FEW athletes have had an impact on strength sports to rival that of Geoff Capes.
But the now 73-year-old's journey to becoming the first Briton to win the World's Strongest Man wasn't a simple one.
One of nine children, Capes grew up on a Lincolnshire farm where he'd work lifting sacks of potatoes when not at school.
Always a larger individual, Capes explained that he often found himself in trouble, during an interview with the Telegraph.
"I was a hell of a fighter as well," he explained.
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" If the next town came down on a Friday and there were only eight or nine of them I'd say: 'Go back and get some more.'
"I'd fight them on my own. I was quite quiet but there was an inner aggression."
Capes also found himself in trouble while at school, explaining how his "headmaster, a guy called Joe Fathers, took great pleasure trying to knock it out of me.
"He was ex-Borstal. He had a choice of canes. He'd hit you anywhere – across the knuckles with a two by two. He tore my ear.
"On the last day I went into his office, I took the canes off the wall in the office in front of him, and walked out."
Mentored as a teenager by Olympic hurdler Stuart Storey, Capes went on to become an athletics star.
Speaking to Spalding Today, Capes said: "At the age of 11, I was throwing men's shots.
"I wanted to emulate the comic strip heroes and Tarzan by becoming like those characters.
"My dad was a gangmaster so I probably worked on all of south Lincolnshire's farms where I learned about strength and lifting.
"Our issues were all about where was the dinner money coming from. I went to school in dead men's clothes which my mum picked up at work and we couldn't even afford a pair of plimsolls.
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"I was proud to represent myself and Lincolnshire because of my background.
"It was important to represent your country but it meant more to me in terms of where I've come from."
A seventeen-time National Champion shot putter, Capes also became a European Championship bronze medalist, a two-time European Indoors Championships gold medalist, and a two-time Commonwealth Games gold medalist.
He also competed at the 1972, 1976, and 1980 Olympic Games, finishing a high of fifth.
During much of his athletics career, Capes also worked as a police officer.
However, politics eventually forced him to resign, telling the Telegraph that "Russia invaded Afghanistan, and Margaret Thatcher banned all the services from going – army and police – because they paid their wages.
"So I resigned from the police just before the Olympics. I lost my career, lost my pension, lost my income. They had total control over you."
Following his athletics career, Capes turned his focus to strength sports, winning World's Strongest Man twice, and finishing on the podium another four times.
Meanwhile, he also won Europe's Strongest Man three times and came in second on another three occasions.
Powering the 6-foot-5 giant's career was a monster diet which reportedly consisted of: "Six pounds of red meat. A dozen eggs. A large tin of baked beans. Two tins of pilchards. One and a half pounds of cottage cheese. A packet of cereal. Two large loaves of bread. A pound of butter."
If this wasn't enough, he would also drink: "A pint of orange juice. And seven pints of milk."
After he left his sporting career behind him, Capes went on to own a sportswear store, run a security company, coach, and breed budgies.
This interest in the colorful birds was a direct result of an arrest he made during his career as a police officer.
Capes told the Daily Express: "My interest in budgerigars started in the 70s while I was in the police.
"I went to arrest a chap and noticed he had lots of them in his front room. I arrested him first then asked if I could look at the birds.
Later, he ended up giving me my first two budgerigars."
