Larry Wheels

From ages 7 to 12, he bounced among homes, after his mother lost custody of him. At first, he lived with his grandmother, but eventually he was spun full-time into a system of strangers taking him in, and then booting him out. At the age of 12, and no longer in school, Williams walked away from the boroughs of New York City and sought out his mother on the French Caribbean island of Saint Martin, where he lived seaside with her for the next three years.

There were two options for school on Saint Martin, one with instruction taught entirely in French, and the private school full of English-speaking rich kids. Williams couldn’t attend either, so he lived without an education, and with few friendships. Although he had his mother now, he felt boxed-in by the sea.

At 15 years old, Williams wanted to join a gym, but wasn’t allowed to. The minimum age of gym entry on Saint Martin was 16. At the same time, his mother, waitress to make ends meet, was ready for change. They’d been reunited for three years now, but the Caribbean wasn’t home. Together, they moved back to the Bronx. Williams joined a gym almost immediately, working at a restaurant to pay for his membership. After a year of lifting weights, he knew two things: First, he was stronger than any grown man in his gym, and second, lifting would be his life.

“I guess I could have tried to be a firefighter or NYPD,” Williams says. “But the way my life went, power lifting and bodybuilding were the only things I had an edge in. So, I gave them everything I had.” By the age of 18, Williams entered his first RPS Power lifting meet. He weighed 247 pounds but competed in the 275-pound weight class and won. He’s been steadily winning, and setting records, since. In November of 2017, he competed in the 275-pound weight class and commandeered a raw, combined world record of 2,275 pounds, roughly the weight of two polar bears. Within three months of his power lifting record, Williams had dropped his body weight to 259 pounds and competed in his first bodybuilding competition, the NPC Gold Coast Muscle Classic in California, in February of 2018. He won that, too. As a crossover from power lifter to bodybuilder, Williams is a double threat. And he’s even more of a threat because, as he reiterates, “This is everything.” And he means, just like when he was a kid, that there literally is nothing else.