SMALL & MIGHTY
World’s strongest boy ‘Mini Hulk’ who could lift dumbbells age 3 after being born with rare ‘double muscle’ condition
THE world's strongest boy dubbed "Mini Hulk" could lift dumbbells at age three after being born with a rare "double muscle" genetic condition.
Liam Hoekstra, from Grand Rapids, Michigan, started performing expert gymnast moves when he was just five months old.
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By eight months old he was able to do a pull-up and by nine months, he could climb the stairs.
Liam had a six-pack and could lift dumbbells at just three years old which led him to gain the nickname "mini hulk" as his insane muscles sparked a media and medical frenzy.
In 2014, Liam starred in a documentary called The World’s Strongest Toddler where doctors called him a “medical mystery”.
It followed the toddler as experts attempted to figure out the secrets of his super strength.
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The bizarre footage showed a young Liam with the abs of a bodybuilder as he was able to pick up and move around furniture at the shocking age of three.
As Liam only grew stronger, his family decided to take him to specialists who later diagnosed him with a rare condition loosely called myostatin-related muscle hypertrophy.
It caused him to have 40 per cent more muscle mass than the average child, meaning he had very little body fat.
The condition is so rare, that only a few similar cases have ever been documented in medical recordings.
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A similar case was also identified in a breed of cattle dubbed "supercows" because of their insanely muscular physique.
A Belgian breed of cattle, the Belgian Blues have a naturally occurring mutation called "double-muscling" - which turns them into beefcakes.
Virtually every animal on Earth has a gene that produces a muscle growth-inhibiting protein called myostatin, Dominic Wells, a professor who studies myostatin at Imperial College London told
High levels of myostatin make it hard for the body to build muscle, and low levels of myostatin allow muscle to grow.
After the mice and cattle discovery, scientists found natural mutations in some dogs and sheep, but never in a human until 2004.
Now, Liam is unrecognisable at age 17 and seems to be living the life of a normal teenager.
He has honed in on his super strength to play ice hockey and is a keen fisher.
It comes after the boy who was once dubbed the world's strongest kid looks unrecognisable 13 years after setting the bodybuilding record.
Giuliano Stroe, from Romania, became a global sensation after he was entered into the Guinness World Records at the age of five.
And one 10-year-old can already deadlift 115kg as he works towards becoming the world's strongest man.
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Mighty Rowan O'Malley goes to the gym daily and is now targeting world weightlifting records.
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