Mark Henry

Mark Jerrold Henry (born June 12, 1971) is an American former powerlifter, Olympic weightlifter, strongman, and professional wrestler currently signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW) as a commentator/analyst, coach, and talent scout.

He is best known for his 25-year career in WWE.

As an 18-year-old high school senior, Henry was called "the world's strongest teenager" by the Los Angeles Times, and made it into the headlines in early 1990 for winning the National High School Powerlifting Championships and setting teenage lifting world records in the squat 832 lb and total 2033 lb. By the time Henry finished high school, he was a three-time Texas state champion with state and national records in all four powerlifting categories—the squat at 832 lb, bench press at 525 lb and deadlift at 815 lb as well as the total at 2033 lb.

At the Texas High School Powerlifting Championships in April 1990, Terry Todd, a professor of kinesiology at the University of Texas at Austin and former weightlifter, spotted Henry and persuaded him to go to Austin after he graduated to train in the Olympic style of weightlifting.

In July 1990 at the USPF Senior National Powerlifting Championships, 19-year-old Henry came second only to the legendary six-time World Powerlifting Champion Kirk Karwoski.

While powerlifting relies primarily on brute strength and power, which Henry obviously possessed, Olympic weightlifting is considered more sophisticated, involving more agility, timing, flexibility and technique.

There have been few lifters in history who have been able to be successful in both lifting disciplines.

Mastering the technique of weightlifting usually takes many years of practice, but Henry broke four national junior records in weightlifting after only eight months of training.

In April 1991, he won the United States National Junior Championships; 20 days later he placed fourth at the U.S. Senior National Championships, and finished sixth at the Junior World Weightlifting Championships in Germany two months later.

Only few weeks afterwards, he became 1991's International Junior Champion in Powerlifiting as well.

In Henry's first year in competitive weightlifting, he broke all three junior (20 and under) American records 12 times, and became the United States' top Superheavyweight, surpassing Mario Martinez.

Henry is a two-time Olympian (1992 and 1996) and a gold, silver, and bronze medalist at the Pan American Games in 1995.

At the age of 19, Henry had already managed to qualify for the weightlifting competition at the 1992 Summer Olympics, where he finished tenth in the Super- Heavyweight class.

Ten months before the 1992 Olympics, Henry had begun training with Dragomir Cioroslan, a bronze medalist at the 1984 Summer Olympics, who said that he had "never seen anyone with Mark's raw talent".

After the Olympics, Henry became more determined to focus on weightlifting and began competing all over the world.

In late 1992 he took the win at the USA Weightlifting American Open and further proved his dominance on the American soil by winning not only the U.S. National Weightlifting Championships, but also the U.S. Olympic Festival Championships in 1993 and 1994.

In weightlifting, Henry was a three-time U.S. National Weightlifting Champion (1993, 1994, 1996), an American Open winner (1992), a two-time U.S. Olympic Festival Champion (1993 and 1994) and a NACAC champion (1996).

He held all three Senior US American weightlifting records in 1993–1997.

As a powerlifter, he was WDFPF World Champion (1995) and a two-time U.S. National Champion (1995 and 1997 ) and once held an American record in the deadlift.

Currently, he still holds the WDFPF world records in the squat, deadlift and total.

At the 1995 Pan American Games Henry won a gold, silver and bronze medal.

Hebry won the ADFPA U.S. National Powerlifting Championships in 1995 with a 2314.8 lb raw Powerlifting Total.

Since joining the World Wrestling Federation (now WWE) in 1996, he became a one-time WWF European Champion and a two-time world champion, having held the ECW Championship in 2008, and WWE's World Heavyweight Championship in 2011.

First winning the ECW Championship, he became only the fourth black world champion in WWE history (after The Rock, Booker T, and Bobby Lashley).

Despite competing without supportive equipment in contrast to the other competitors, Henry managed to outclass the lifter in second place by 286 lb, defeating not only five-time IPF World Powerlifting Champion and 12 time USAPL National Powerlifting Champion Brad Gillingham, but also America's Strongest Man of 1997 Mark Philippi.

In the process he set all-time world records in the raw deadlift at 903.9 lb and the squat without a squat suit at 948.0 lb as well as the all-time drug tested raw total at 2314.8 lb.

Later that same year in October, he competed in the drug-free Powerlifting World Championships and won again, even though he trained on the powerlifts only sparingly—due his main focus still being on the two Olympic lifts.

He not only become World Champion by winning the competition but also bettered his previous all-time squat world record to 953.5 lb and his all-time drug tested world record total to 2336.9 lb.

In strongman, Henry won the inaugural Arnold Strongman Classic in 2002.

In April 2018, Henry was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame Class of 2018.

Henry was born in the small town of Silsbee in East Texas, 90 miles northeast of Houston.

As a child, he was a big wrestling fan and André the Giant was his favorite wrestler.

While attending a wrestling show in Beaumont, Texas, young Henry tried to touch André as he was walking down the aisle, but tripped over the barricade.

André picked him up out of the crowd and put him back behind the barricade.

When Henry was 12 years old, his father, Ernest, died of complications from diabetes.

When he was 14 years old, Henry was diagnosed with dyslexia.

Henry comes from a family in which almost all of the men are larger than average, especially his great uncle Chudd, who was 6 ft 7 in, weighed approximately 500 lb, never had a pair of manufactured shoes, and was known as the strongest man in the Piney Woods of East Texas.

Henry played football in high school until his senior year, when he strained ligaments in his wrist during the first game of the year and scored below 700 on the SAT.

By the time Mark Henry was in the fourth grade, he was 5ft 5in and weighed 225 lb. His mother bought a set of weights for him when he was ten years old.

During Henry's freshman year at Silsbee High School, he was already able to squat 600 lb, which was well over the school record.