Lately I've found myself telling the story of the Thomas Inch dumbbell to a few students, so I decided it would be a good topic to write about.

First off, you're wondering, who is Thomas Inch? Thomas Inch was a famous British bodybuilder and strongman. He was born in 1881and died in 1963. During his lifetime, he ran a very successful mail order bodybuilding course and equipment sales business.

He is most famous, however, for his infamous dumbbell. My first encounter with the Thomas Inch dumbbell was about three years ago, while visiting the Santa Cruz headquarters of CrossFit for a certification seminar. They had an Inch dumbbell at the gym and during a break from lecture, it quickly became a challenge, to see who could lift the dumbbell.

So what's so special about it? This excerpt from Bodybuilding.com, best explains the history of the dumbbell:

The Inch Dumbbell has a rich, interesting history that goes back as far as weights themselves. Thomas Inch (1881-1963) of Great Britain, requested three dumbbells to be made by Appleby and Brogdens Iron Works for his traveling circus show. Mr. Inch himself was no slouch in the strength game. Once Britain's Strongest Man, he had a personal best overhead press of 356 lbs, could deadlift 560 lbs with one hand at the age of 69(!) and could easily lift the original Dumbbell at a bodyweight of only 168 lbs at the time. (Yup, he weighed less than the Dumbbell itself!)

So when Appleby and Brogdens Iron Works made his Dumbbells, because of the tremendous weight Inch wanted them to weigh, they figured the only way to keep them from bending was to make them with an extra thick handle. This is what would end up making them so popular and so difficult to lift. The three Dumbbells weighed 130, 153, and 172 pounds. The lighter two had 2" diameter handles while the heaviest (now replicated) had a handle "as thick as an old glass milk bottle". It's actual measurements were: 20" overall length, 8.5" diameter of the spheres at each end, and the handle was 7.75" in circumference, 2.47" in diameter and 4" long. (Distance between each sphere.)

Thomas once wrote an article entitled "Secret of the Unliftable Challenge Dumbbell". He discussed that over 20,000 strongmen, gymnasts, boxers, wrestlers, bodybuilders, and powerlifters had tried it for over 40 years, all without budging it off the Earth.

Here is a video of Thomas Inch himself demonstrating lifting the dumbbell from the floor to overhead:



To see someone make a recent attempt at lifting the Thomas Inch dumbbell, watch this video:

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