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IF YOU’RE LOOKING to become the strongest version of yourself, there may be no one more qualified to ask than the strongest guy on Earth. Literally.
Meet Mitchell Hooper: the 2026 winner of the World’s Strongest Man competition. If the name sounds familiar it’s not his first time wearing the crown—he won the title back in 2023 along with winning the Arnold Strongman Classic four consecutive times. Or maybe you’ve heard of how he tried to beat the deadlift world record at the controversial Enhanced Games in May?
Yes, those steroid Olympics, where almost everyone was on performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs). Hooper was no exception. And overall, he’s pretty candid about the PEDs he takes. In the latest Strong Talk, he talks to MH fitness director Ebenezer Samuel, C.S.C.S. about his experience—including the reality of what happens when you take drugs meant to push past the natural limits of human performance.
"The cost is that I’ll die younger than I would without it for sure, because I’m doing things supraphysiologically that are not health-forward, and I hope that I can undo some of the stuff that I’m doing to my body right now,” says Hooper. "But the reality is that I’m playing with a bit of fire. And the biggest fire that I was playing with is the one that people talk about last is fertility. That’s an absolute guaranteed risk."
The episode delves into Hooper’s own personal PED journey as a strongman, his very real concerns for himself about taking testosterone and other performance-enhancers, and why he believes testosterone and GLP-1s can be incredibly useful to the general population.
Want more deep-dive fitness wisdom from Samuel and other celebs and experts who've been on our Strong Talk podcast? Check out all our episodes here.
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Jocelyn Solis-Moreira, MS is the associate health & fitness for Men's Health and has previously written for CNN, Scientific American, Popular Science, and National Geographic before joining the brand. When she's not working, she's doing circus arts or working towards the perfect pull-up.
