Strongman Wedding

strong·man (strôngmn) noun- 1. a person who performs remarkable feats of strength.

Luke Whippo and Tina Wilderson got married yesterday and I had the honor to be the best man at their wedding. Luke and I have been training strongman together for the past 5 or 6 years. Luke is of the quiet type and his family and friends outside of strength training don't know much about what he does. It's not like him to talk about his own abilities, so I figured the best man speech was the perfect opportunity to talk about his abilities for him!

Giving a "best man speech" is a new experience for me. I paid careful attention to keep the focus on the groom. I named a few of his PR's using the most lay terms so even the oldest of grandmothers could understand what I was talking about. But talking about feats of strength does not communicate nearly as well as demonstrating them...

This is part of what I said:

"Perhaps one of his most impressive feats of strength though, is bending steel. I could tell you what Luke can do with a piece of 1/2" rebar, but you would have to see it to believe it. That's why I brought some 1/2" rebar with me.

*reveals rebar from behind the curtain*

Who wants to see what Luke can do with 1/2" rebar?!

Luke, would you please show your guests what you can do with 1/2" rebar?"

I then helped him out of his jacket and led him out to the middle of the dance floor!

I did not tell Luke I was going to do that. :)

I did however ask the bride beforehand to make sure she was alright that her soon to-be husband bent steel over the bridge of his nose at their wedding reception.

But Luke and I had no talk about this. :)

I found out later that Tina did say something to him, like a caring wife would, I suppose. Luke knew something was coming but he didn't know what kind of steel I was bringing or what I was going to ask him to do. The audience of course had no idea they had walked strait into a Strongman Wedding!

Luke proceeded to bend the bar over the bridge of his nose and scroll it into a pretzel! It was awesome! I doubt there was ever a man in a tuxedo who bent rebar over his nose at his own wedding!

The whole thing lasted under a minute... a few seconds for us to make our way to the dance floor, a few seconds for Luke to kill some steel, and a few seconds for us to get back to the head table so I could finish my speech.

We toasted some champaign and celebrated what was a great wedding!

I wish Luke and Tina all the best!

Speech and feat video...



High resolution feat-only video...