Mandy Baggot

Morning everyone! Now, due to my trumpet blowing of yesterday I completely forgot to tell you about my trip to watch Salisbury's Strongest Man.

Now, for those of you that don't know, I have a little fetish for Strongman! Ever since I was a little girl one of the highlights of my year has been sitting around the TV at Christmas time to watch World's Strongest Man. And I have been lucky enough to see some of the world's strongest men compete LIVE in front of my very eyes! If you check out the photos page on this website you can see me sat on Geoff Capes' knee and with the current third strongest man in the world, England's Terry Hollands!

Salisbury's Strongest Man was obviously a local event but the disciplines they performed were very similar to the events in the world competitions although at a lesser weight! These men train really hard 365 days a year, have to follow a strict regime and diet and Strongman isn't just about being the strongest any more - some of the events require extreme fitness and cardio stamina. Two of my fave events are the Farmer's Walk and the Barrel Loading.

Here is a link to Terry Hollands in training for barrel loading http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxqV5UkrACc

There was a fantastic crowd for Salisbury's Strongest Man and there were some fantastic competitors including Mr Big's friend from school Roger Pearce! Here is a picture of Roger in action and another one with him and World's Strongest Man competitor and guest referee for the day, Rob Frampton.

Well done to everyone that took part, it was a massive success and I hope it's the first of many Salisbury's Strongest Man events!

Now, I know some of you enjoy my adventures in pop so I am going to leave you with a new You Tube video I recorded yesterday. Yes, I'm doing Lady Gaga again! Enjoy!

Mandy xx