Yes, Arm Wrestling Is a Real Sport
Our American Stories
iHeartPodcasts
4.6 • 817 Ratings
🗓️ 13 March 2026
⏱️ 11 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On this episode of Our American Stories, Dustin Tomlinson grew up in rural Missouri, the youngest of four brothers on a cattle farm where competition was part of everyday life. Like a lot of people in small towns, he had arm wrestled plenty of times on truck hoods, in hayfields, and around the high school cafeteria table. But he never imagined it could become a serious sport.
After stumbling across professional arm wrestling online, Dustin decided to see how far he could take something he had always done for fun. What started as a trip to a local tournament soon turned into a passion for a sport that demands strength, strategy, and precision. Dustin shares how he discovered the competitive world of arm wrestling and what it takes to move from friendly challenges to the professional arena.
Support the show (https://www.ouramericanstories.com/donate)
Support the show: https://www.ouramericanstories.com/donate
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | This is an I-Heart podcast. |
| 0:02.3 | Guaranteed human. |
| 0:14.2 | And we return to our American stories. |
| 0:17.9 | In the world of sports, there are several newcomers that have been making some waves, |
| 0:22.8 | slap fighting, competitive tag, and of course, arm wrestling. While the competition has been around |
| 0:29.4 | for ages, its foray into the world of being more than just a bar battle hasn't. Up next, a story |
| 0:36.6 | about a professional arm wrestler. Let's get into it. |
| 0:41.0 | You've got three older brothers. I'm the youngest. We're all built about the same. I think |
| 0:45.6 | I'm the tallest. But yeah, I might be, I think I'm the second to the lightest. Yeah, and I'm almost |
| 0:52.0 | 300 pounds. So you always have something to prove, being the youngest, you know. |
| 0:55.5 | You got to be macho. |
| 0:59.9 | My name's Dustin Tomlinson. I live in Anderson, Missouri. I've lived here my entire life. Growing up, |
| 1:10.6 | I lived on a farm. We had about 50 hit of cattle. |
| 1:12.6 | The high school I went to, my graduating class was just a little over 200 people for the whole county. |
| 1:18.6 | So grew up turning ranches. I've always worked blue collar jobs. I'm 26 years old right now. |
| 1:24.6 | And for the last five years, I've been an industrial maintenance mechanic at chicken plants and |
| 1:30.3 | when I'm not working I like to go canoeing a lot of fishing I like to hunt whenever I get the time I like to shoot bows |
| 1:39.3 | and I like to compete in arm wrestling. I have followed the sport of professional strongman for years. |
| 1:47.0 | And there's one world-class strongman, Brian Shaw, that I've followed for a long time. |
| 1:52.0 | And I've seen him on a YouTube video, and I enjoyed the video. |
| 1:57.0 | So I watched the next one that was put out by this channel. |
| 2:00.0 | And this was three years ago. And from that moment moment I got hooked I realized it was a sport and growing up everybody |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from iHeartPodcasts, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of iHeartPodcasts and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.