Oh hell yeah! Soviet express is going strong and is showing no signs of stopping. We have cataloged Ivan’s journey to a 500kg deadlift and now his journey to the 502kg(maybe even 510kg) deadlift and the title of being the ultimate alpha male and the best deadlifter on the planet.
In his preparation for the Deadlift world championships, Ivan has been posting some training videos on his Instagram and if the videos are chronological(they happened around the same day or week they were posted on Instagram) Ivan is getting stronger by the day. About a month a go he was pulling 440kg for a double then he tried pulling 550kg of blocks but couldn’t quite get a lockout. Now he’s just 10 kg short of equalling Eddie Hall’s 500kg and 11kg of equalling the current deadlift record of 501 kg.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CEmaELgIcTH/
The weight looks like it’s giving him a fight, but being that close to the world record couple of weeks out of competition means he could easily have a new world record in him come competition day. Remember, Thor’s best filmed pre-world record lift was 470kg and he did 501 kg just a few weeks later. This should be really encouraging for Ivan as he enters the finals stages of his training sessions.
I contacted Ivan Makarov back in May and did an improv Instagram interview with him and he then told me that he was training for Giants Live’s deadlift championships which were to be held in September. However, due to all these crazy travel restrictions that are in place around the world, I am guessing this event should be postponed. Now again, I have no insider knowledge on this and I am just speculating. However, after doing some light digging I did find that Giants Live will be hosting an audience free Europe’s Strongest Man contest in September. The interesting thing for me is that the date of this year’s ESM is September 11th, while the original announcement for the Deadlift championships was for September 12th. Now, since ESM will be contested over a period of two days, it is entirely possible that the Deadlift will be contested somewhere during the second day. Regardless of that, Ivan is still training strong and is pulling near world record numbers in training. Giants Live is releasing the event schedule on their fb page one event at a time, so will find out soon if Ivan will get to try his hands on the mind-numbing 502kg world record.
Catch comprehensive coverage of the 2025 Arnold Classic, including pre-judging, event recaps, analyses, and complete Arnold Classic results at our Arnold Classic coverage hub: FitnessVolt.com/arnold-classic
You can also follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and
YouTube for even more content.
