Rob Kearney lifts a log weighing 290 pounds while training at Lighting Fitness in Connecticut for a strongman competition. 114k Followers, 667 Following, 736 Posts - See Instagram photos and videos from Rob Kearney (@worlds_strongest_gay) That was fine, though, because my goals were always modest and incremental—do slightly better at this contest, improve my max in this lift by few pounds or my time in this event by a few seconds. … Back in 2009, Kearney was just a beefy if somewhat undersized 17-year-old kid looking for something to do besides football — and a teacher at his high school tossed him a life preserver, inviting him to train at the local CrossFit gym. I was improving, gaining weight and muscle mass, but also and more importantly becoming technically as close to perfect as possible at the lifts I was doing.”, In 2014, Kearney—just 22 but already someone on the strongman map—decided to publicly disclose his sexual orientation. Kearney will be making his 3rd appearance at the 2019 Tachi Palace World’s Strongest Man. I’m going all-in.”, With Kearney only a decade removed from the start of his career, what would he want to say to a young kid who shared his circumstances—confused about their identity and casting about for a sport in which to excel? Rob Kearney is a multi-time World’s Strongest Man competitor and the 2019 Arnold Australia Strongman champion. Men's Health participates in various affiliate marketing programs, which means we may get paid commissions on editorially chosen products purchased through our links to retailer sites. This content is imported from YouTube. This 27 year old represents the USA and resides in Easthampton, Massachusetts. Or maybe they’re a big-time lifter and they’re just very interested in training alongside me, because they want to get better the same way I did, and this other stuff isn’t important to them, isn’t something that will even come up.”, That said, Kearney has dealt with a bit of real-life heckling. About Rob Kearney Rob Kearney is an American Professional Strongman as well as the first and only openly gay professional strongman in the world. Openly gay pro strongman Rob Kearney marries his boyfriend Rob Kearney won a pro strongman contest and then married his boyfriend on a beach. Robert “Rob” Kearney (born 26 March 1986) was an Irish rugby union rugby player who played fullback for Leinster and Ireland. The first is that Kearney, at 5’10” and 285 pounds, is a surprisingly normal-sized competitor—relatively speaking—in a sport filled with giants like four-time World’s Strongest Man champion 6’8”… “Look at my Instagram”—where Kearney goes by the handle worlds_strongest_gay, while husband Aleixo is worlds_gayest_strongman — “and that’s what you’ll see: me lifting heavy weights and hanging out with my husband.”, A guy in the crowd was shouting dumb slurs. A fellow strongman, Rob Kearney, broke his log press record in April 2019 when he lifted 471 lbs or 213.5 kg. Rob Kearney is an American Professional strongman (born 16 november 1991) in Brooklyn, New York. Rising strength star Rob Kearney, a.k.a.
“I’m here for two reasons: to succeed at the sport of strongman, and to show LGBT folks and everyone else that this sort of success isn’t just possible but normal and acceptable,” Kearney tells me. “And if I had to tell that kid, that younger version of me, something I would have wanted to hear, it’d be to urge him to keep training to be the person everyone else said you’d never become. Three things immediately stand out about Rob Kearney, a 27-year-old rising star in the professional strongman world who looks to make a big impact in this year’s World’s Strongest Man competition that starts June 13 in Bradenton Florida.

And gradually I got better, with a longer runway than most because I was just a teen when I started. Robert, when he heard the news, swore to break not only the American record but also the world record of 502.5 lb or 228 kg, held by Žydrūnas “Big Z” Savickas.

“I also joined the school’s powerlifting team, and helped remake it into ‘Team Iron Sports,’ which went beyond powerlifting to include strongman and bodybuilding-style training as well,” he says.

[Arnold Classic and America’s Strongest man winner] Derek Poundstone, who is coaching me right now, said the same thing.

The 24 Best Face Masks For Outdoor Workouts, Michael K. Williams on HBO's 'Lovecraft Country'. And the third is that Kearney, openly gay since 2014 and married to husband Joey Aleixo since March of this year, pulls no punches about matters of identity. I’ve quit my job and I’m able to train full-time for this now.

“I was still below 200 pounds and also commuting to South Windsor, Connecticut, to train at Lightning Fitness, because that meant I had the opportunity to train alongside people who were better than me.”, During this period, Kearney pursued his undergraduate and then graduate degree while laying the literal and figurative groundwork for a career in strength sports. That’s my current goal. This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. The second is that Kearney’s strongman workouts are masterpieces of technique and conditioning, where he uses excellent pressing technique to heft training logs and dumbbells and blasts through sled and yoke runs. I’ve already won the Log Lifts World Championship and set the American log lift record [471 pounds]. And that’s what I’ve seen from these high-level athletes: they’re all competitors who value strength and performance, and they’re not going to think in terms of stereotypes, they’re going to think in terms of this being a community of people who have a shared goal of getting stronger,” Kearney says. But there’s still a lot of time. I was setting and meeting manageable goals. this year’s World’s Strongest Man competition, How to Watch the World's Strongest Man Competition, "The Mountain" Thinks the Referees Stole the World’s Strongest Man Title From Him, 2020 World’s Strongest Man Competition Postponed, Brian Shaw Shares World's Strongest Man Training, The Mountain Wins the World's Strongest Man Title, The Mountain Loses the World's Strongest Man Title. “But it wasn’t like I was fantastic right off the bat,” he says. “Brian Shaw texted me to tell me he appreciated my courage. I’d like to finish in the top two of my qualifying heat and get into the finals this year and then see what happens. You’ve got top stars who have participated in this sport well into their thirties, and I’m only 27. The first is that Kearney, at 5’10” and 285 pounds, is a surprisingly normal-sized competitor—relatively speaking—in a sport filled with giants like four-time World’s Strongest Man champion 6’8”, 440-pound Brian Shaw and 6’9”, 440-pound defending World’s Strongest Man winner and Game of Thrones actor Hafthor Björnsson. “In person, when people hear my story, they’re very understanding, very interested. “When there’s been trolling, it’s almost always this online stuff,” Kearney says. I said, ‘Dude, I suck dick and I’m stronger than you.'. Among them include, worlds Strongest Man, The Arnold Strongman Classic, and the Arnold Strongman Australia. “While I did begin participating in strongman competitions right away, that meant I finished last in eight consecutive events. “At one contest, I had someone in the crowd chirping at me, shouting the usual dumb slurs,” says Kearney. He is known for being the first openly gay strongman in the sport.

Oliver Lee Bateman writes about strength and culture for a range of publishers including VICE, Al-Jazeera, Salon, Pacific Standard, The New Republic, Vox, The Atlantic, Columbia Journalism Review, The Ringer, The Outline, Matter, VQR,  Hazlitt, The Awl, and The Paris Review. “The successes started to come, slowly but surely,” he says. There are many more workouts ahead of me, many more modifications I can make to my programming. He began his professional career in the 231lb (105kg) weight class where he took 2nd place at Americas Strongest Man in 2014 and 2015. “But this year the lineup of competitors in my heat and the list of events seem tailor-made for my skill set.

Rob Kearney, head … And while Kearney wasn’t built to blaze through Fran in record time, he did flash some innate talent for lifting heavy weights. Anything more than that, I think, and you’ll get discouraged and want to give up. He’s one of the rising stars in … “There are a bunch of stigmas around that, the kind of baggage and negative thinking that will get in the way of a person accomplishing everything they want at the gym.”, The strongman community was extremely supportive. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. For Kearney, this level of self-assurance has come after a decade of consistent improvement in his chosen sport. “I was in two World’s Strongest Man competitions, in 2017 and 2018, but I didn’t get out of the qualifier heats and into the finals,” he says. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io, Busta Rhymes Shows Off His Abs and Weight Loss, A CrossFitter Got Wrecked by VO2 Max Fitness Test, An Average Guy Mastered the Handstand in 5 Months, This Bodybuilder Ate and Trained Like Mike Tyson, This Guy Tried Henry Cavill's 'Superman' Training, Bobby Maximus Shares His Top Pump Up Workout, How Zedd Survives His ‘Brutal’ Leg Day Workout.
Many people wrote me off as a serious competitive athlete, someone without untapped athletic potential. “And after listening to that for a while, I just looked at the guy and told him, ‘Dude, I suck dick and I’m stronger than you.’ That was the end of that.”, Hecklers are easily silenced by winning, and winning—or at least progressing in his World’s Strongest Man career—remains Kearney’s goal. “Although this continues to improve as social attitudes change, it is still very intimidating for an LGBT person to enter a gym and engage in strength training,” Kearney says.

I’ve had time on my side when it came to getting better.”, After high school, Kearney enrolled at Springfield College — an alma mater shared by massively muscled WWE great John Cena and Gay Games founder Tom Waddell — and studied athletic training. But I managed to turn one lucky invitation to a gym into an entire career, and I became a professional athlete.

He has competed in many strongman competitions around the world. Rob Kearney is a pro-strongman who was formerly the Director of Sports Medicine at The Williston Northampton School. We may earn a commission through links on our site. People didn’t see that potential in me, but I saw that in me, and I trained until I’d brought it to the surface.”. As a youth he also played rugby union for Clongowes Wood College and Gaelic football for Louth in the All-Ireland Minor Football Championship. A one-pound personal best is still forward progress, and progress toward a brighter future, however halting it might be, is what really matters. His mom is a breast cancer survivor. The World's Strongest Gay, has already smashed stereotypes, but he’s young enough and hungry enough to challenge and maybe even defeat the reigning champion Hafthor Björnsson.

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