This is a Hot…Hot…Hot (103 degrees) Hot!

My nephew Ryan Malin…Hot and hard work.

Becoming a Strongman
For the Spectrum & Daily News

What boy wouldn’t like to be strong and look like his heroes? Ryan Malin, of Washington City, was no different while growing up watching body builders.

“When I was a kid, I watched the strongest man competition on television,” Malin said. “They had great strength. I wanted to be like them. They were my heroes, like Arnold Schwarzenegger. I just liked the idea of being big.”

At 15, Ryan was 6-foot-2-inches and weighed 115 pounds and was on the wrestling team at Pine View High School.

“I started out being tall and scrawny,” Malin said. “Being little, I wanted to change that and started working on body building.”

Malin started competing in body building at the age of 17. His coaches, including wrestling coach Vance Casperson at Pine View High School, encouraged him to train.

“(Casperson) taught me something very important, how to feel good about myself,” Malin said.

He placed first in freestyle at state and fifth at state for wrestling. His mentor was Marty Haughton Boding at Gold’s Gym in St. George.

In 2003, at 19, the many hours spent at body building paid off. Malin placed second as Teen Mr. Utah competing in Bountiful.

“It was fun for me,” he said, “but appearance is all part of the body building, whereas the Strongman Competition is strength, so I switched to that sport.”

ow at 25, 6-foot-4-inches and weighing 300 pounds, Malin is competing in the Strongman Competitions.”The Strongman competition is designed around the work industry of pure strength of feats like pulling trucks, flipping cars, keg toss, log lift or throwing the Atlas Stones,” Malin said. “I like doing them all and train to do them.”

Training takes at least 1 1/2 to 2 hours six days a week at home as well as at Gold’s Gym and the Academy, where Malin works.

Working out with the weights on a daily basis helps him keep in good condition. He says it is also good to get a good night’s rest.

“I don’t really have a regular time for bed or when I get up,” he said. “I’m a night owl and not a morning person but it’s important for me to get eight hours straight sleep, which I do. Everyday it is different when I go to bed and when I arise.”

He believes it is also important to have a good attitude and to have confidence.

“My favorite saying is taken from one of my favorite movies ‘The Departed.’ It is this, ‘I don’t want to be a product my environment. I want my environment to be a product of me,’” Malin said. “My parents also taught me that ‘You can do and achieve anything you want to.’ These thoughts are what I try to teach the kids I mentor at the academy.”

Competing in Strongman

This is Ryan’s first year competing in Strongman events. In his first competition in Phoenix, he placed seventh out of 40 heavy weights in the Dead Lift Medley. He lifted in five different events that day dead lifting 700 pounds, the 600 pound bar, and the 700 dead lift weights.

In the Huntington Beach, Calif., competition, Malin placed seventh out of 25, pulling a 40,000 semi-truck. In July, he was also training for the Colorado Strongman Competition.

Switching from body building to strongman competition also had a lot to do with diet.

“I hated the body building diet I had to follow, which was three months of eating a strict diet of protein, rice and broccoli throughout the day,” he said. His diet now includes anything and as much as he wants to get at least 8,000 calories a day.

He attributes his success to his sponsor, Coral Canyon Chiropractic.

“I would not even be able to go to these events without my wonderful sponsor …” Malin said. “When I was injured at one of the meets, the chiropractor adjustments and the supplements helped my healing recovery time in less time.”

Coral Canyon Chiropractic is a partnership with Dr. Kelly Murie, Dr. Joshua Carr and Dr. Adam Murie. They met Malin when he came into their practice because of an injury he incurred while training.

“We work on his body to help him have performance enhancement to avoid injury, hopefully, during competition,” Murie said. “He is a special guy to take the rigors of the competition.”

They use the Active Release Technique, which effectively restores normal function to tissues in the body by breaking down the fibrous adhesions that cause tension and pain through combined pressure and stretching in a specialized manner.

“Through restoring range of motion to the joints and muscles, Ryan is more effectively able to strengthen more of the muscle fibers of a region,” Murie said. “Without it, he could not fully move through a full range of motion. Chiropractic manipulation and ART restore that motion so he can heal faster, but also strengthens better.”

Currently employed at the Abundant Life Academy in Kanab, Malin counsels with youth, ages 18, mentoring, working on self-esteem and teaching them lifting techniques.

“I like to give,” Malin said. “It is a very rewarding position to work with these boys.”

Malin’s future plans include preparing to go to nationals. He plans to start his own business by opening a fitness center in Hurricane. He is also in the process of developing a supplement drink.

Thaya Gilmore
St. George Spectrum News