How did you get interested in strength sports originally?

 

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Pretty much right now, I’m a strongman athlete. I started out with bikini, pretty much, because I thought that was the only thing I could do. For those of you who don’t know what I look like, I’m pretty gangly. [laughs] Don’t laugh. You know it’s true.

I grew up twig-like, and I had many people tell me that I probably shouldn’t pursue a strength sport, when I really wanted to try. I was like, “Well, I’ll go for bikini.”

Few years of bikini, I actually ended up getting my pro card in the natural bodybuilding division. That was pretty cool. But, ironically, I dropped out after that and was like, I just want to get strong. I pursued strongman, I fell in love with it, and now I’m actually a coach for strongman remotely, which is pretty awesome, and an athlete myself.

David TaoDavid Tao

I don’t compete in bikini, and I don’t compete in strongman. If that’s not obvious to everyone, maybe one more than the other. But I can’t imagine two sports under the strength sports lifting banners, that might be more different as far as lifestyle, than bikini competition and strongman. Those are, I don’t want to say polar opposites, but they’re definitely far apart on the spectrum.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

 Yes. Actually one of my, I don’t want to say pet peeve, I feel like that’s a bit much. But, a thing I don’t like about people who don’t know about strongman is they think it’s all a bunch of dudes with power bellies that are huge, and they just do the static strength stuff.

The amateur strongman shows if you go to one, or nationals, you will see it’s highly competitive and highly athletic. There’s a lot of chicks that look like CrossFit athletes anymore. I feel like we’ve gotten smarter, in general in the population, with nutrition. We’re not just eating to gain and gaining a ton of weight. We’re actually being smart about it and trying to gain muscle instead.

I feel like a lot of people have this expectation of strongman is like these huge dudes. In reality, it’s not. It’s a little bit of everybody.

David TaoDavid Tao

Going from training for aesthetics, to training for performance, and that’s really what I mean about the difference here, because bikini figure bodybuilding is all about aesthetics. Strongman, I see as something that is so, so, so focused on performance, and a sport that I think is maybe getting increasingly athletic, especially at like the national level events.

Modalities are getting a little bit longer. Endurance is becoming more of a factor. Was it a gradual transition from bikini to strongman, from aesthetics to performance? Or was it something where you got your pro card and you’re like, “I’m training for performance now,” like sudden shift?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

In my mind, it probably felt gradual, but I think in reality, it was a [laughs] huge turning point. I had literally won my pro card. Then I was talking to my coach that next day.

We were going through my future goals and whatnot. I was asking him how far he think I could make it. He was like, “Well, you just have to take it seriously, blah, blah, blah.”

Then I am sitting there. I’m thinking about how this last prep went for bikini. How miserable I was. Honestly, the last few weeks, it really hit me. I was thinking I was doing well for a while. You have your training to look forward to. That’s literally it.

You don’t want to go out. You don’t want to do things with friends. You don’t want to go to social events because literally you’re surrounded by food you cannot eat. People are constantly asking you, “Why can’t you eat this? I just don’t understand why you can’t eat it.”

You have to explain to literally everybody. I’m from Iowa. It’s a ton of fattening gross food everywhere you go [laughs] and beer. There’s a ton of beer.

I was so sick of the whole diet part and restricting myself. My strength had went way down. I was kind of depressed about that. I told them, I’m like, “Honestly, I just kind of want to get stronger right now.” Then maybe keep some accessories like Super Hyper Turkey. We can still grow but gain some strength.

He was cool with that. I actually was fascinated with Westside at the moment. We did like a conjugate-style training to get back to heavy. That was super fun. That’s when I told him that I want to pursue the strongman-style training.

It was a quick turning point, but in my head it was slow. [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

Strongman is a sport where you see a lot of people coming from other sports into strongman. You see a lot of powerlifters who want to explore strongman because the event seems fun. It’s athletic.

I’ve talked to so many powerlifters who are like, “I want to do strongman or I do strongman because it’s fun.” We’ve seen people move from CrossFit over to strongman. Rob Kearney is a really good example of that. I mean, he’s a world’s strongest man and competitor who got his start in CrossFit.

He’s about twice the size he was when he started doing CrossFit to be fair.

It’s a style of training. Training for these strongman’s events it is fun. It’s not as readily accessible as far as equipment availability and things like that. Finding the implements, finding the axles, the stones, things like that.

It’s not something you’re going to find in your average Globo Gym. Is that’s something that you had to seek out? Is it something that was readily available where you live and train? What was that process like?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

The gym I was at at the time is actually a strongman gym. That…

David TaoDavid Tao

You were training bikini out of a strongman gym?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Yes [laughs] . It’s funny. The coach, the owner of the gym is a strongman. At that time, he had so many bikini competitors. It was a huge joke all the time at the gym. He was actually really good at posing. He would teach us all posing. [laughs] It was fantastic. I was very fortunate to actually be around a bunch of strongman equipment from the get-go.

David TaoDavid Tao

It’s definitely something where it is, I do believe and Kalle Beck has written on this. Michael Gill has written on this. How to train strongman in a commercial gym with limited access to specialized equipment.

It is possible, but it’s certainly something where if strongman is your main sport and your main pursuit you’re going to want. You’re going to seek out a place that not only has the equipment, but has other people competing in the sport, and doing the same events. It’s a really important part of any sport training, I believe, in advancing.

Do you have a group that you regularly train with at this gym?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

I do not have a group anymore. I’m at another gym now that’s probably like 30 minutes away from this gym.

They have a little bit of strongman stuff, a decent amount. Enough to get by. The thing that a lot of them lack is variety of stones and all the stuff like that. Which, I’ve found, I can just travel if I need to and make an event day out of it or whatnot.

It’s not a huge deal. Thankfully, I’m not in a commercial gym. [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

Tell us about your training for your first strongman competition. When was that? What was your prep like? What are some of the lessons? They might be hard lessons that you learned during your first ever competition.

I always love hearing about the learning curve people go through the first time they compete in strength sports. For strongman, it’s especially fun because powerlifting people are like, “Oh, I had to learn about calling attempts, I had to learn about loading, or I had to learn about warm-ups.” For strongman, it seems people always have these stark lessons the first time they actually have to do it in front of a crowd and in a competition.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Well, it was super different for me because I had never done powerlifting or strength sport or anything. Peaking for it, in general, was crazy. I felt really beat up and then just ready to get it over with.

The actual competition, I learned that, like my coach always told me, smooth is fast. There was a keg run in ours and so many people would get ahead of themselves and topple over the keg, [laughs] fall, and almost hit people in the audience.

A lot of it is nerves. You get so anxious to get going, and then they say, “Competitor, ready, go.” Your heart is racing, and you grab it and then you get ahead of yourself and then you trip. There were so many people tripping. Thankfully, I didn’t. That was a main focus.

The other thing is how, throughout the day, your adrenaline is constantly peaking at each event, and just trying to get yourself to calm down and have fun in between without getting your nerves or getting yourself anxious and revved up. You need to calm yourself down before each event so that you can do your best for the next one.

David TaoDavid Tao

What is your competition schedule like? Over maybe the next, let’s call it the next year or so. What is your competition schedule like? What are some goals you have as a competitor in this sport?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

I plan on doing the LA Fit Expo, which is in January. That’s a platinum plus show. What that means is if you get first, you get to go to the Arnold. I think it’s like the top two or three get to go to nationals.

My ultimate goal would be to go to the Arnold and then do well there, get to the main stage there. Also, nationals would be fantastic as well.

David TaoDavid Tao

Let’s talk a little bit about the sport when it comes to competition tiers, body weight categories. When people learn about strongman, it’s almost always through something like the World’s Strongest Man or the Arnold Strongman Classic.

Like you talked about, we do have these misconceptions of the people competing, all being these 400-pound behemoth men. We’ve seen a lot of body type variation in that open category, but they’re generally gigantic.

They’re the biggest strength athletes on the planet, but strongman is much more than that men’s open category. What category do you compete in, and what do you think the future of the sport is? Especially on the women’s side and opportunities for women’s competitors.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

I’m still an amateur. Amateurs, there’s two federations. One is USS and one is Strongman Corp. Both have nationals. Through Strongman Corp though, you actually get to go to the Arnold. That’s usually a big highlight for a lot of people in their amateur careers.

From there, you can actually be a pro and then you go to pro shows and whatnot. That being said, pro shows are obviously much harder. [laughs] The ante is up. They just started a few years ago a different federation that is world’s and it’s Official Strongman Games. It’s what it’s called.

Through that, you can either try to qualify online, or you get an invite by doing well at other contests. It is growing, the sport is growing. We’re opening up to different avenues and different ways to get involved.

I think there’s a lot more promoters now than there used to be in every state. It’s super cool to watch it grow. Just having more people get involved in volunteering is going to help, in general.

David TaoDavid Tao

I do have a question that I’ve actually never asked anyone on a podcast in the strongman community, and I really want your take on it. The sport is called strongman, that’s how most people refer to it.

You are a woman competing in strongman. Should we say strongwoman as the sport name for what you do? What is your opinion there? What’s the right nomenclature to use? What do you prefer?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

My take would be, if you’re referring to a group of people, you’d say, “Hey, guys.” The same thing. It’s strongman. We’re doing strongman. We’re competing in strongman. That’s what the sport is. However, I am a strong woman competing in strongman. Does that make sense?

David TaoDavid Tao

I like the way you put it. It makes sense to me. Ultimately…

 

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

 It should be nothing that should offend anybody. That’s just what the sport’s called. You can put a little “wo” in quotes, [laughs] if you want, if that makes you feel better.

David TaoDavid Tao

That’d be a lot more difficult to type out, to be fair.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

There’s a lot going on.

 

David TaoDavid Tao

You have to put a parentheses in the middle of the word. You talked about the sport growing. What do you think has contributed to the growth of the sport in the United States, specifically, especially on the women’s side?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

There’s been, I hate to say it, but I feel like especially since Instagram is a huge thing, other women seeing a variety of body types, maybe a body type closer to theirs is doing strongman is helpful. I’ve had many people reach out to me with the long lanky body type. They’re like, “You inspire me. I never thought I’d be able to do things like this, and I see you doing it and it gives me hope that I can do log press and do all these things.”

I think just opening up the world, and everybody being able to see that you don’t have to be a huge person. You don’t have to gain a ton of weight just to be strong.

David TaoDavid Tao

Let’s talk about what you like about the sport and its current form. This could be competition style, this could be popular events, this could be governance, and then I’m going to follow that up. Just a spoiler alert.

I’m going to follow that up with a question about what you don’t like about the sport and its current state. What do you like about the current state of strongman?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

I like how any event I can go to, I know that everybody is helping each other. It’s, honestly, a great community. There’ll be people at a contest that don’t even know how to load a stone and they’re doing that.

I’ll see like three other people helping them and they might be competing against them, and they’re still helping. That and I would say the athletic part. Just being an athlete in the past and then missing that, and then finding strongman is pretty awesome.

I love being an athlete and I love coupling that with strength. It’s pretty fun.

David TaoDavid Tao

Yeah, it’s the strength sport where, if you like running it’s a good strength sport, but if you don’t like running too much, right?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Right. [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

So, [laughs] I’ve heard strongman competitors say, “I like to move. I like to run, but I don’t want to go run 10 miles. That’s why I don’t compete in CrossFit.” [laughs]

It’s a nice in-between. You get to be athletic, but you get to be athletic for 60 seconds. You don’t have to go be athletic for 60 minutes.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

It’s more like short, brutal, more like sprint style.

David TaoDavid Tao

What are some things that you don’t like about the current state of strongman? When I say that I’m specifically referring to competition coverage events in the United States, which is your bread and butter as an amateur where you’ve been competing. I know it’s a little different to some other countries and on the international scene – they’ve their own issues, pros, cons.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

laughs] I don’t like, yet I have mixed feelings about this, though a lot of times they’ll change events even at nationals and stuff. Whether there’s something wrong with the equipment or whatever happens, they’ll change the whole event.

People have been training for something for so long, and then all of a sudden it gets changed. Obviously, a lot of people get hurt about it, but it’s an awesome thing, too. You literally have to be strong in all aspects, and that’s what it’s all about with strongmen.

You need to be a good presser. You need to be a good deadlifter. You need to be able to move with weight. You need to have good grip. It’s always going to be like that. People get so hurt about this. Yet, [laughs] it’s what we do.

David TaoDavid Tao

Are there events that you think are overemphasized at the national level?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

 It’s not a specific one, but they’ll take one event. Right now, in the past few years — last year and this year — it’s been bag toss over bar and that’s just gotten beat to death.

They’ll take one thing. Stones hadn’t been in a lot of contest that I’ve been looking at over the past year and a half just because of that bag toss. They’ll take one event and beat it to death, and then they’ll change it again.

Strongman’s variety, and I just hate how contest will see other contest doing that, and then they’ll do the same [chuckles] . It just doesn’t make sense to me.

 

David TaoDavid Tao

What do you think it’ll take? We’ve seen a growth of the sport, we’ve seen increased popularity of the sport. Some of those aspects you pointed out. Women seeing other women on Instagram with a variety of body types competing.

We’ve seen strongman hit the mainstream and that we see some strong men athletes in Game of Thrones having documentaries made about them. The sport is growing as far as the public consciousness. What do you think it’s going to take for the sport particularly on the women’s side, I am curious as to your opinions here, to level up again in the public eye?

 

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Honestly, we just need more people volunteering at events, more people willing to teach. I started putting myself more out there on Instagram. Trying to teach things because I am a coach and I do enjoy going through things with my clients in critiquing and teaching them how to log press or teaching them how to do after cleaning presser or a stone load or whatever.

We just need more knowledge in general because, like you said, a lot of places lack equipment even and people are very interested. They’re just intimidated. They have no idea how to start. More knowledge is going to be I think the key.

David TaoDavid Tao

What are some tips you’d give to someone maybe interested in starting in the sport of strongman. Assume they have a bit of a strength background. They might not be like a world record holding power lifter or weightlifter.

They have a bit of a background in that, a bit of a basis in that. What are some pieces of advice you’d give them? Or what are some pieces of advice you give people when they reach out to you about remote coaching? And they say, “Hey, I’m new to this. I’m not really sure where to get started.” What are some of the starting points?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

 I’ve been able to thankfully guide people to certain gyms in which they turned out loving. It’s just finding whatever in your area that you can work with. If it’s a powerlifting gym that only has a few strongman implements, that’s enough. Just go from there to getting a coach, whether it’s a coach in person or a remote coach.

As long as you have somebody guiding you, because there is a lot of stuff that’s technical in strongman. There’s a lot of little niches and fine-tuning and whatnot. It’s going to be super important to have somebody to at least guide you. Like I said, finding a gym too, that has at least a few…like a log or whatever.

David TaoDavid Tao

What does a typical training week look like for you? How does that change leading into a competition? What does your peak look like?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Right now I’m still pretty much just trying to get stronger. I’m actually working on my conditioning a lot more. It’s really sucky. A lot of time to rest, bike sprints and all that fun stuff. As it gets more to competitions, you just get more event-specific. Sometimes I’ll even drop a day.

Right now I’m on five days a week. Sometimes I’ll drop a day as the intensity increases and the events get more specific. I’ll go to four days so I can really recover.

David TaoDavid Tao

Are you set on this body weight category for a while? I know that training, frequency and adaptations will occur when people maybe bounce between weight classes, but are you competing and plan to compete in your current body weight category?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

 That’s funny that you say that because… [laughs] Seven months ago or so, I was like 15, 18 pounds lighter.

David TaoDavid Tao

What category did you start…just for reference, what category did you start competing?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

I have competed in both middleweight and lightweight. My goal if I go to the Arnold, I’d like to do it as a lightweight however…

David TaoDavid Tao

 Which is what for women? Just for listeners who might not be familiar with the body weight categories.

 

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

In USS, it’s 132, but in Strongman Corp it’s 140. I’d be doing Strongman Corp because I cannot get down to 132 for the life. That wouldn’t work. [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

Gotcha. What are those body weight categories? It’s 132 or 140. Those are the cut off between lightweight and middleweight and then the next step.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

That’s lightweight in but they’re indifferent.

David TaoDavid Tao

I’m just saying that those are if you’re above those in, then you’re a middleweight in those sanctioning bodies, if you’re below those, you’re a lightweight and then what is the next tier?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

 I’m 55. I think

David TaoDavid Tao

You’re between basically lightweight and middleweight and you’d ideally like to compete as a lightweight if you were to make the Arnold.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Ideally for this year, but my body is wanting to grow right now. I’ve been pretty good about my nutrition. I’m basically eating all the time, a lot of beef nuggets [laughs] I’ve actually put on a good amount of muscle. With that I’ve obviously gained some weight.

We’ll see what happens. I’m going to try to slowly drop down. But I think if I do go to the Arnold and national as a lightweight, I will probably go up to middleweight. My body just wants to be there.

David TaoDavid Tao

I wanted to get into some rapid fire questions and by rapid fire, I don’t mean you have to answer these in one word, but I want your just initial gut reactions to some of these. You can talk as long as you want. But that’s designed just to get that initial reaction. OK. What is your secret talent?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Making a joke out of everything. [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

 You must be a lot of fun to train with then.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

[laughs] I’m kind of a blast. [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

Unbiased opinion. You heard it here, from a completely objective source.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Just ask a few people, they’ll tell you.

David TaoDavid Tao

Or else.

All right. What is your pet peeve? This could be in strength sports or in strength training. Could be completely outside of that.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

That’s 100 percent when somebody doesn’t believe me [laughs] I could say anything, and especially if I know that it’s true, and they’re like, “No, that’s not right.” Oh my God, it drives me nuts.

David TaoDavid Tao

[laughs] Who is a strength athlete, it doesn’t have to be in the sport of strongman. It could be in powerlifting, weightlifting, CrossFit, you name it. Who’s the strength athlete that you really admire, and why?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

That sound sounds really cheesy, but I really don’t have one. I feel like having somebody that you really look up to puts limitations or puts tunnel vision on who you are and where you want to be and where you want to go. I have a lot of people that I have respect for, for sure, but I definitely don’t have one individual that I’m like, “Oh, I really admire them.”

David TaoDavid Tao

Changing the direction there just a little bit. I like that answer. I think it does make a lot of sense especially for an athlete who wants to forge their own path and has their personal goals. They’re not just like carbon copying someone else’s.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Right.

David TaoDavid Tao

Let me change that a little bit. Who would be your dream training partner? Someone you’ve never trained with before.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Oh, boy. [laughs] Oh, God. Honestly, I have a fascination with Dave Tate from EliteFTS. [laughs] Which is funny because it’s not strongman at all but I do love him and I love listening to him and the knowledge that he has and he’s incredibly funny as well. [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

If you could eliminate one movement from strength sport, you can just snap fingers and it just doesn’t exist and has never existed and will never exist, one movement, what would it be?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

 Probably any grip event. [laughs] I’d have to do Farmers Hold for time and that is deadly. [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

Well, that reminds you of the early days of World’s Strongest Man and actually they were doing it in the 2000s where they were just hanging from a pull up bar for a time over a big pool of water.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Stuff like that. No. Don’t like it. [laughs] You’re dying on the inside but for people watching it’s like, “This is boring.” [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

They’re not even moving. They’re just standing there.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

On the inside, you’re like, “I swear to God. I can’t last two more seconds.” [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

Those are actually some of my favorite events because I love it from a respective standpoint because you do see people dying on the inside. You just see them absolutely exerting themselves. They’re not moving. They’re trying to keep it cool. They’re to look like they’re not suffering but you know they are.

 

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

And you see sweats just coming out. [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

The vein just popping out at the forehead.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Oh, for sure. [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

I would say, I prefer when it’s something like a Farmers Hold or just hanging from a pull up bar. Hercules Holds, they look a little bit more impressive. It’s clear to any observer that that person is doing something.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

They’re clearly holding two poles at. That’s pretty cool and their shoulders look like they’re about to pop out. [laughs]

David TaoDavid Tao

What is your favorite movement in this sport of strongman?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Stones, for sure.

David TaoDavid Tao

Stones are something that maybe the most classic strongman movement. It’s a movement that’s maybe associated with strongman like Farmer’s Carrys could be up there. Log Press could be up there.

Stones are also something where you see lot more variety, we’ve seen the Stone of Steel is not just concrete stones anymore. What is something about stones that you think you’d like to see like change or introduced? How do you think competitions going to have a little more variety to that?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

This is a hard one because like the local contests, they don’t have access normally to a lot of variety of stones though you don’t get to do medley as very often. You don’t get to go head to head with somebody else because they have limited stones.

I would definitely love to do a contest like that where you can go head to head with somebody. I also am huge fan of Stone Over Bar going head to head with someone where you have 15 seconds to get it over and they have 15 seconds to get it back. That’s super fun.

David TaoDavid Tao

It is nice to do something where you at least can look your competition in the eye because so much in strengths for to solitary.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Yes.

David TaoDavid Tao

I don’t know. There’s a cool mental aspect there that you don’t get to explore with a lot of other event certainly.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Oh, for sure. That’s why that Official Strongman Game that just started three years ago, they’re very much like that and it’s super cool to see them doing all of this like head to head type things and you actually get to see the competition next to each other. It’s very cool and creates a really good atmosphere and good energy.

David TaoDavid Tao

My last question for you today. Working folks keep up to date with what you’re doing, your training, your upcoming competitions. What’s the best way to follow you?

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Follow me on Instagram, it’s @sjfurm. I do not have a website right now but I am building. For my remote coaching, it’s Be Better and I’m building a website here soon. I have one-on-one training and I just started group training. It’ll be fun.

David TaoDavid Tao

Fantastic. We’ll have that information in the show notes as well. Sarah Furman thank you so much for taking the time to join us. It’s been a real pleasure.

Sarah FurmanSarah Furman

Thank you for having me.

About David Tao

BarBend's Co-Founder and CEO, David is a veteran of the health & fitness industry, with nearly a decade of experience building and running editorial teams in the space. He also serves as a color commentator for both National and International weightlifting competitions, many through USA Weightlifting.

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