• Eddie Hall is a British strongman and actor born in 1988
• He is known for winning the 2017 World’s Strongest Man competition and previously held the world deadlift record
• He began working as a truck mechanic in 2008 and entered his first strongman competition in 2010
• In 2015 he set a world record for deadlift and won the 2017 World’s Strongest Man competition
• He has an estimated net worth of $5 million, is 6ft 3ins tall and weighs 185kgs, and became a vegetarian in 2019
Eddie Hall is a British strongman and actor, born on 15 January 1988 in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire England. He’s known for being the winner of 2017’s World’s Strongest Man competition, and held the world dead-lift record.
Early Life
Edward “Eddie” Stephen Hall was always an avid admirer of weightlifting athletes: ‘I remember watching World’s Strongest Man as a kid, and I was just obsessed with it at sort of five, six years old. Just watching these huge guys lift planes, pulls train, lift stones – I was just mesmerized by it.’
A competitive swimmer and rugby player in his childhood, Eddie gained excellent physical condition, and the will to follow strict training routines –from 15 to 20 hours a week – in order to be successful.
However, despite the good state of his body, he started suffering from depression and anxiety after his Nan was diagnosed with cancer when he was 12 years old: ‘I’d always be wanting to go to the toilet to sit on my own and just rock back and forth and just calm down and get the anxiety out. If I had to go out for a family meal or go out with mates, I’d be throwing up before I went out, I’d be that anxious.’
His constant anxiety attacks left him unable to complete his classes at Clayton High School, ultimately causing his expulsion when he was 15 years old. He had to be homeschooled until his matriculation.
His mental health problems not only affected the course of his education, it also affected his dream of becoming an Olympic swimmer: ‘I was thrown out of the swimming club – which was going to be my career – I was always in trouble with the police, in trouble with my parents, my family, always getting into fights and, I don’t know, it just f****** hit me hard.’
Besides entering a counseling program – which he attended for years – Hall was prescribed Prozac by his doctors to deal with his depression, which helped with his recovery.
When Hall was 17 years old, he discovered he was incredibly good at weightlifting, and started considering dedicating his life to it.
Career
Mechanic
In his book “Strongman: My Story” published in 2018, Eddie Hall revealed he started working as a truck mechanic in 2008, when he was 20 years old. During this time he never lost his good physical condition, and kept on training, though the job at Robert Wiseman Dairies’ garage in Shropshire was his only source of income for the six years he worked there.
Strongman
Having worked on bodybuilding for years, and conditioned by his physical prowess obtained in his swimming years, Eddie Hall’s big chance to become a strongman came in 2010, when he entered the Strongmen Championship in England after an injured Dave Meer dropped out of it.
Although Hall was completely new to the competition, he impressively won first place. This was the signal he was looking for to become a full-time strongman.
In 2011 Hall participated in UK’s Strongest Man – his second important competition – in Belfast. Once again Hall was successful in his journey, and not only did he win the tournament, he also set a new Viking Hold record of 18 seconds when he held axes of 20kgs (44lbs) on each arm.
Despite his torn and injured forearms, Hall successfully won a place to participate in World’s Strongest Man (WSM) competition in 2012. However, Hall had to face other competitions first, including Giants Live Melbourne in New Zealand, celebrated in February that year. This was Hall’s first taste of an international tournament, and proved to be a big challenge for him – added to a back injury, as he was placed fourth at the end.
Two months later in April, Hall competed in Strongest Man competition in Europe, and despite not obtaining the results he wanted, ending up in eighth place, his mark was impressive considering he competed with some of the strongest weightlifters in the world, Žydrūnas Savickas – four-time winner of World’s Strongest Man – included.
Later that year Eddie finally participated in the World’s Strongest Man championship, though his efforts weren’t enough to reach a good position and he didn’t pass the qualifying group, ending 18th in the competition.
Initially Hall wasn’t going to participate in Strongest Man Europe, though an injury suffered by Ervin Kanton allowed him to enter the competition, ending in eighth place. Next year Eddie’s work progressed regarding international events, when he got to the final round of WSM 2014, and finished in sixth place.
In 2015 Hall established a new world record with a dead lift of 462kgs (1,019lbs) in Australia during the Arnold Classic event, hosted by Arnold Schwarzenegger. This record didn’t last long though, as Eddie himself surpassed it the same year at the World Deadlift Championship.
Also in 2015 Hall surpassed his previous position at the WSM Competition, when he was placed fourth at the final round. Not stopping there, Eddie pushed his limits once again when he surpassed his previous dead lifting record at Arnold Classic Strongman in 2016, only to break it again months later, when he achieved a mark of 500kgs (1,100lbs).
However, making history wasn’t an easy task, and in an interview with Barbend, Hall recalled the health problems he faced for lifting such a massive weight- including arc blindness: ‘I had a really bad concussion, memory loss, bleeding out of every hole on the body. So yeah, it was a really risky, dangerous lift and the health consequences weren’t the best, but it was all worth it.’
In 2017 and after a long and painful journey, Eddie Hall finally reclaimed his title as the World’s Strongest Man.
It was then that Eddie expressed his desire to retire from dead lifting competitions, revealing he was concerned for his health.
TV Appearances
Eddie Hall’s first TV appearance was in 2015 in “Watchdog”, in which he helped drivers to test their skills while facing diffcult circumstances.
The same year the documentary “Eddie: Strongman” directed by Matt Bell was premiered, which centered on Eddie’s two-year journey to become one of the strongest men on the planet.
In 2018 Eddie appeared in “Celebs In Solitary” in which viewers watched him trying to spend five days isolated. In 2019 he formed part of the cast of the reality TV series “The Strongest Man in History,” and in “Beasted”.
Eddie briefly appeared in “Transformers: The Last Knight” of 2017.
Personal Life
Eddie Hall is married to Alexandra Hall, with who he has two children named Layla and Maximus. Nowadays Eddie and Alexandra enjoy a happy marriage, though it wasn’t always like that.
As Eddie recalled in an interview, their marriage was about to end in 2017, shortly before he won World’s Strongest Man- when they faced problems originated by his career and the long time he spent away from his family: ‘Five weeks before I won it my wife was basically packing her bags… she was gone, she was out the house, I had to beg her to give me five more weeks’ (…) ‘I promised her I’d win it and that our life would get better. And thank f*** I won it because, honest to god, that saved my marriage’.
Net Worth
Eddie Hall has an estimated net worth of $5 million, as a result of his long career as a dead-weight lifter, strongmen and TV personality.
Physical Appearance
Eddie Hall has a bulky, strong appearance. He weight approximately 185kgs (410lbs), and is 6ft 3ins (1.90m) tall.
Interesting Facts
Eddie says that Brian Shaw is one of the smartest strongmen.
He wants to play the role of a bad guy in a movie.
During his training process to win the World’s Strongest Man, Eddie saw his family only two hours a week.
He expressed that his calorie regimen is very tiring.