‘The Mountain’ only needed a round.
You thought we were done with novelty boxing matches? Of course not! This one was quite literally a big one, as it involved ‘The Mountain’ from HBO’s Game of Thrones series.
On Saturday afternoon in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, boxing fans were treated to Icelandic giant and 2018 World’s Strongest Man Hafthor ‘Thor’ Bjornsson taking on legendary arm wrestling champion Devon Larratt of Canada.
To set the scene: This boxing match was only booked about a month ago after Bjornsson’s original opponent, fellow strongman Eddie Hall, was forced to pull out of the event. Larrett has no prior combat sports experience at all. So he trained at Tristar Gym in Quebec to get prepped for Bjornsson, who has a couple of boxing exhibitions under his belt.
What do you get when a 46-year-old goes in there with five weeks of boxing training against a 32-year-old who’s an all-around athletic freak with slightly more boxing experience? Well you get a first-round TKO. Larratt looked as out of his depth as you’d expect and Bjornsson drew blood, landed several clean shots and got a standing stoppage. This was listed as an exhibition so don’t worry if you thought this was an actual pro bout.
Watch the video at the top of the page.
It looks like Bjornsson vs. Eddie Hall will be rescheduled for 2022. There might not be a standard ring big enough for both of them.