Worlds strongest boy reveals abusive past, 25 years later: Im looking back at a different persons life
The former “world’s strongest” boy Richard Sandrak — better known as “Little Hercules” — has revealed that being a kid bodybuilder wasn’t all it was pumped up to be.In a viral interview with the Metro 25 years after he blew up, the now-unrecognizable ex-Adonis revealed that his seemingly prodigious childhood was fraught with abuse and manipulation.“When people talk about a childhood memory, it’s usually associated with something positive.I can’t really relate,” Sandrak, 32, told the outlet.
“For me, it was a daily occurrence to where I was physically and emotionally abused by my dad.”Born in Ukraine to a martial arts world champion father and an aerobics-star mother, the well-muscled wunderkind seemed destined to become famous for his physique.Sandrak was working out every day by the time he was 5.By age 8, he could bench press three times his body weight and boasted rock-hard pecs and abs that were so well-defined, they looked Photoshopped.After emigration to the U.S., Sandrak quickly took the world by storm, competing in bodybuilding contests all over the globe and earning the title “the strongest boy in the world.”During Little Hercules’ halcyon days, he rubbed elbows with the likes of muscle mavens Arnold Schwarzenegger and “The Incredible Hulk” star Lou Ferrigno and even landed a spot in the flick “Tiny Tarzan,” the Daily Mail reported.
The iron-pumping prodigy also appeared on primetime TV, chatting with Jimmy Kimmel, Howard Stern and other media personalities.However, while on the surface everything seemed Hulk-y dory, there was a dark side to Sandrak’s success.Alarm bells were set off with the release of the 2005 documentary “The World’s Strongest Boy,” which depicted the grueling training regimen the child had to endure, including a stringent “athlete’s diet” devoid of the treats enjoyed by kids his age in the 1990s.As a result, he developed an unnatural physique with dangerously low levels of body f...