Cool Dudes part 1 was unlabeled. It was the Josh Barnett article I wrote a while back, so go check it out if you haven't.
It's 1974. A young Minnesota farm boy takes his new wife out to eat. He looks into the window of the little cafe, where he sees a poster advertising an arm-wrestling tournament at a local bar. He says "Sounds like something to do on a Sunday". He enters, he wins. 4 years later he comes in second at the world championships. A decade later he won Worlds. Then he did it again next year. All this shit happened before most of us were born.
Richard Lupkes is a mountain range of a man: silent, gigantic, and full of ways to crush your skull like an egg. At 6 foot 5 inches (195 cm) and 330 pounds (150 kg), he is truly the granddad you want to be (he is a granddad too, which is cool). He was a farmer all his life, like his father was, tilling and growing corn on 300 plus acres; which I am assuming, helped build his work ethic and incredible strength.
This is a good little early life Bio on the man, talking about how he got into it and how he pulled at the Over the Top event (yeah the Stallone movie that you need to watch).
https://youtu.be/TtaidZHkrNk
https://youtu.be/dnPpX8vdjh8
His training partner has been quoted saying that when it comes to arm wrestling, technique usually always beats strength, but Richard is the exception. That's not to say Mr. Lupkes isn't technical.
And this is another video showing a really badass partner-assisted wrist curl that would probably kill a normal man.
https://youtu.be/0TtjBvDvnns
He holds more than 20 large scale titles in pulling, both left and right-handed, and after a debilitating bicep tear in 1991 (surprising having nothing to do with arm wrestling) doctors said would leave him with, at max, 40% of his arm strength. That was nearly 40 years ago, and at 65 he's still battling with 20 somethings. Obviously he took some time off after his injury but got back to it in 2007 and I'm pretty sure that he is still going strong. So here's to you Mr. Lupkes, may you pull long after I am gone from this realm.
What an inspiration!
I armwrestled for a long time as a kid into my teens, my mother is both a national and world womens champ. Its a fantastic sport. And I enjoyed this read!