Giants Live World Tour Finals 2023 - Race with Czech participation | Report and results

An autumnal Saturday afternoon in Glasgow promised to be an amazing event. Specifically, on Saturday 21 October 2023, another Giants Live race took place. Always a meticulously prepared event for a huge crowd. This time it was called the 2023 Giants Live World Tour Finals.

Not only do I love to write about these races, I am even more happy to see the Czech footprint at the world's top professional races for the first time in a really long time. The last time Jirka Vytiska competed with the best was at the Arnold Pro World Series in 2017, before him, at the beginning of the millennium, Zdeněk Sedmík, who competed at the Arnold Pro Classic 2003. This year, the Czech flag was flying again. Ondřej Fojtů came to show that the Czech strongman sport has moved forward a lot and that our competitors are definitely competitive with the world's best.

Ondra stood in the line next to big names of strongman sport like Tom Stoltman who looked much bigger than before, Michell Hooper, Pavlo Kordiyaka and others. And he competed in a total of five disciplines:

• Loglift to the max
• Sandbag steeplechase
• Deadlift for repeats
• Conan's wheel
• Castle Stones

The race also featured Cheick Sanou, aka Iron Biby, attempting to break his own two-year-old loglift record. This year's attempt is worth a whopping 230kg.

Loglift

The royal discipline of the sport, it's a crowd favourite, looks brutal, brutal... Just the ideal representative of strongman sport - Loglift. Amazing wooden Slater log complete with discs on both sides. The competitors started at 170kg and gradually built up. Only 2 fighters didn't make the basic weight and in total 5 competitors broke the 200 kg mark. Tyler Cotton, Luke Stoltman, Pavlo Kordiyaka and Mitchell Hooper tied for second place at 200 kg.

Tom Stoltman was the winner of the 210 kg event. Ondrej Fojtů finished right in the middle of the starting field with a valid attempt at 186 kg. Great performance.

Sandbag steeplechase

How to translate or describe this discipline. Obstacle course? We know steeplechase more from horse racing. But there's no limit to the imagination of the organizers, so I guess steeplechase. The competitors had a hurdle in the exact middle of a 20-metre track. Their task was to pick up two 150-pound sandbags from the ground and throw them over the obstacle. If they threw the second bag over, they circled the obstacle and again had to pick up the sandbag and throw or place it over the finish obstacle, then return for the second bag and finish. It was anything but easy. Anyway, everyone struggled through it.

Third place went to Mathew Ragg of New Zealand with a time of 31.41 seconds. Second place went to the incredibly fast and agile Pavlo Kordiyaka with a time of 30.47. Tom Stoltman finished half a second faster, in 29.92 seconds. Ondrej certainly did not let himself be embarrassed and took the fifth place with a time of 34.44. Unfortunately Evans Aryee, whom we know from this year's race in Vrdy, was injured in this discipline. He tore or ruptured his biceps, so he had to interrupt his participation in the race.

Deadlift

Now, readers, please close or close your eyes. Imagine a 350 kg barbell. Now lift it in that imagination, but not just once, but for reps. Do you have it? How was that? Unimaginably hard, I agree, but that's exactly what the competitors did. Split second place with 7 reps between Mitchell Hooper and Tom Stoltman. Mathew Ragg managed one more repetition, 8. Ondra was again right in the middle of the field. He managed a great 4 reps, as did lifters Luke Stoltman, Pa O'Dwyer, Eddie Wiliams and Pavlo Kordiyaka.

Connan's Wheel

Connan's Wheel. A discipline hard on the psyche, also if you grip it wrong you can't breathe. It's a lot about the head, but of course it's also about strength and will. Each of the riders in the field has done more than one lap. But in total, three of them all missed by a steamer. First Pavlo Kordiyaka set a best of 820 degrees, but in the end it was enough for third place. Michell Hooper bested him, stopping at 841 degrees. Even that was not enough to win.

Mathew Ragg reached the bottom of his strength when he pushed his limits and everyone else's limits to the limit, breaking 845 degrees. The victory was his. Ondra with a performance of 553 degrees showed that he too is a force to be reckoned with.

Castle stones

Castle stones or Atlas stones, depending on how you want to name the discipline, it's the same thing. At Giants Live, this is the last discipline. It also has the most weight on the eventual point tally. Better in this discipline takes better placement. Those are the rules. At our races, the overall race and the better placing in all disciplines are judged. But this is different. The competitors had to classically pick up 5 atlases weighing from 120 kg to 200 kg on 5 different high pedestals. The heavier the ball, the lower the pedestal. And since I mention it every time, I won't forgive myself now.

If there are Atlas Stones in the race, and at the same time if Tom Stoltman is racing, and at the same time if a totally unexpected event happens, which happens once in a lifetime... the winner is clear. in a time of 19.23 seconds, it is Tom who takes the win of the discipline. Compared to second place, he's almost 10 seconds faster. Apart from Tom, 4 other competitors managed to put all five stones on the pedestals. Tom's older brother Luke Stoltman finished third with a time of 37.56 seconds. Mathew Ragg took second place with a time of 28.81. Ondra unfortunately was the only one to complete only 3 stones in this event in a time of 42.16 seconds, taking only 2 points.

It was a really exciting competition with World's Strongest Man 2023 Michtell Hooper, World's Strongest Man 2021 and 2022 Tom Stoltman, Europe's Strongest Man 2023 Pavlo Kordiyaka and other fighters of the world's top strongman sport, among them also Czech representative Ondřej Fojtů from Brno SPC Gym.

His participation is already a sensation. On the other hand, as you will see in the results below, Ondra was definitely not lost among the competitors and considering his age I can put my hand in the fire that we will see him again and that the Czech flag could settle on the starting field for a long time. It would also be very nice if our participation would be doubled thanks to another Brno strongman Lukáš Pepř.

Third place in the race goes to Canadian strongman Michell Hooper, who scored a total of 45 points. Second place went to Mathew Ragg from New Zealand with 51.5 points. The overall win was confirmed by Tom Stoltman, who is definitely looking to claim his third World's Strongest Man trophy. What do you think, will he do it next May?

The judging table