The 2023 Giants Live World Tour Finals are scheduled for Oct. 21, 2021, in Glasgow, Scotland, and will feature the 2023 World Log Lift Championships. Among the athletes on the confirmed roster are 2023 World’s Strongest Man (WSM) champion Mitchell Hooper, former two-time WSM champion Tom Stoltman, and current log lift world record holder Chieck “Iron Biby” Sanou.
Hooper is the defending World Tour Finals champion, having scored 52 of a possible 60 points in 2022. Check out a breakdown of the roster in the video below, courtesy of 2016 Europe’s Strongest Man (ESM) champion Laurence Shahlaei‘s YouTube channel, followed by the full 13-athlete roster.
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2023 Giants Live World Tour Finals Roster
- Tom Stoltman (Scotland)
- Luke Stoltman (Scotland)
- Mitchell Hooper (Canada) — Defending Champion
- Luke Richardson (England)
- Graham Hicks (England)
- Eddie Williams (Australia)
- Mathew Ragg (New Zealand)
- Pavlo Kordiyaka (Ukraine)
- Gavin Bilton (Wales)
- Pa O’Dwyer (Ireland)
- Evans Nana (Ghana)
- Tyler Cotton (USA)
- Chieck “Iron Biby” Sanou (Burkina Faso)
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To place a bet against anyone other than the reigning WSM champion Hooper or two-time former WSM champion Tom Stoltman would typically be for those boldly looking to lose their shirt. However, the field might be a bit more flat in Glasgow than it reads on paper. The weekend after the 2023 Giants Live World Tour Finals is the 2023 Rogue Strongman Invitational, a two-day event, as opposed to a single-day event like the World Tour Finals, boasting a much higher prize purse.
Hooper and both Stoltman brothers are confirmed for the 2023 Rogue Strongman Invitational roster. Therefore, it wouldn’t be out of left field to expect Tom Stoltman, Luke Stoltman, and Hooper not to go all out for the win in Glasgow to ensure they have enough in the tank to compete at the top of their games in Round Rock, TX, where the Dell Diamond Stadium that hosts the Rogue Invitational resides.
Additionally, for Hooper, the Rogue Strongman Invitational is one of the few remaining premier strongman contests he doesn’t have on the gold side of his resume — he’s the reigning Arnold Strongman Classic and WSM champion. The events for the World Tour Finals have not been released yet at the time of this article’s publication, other than a max log lift for the World Log Lift Championships. So it isn’t currently clear if the contest will bias athletes who excel in dynamic strength versus static strength.
If the events reward the former, Kordiyaka and O’Dwyer will have juicy podium chances on their hands. If the events reward the latter, perhaps Bilton and Ragg are the athletes likeliest to contend for gold. In Glasgow, the looming presence of the Rogue Invitational is likely to play a factor. If that proves true, the question becomes which athlete will take advantage?
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