Swindon’s Laurence Shahlaei upset the odds just under a fortnight ago to become Europe’s Strongest Man, impressively defeating Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson in the process.
As you’d expect, overcoming the 6ft 9″ challenge posed by ‘The Mountain’ from Game of Thrones is no mean feat, but Shahlaei has revealed some of the nutrition regime which led him to glory.
And it was not as strict as you may expect…
Speaking to Gloucestershire Live, Shahlaei said:
I have put some size on this year.
The guys are so big. The Mountain (Hafthor Bjornsson) is about 30 stone and 6ft 9ins and I’m only 6ft 2ins.
It’s pretty much the same every day, so it’s easy to monitor what I’m eating. It’s not forever, after the competitions I relax my diet for a while.
My fiancee Liz Mason does a lot of the cooking, but she eats less than what I eat for breakfast in a whole day!
A video posted by Laurence Shahlaei (@biglozwsm) on
According to the south-west publication, the strongman consumes around 7,000 calories per day.
Breakfast includes a monster 1,000 calorie smoothie, which is made up of 200g oats, bananas, milk, two scoops of whey protein, and when ‘Big Loz’ is in need of a cheat day sometimes a scoop of ice-cream.
For lunch Shahlaei will eat two large chicken breasts, with a portion of rice and green veg -and on days where he is more relaxed the rice can be subbed for oven chips.
Mid-afternoon lean mince kebabs are on the menu, made with onion, turmeric, salt and pepper, plus a side of more rice, and a large green salad.
At 5:30pm Shahlaei has a repeat of his lunch, according to his Facebook, before sitting down to a family meal at 8:30pm – which consists of 300g lean meat or 500g poultry, plus 500g of sweet potato or 150g of rice.
Then at 10:30pm a pre-sleep six egg white, four whole egg omelette.
A photo posted by Laurence Shahlaei (@biglozwsm) on
His meal plan is also supported by a range of nutritional supplements too, but on weekends Shahlaei enjoys cheat meals of pizza, ice cream, and chocolate.
Well, before you criticise him, the results clearly speak for themselves!
Hopefully it serves him well at the upcoming World’s Strongest Man competition which is set to take place in Botswana in August.
