About 15 years ago, Richard Sandrak, who moved from Ukraine to the United States, was called the strongest boy in the world.
Today we will tell you how his life has turned out, what he does and how he looks at his 24 years.
Richard started to take up sports seriously when he was just a child. And already at the age of 8 he could bench-press more than 15 kilos! At 11 years old he lifted 24 pounds!
Now he’s 24 years old, and it’s hard to call him a muscleman…
He was once nicknamed «Little Hercules. He was constantly invited to competitions, TV shows, commercials, magazines, and even movies. That’s why Richard’s family moved to California, so the son could fully realize himself.
Training, nutrition, regime — these points were monitored by the boy’s father, a former world martial arts champion. Very often the man was criticized for abusing his son and putting a lot of pressure on him.
And when Richard was 11 years old, he called the police himself when his father attacked his mother. The man went to jail for domestic violence.
The boy stopped communicating with his father and no longer recognized him. For a while he was still practicing. But gradually they became less and less.
At this point Richard puts it this way:
«I’m very proud of my childhood achievements, I’m not ashamed of them and I’m not trying to hide this page of my life from anyone.»
And he adds:
«I just don’t want to live like that anymore. I’ ve been tried to be made out to be some kind of a mistake of nature. But I wasn’t the only kid who through hard workouts managed to achieve high results.»
Now Richard continues to play sports, but not as fanatically. He runs every morning and also likes skateboarding. By profession he is a stuntman at the show «Waterworld» in Los Angeles, where he gets set on fire at least five times a day and then has to dive into the water from a great height.
Once he was asked what he wanted to be, the answer was unexpected:
«A scientist, doing quantum physics… or an engineer at NASA. I’m thinking, why wouldn’t I be one!»
