Olympic 2012 : At 218kg judoko Ricardo Blas Jr is Olympics’ heaviest athlete

Ricardo Blas Junior, who is a judo player, is the heaviest competitor in the history of modern Olympics with a colossal weight of 218 kg.

Blas Jr would take his place in judo’s main event on Friday, the men’s heavyweight division, at the Excel arena in London’s Docklands. Blas Jr, who stands at 1.85 meters tall, is known as ‘The Little Mountain’ on the tiny island in Micronesia that is his homeland, and on first impression he looks like one that would be impossible to move. He weighs in at more than twice the 100kg cut-off point for the category, but according to Stewart Brain, the Australian head coach and 1988 Olympian he is not unbeatable. “You can be big but you’ve got to be strong, you’ve still got to be agile. When you’re that big it doesn’t take much to pull you off balance. It’s not about size; it’s about core strength and your balance. You don’t have to lift 218kg to break someone’s balance,” the WA Today quoted Brain, as saying. Blas Jr has put on 8kg since his first appearance at an Olympics in Beijing four years ago, when he carried the flag at the opening ceremony for Guam but did not make the indentation on the tournament he had hoped for. ANI