Allan Heinricks, a familiar face in the community of Terrace, has recently returned from the provincial arm wrestling competition held on May 19 in Kelowna.
Despite an ongoing and painful foot infection, Heinricks took home an impressive silver medal from the provincial competition.
He competed in the masters division for men’s right arm in the weight category of 177-198 pounds.
Heinricks said the key to his ongoing success is “lots of training,” as well as being a good sport.
“You can’t be a winner if you don’t know how to lose,” Heinricks said. Although he rarely places lower than second place, he says his competition is always tough.
Back home in Terrace, Heinricks is out fundraising at Wal-Mart, Canadian Tire, Safeway and Save-On-Foods for his next trip to Timmins, Ontario to compete in the Canadian National Arm Wrestling Championships from June 28th to July 1st.
The trip to nationals will cost Heinricks approximately $6,000, and with a lack of funding for arm wrestling athletes, Heinricks says he would not be able to compete without the financial support of the community.
“Without local people, I wouldn’t be able to go,” Heinricks said.
This is Heinricks 15th year competing in arm wrestling, and he has been competing internationally since then. Heinricks decided to become an arm wrestler after an incident that left him wheelchair bound and paralyzed on one side.
“I always did sports,” Heinricks explained.
Now Heinricks trains and works outs almost every day. He does arm curls at home, curling around 145 pounds with just his right hand, slightly down from five years ago when Heinricks says he was able to curl 200 pounds with just three fingers.
If nationals go well in Ontario, Heinricks will be off to Poland in September to compete in the world arm wrestling championships.
