The first thing one might notice when meeting Bruce Jones is his hands. Shaking his hand in greeting, it feels like a coiled ball of steel cords, and he measures his grip to not injure the other person. Jones’ hands are the byproducts of a career in arm wrestling that started 16 years ago and won him a national title in 2017.
“It’s something that runs in our family. We have really, really strong hands compared to normal people,” Jones said. “We got the genetics for strong hands, which really helps in arm wrestling because it’s hand control, essentially. It’s called arm wrestling, but wrist wrestling would actually be a more appropriate term because it’s hand-and-wrist control.”
There aren’t many who can match those hands or Jones’ bearlike stature in general, which he hones daily with his brother and training partner in a workout that includes deadlifting a car. But recently, Jones came up against some creatures that matched and surpassed even his burly stature, paws and all — a trio of full-grown grizzly bears in the made-for-TV competition Man Vs Bear. Jones, 34, won the show over 20 other contestants, claiming a trophy and the title Superhuman Champion in the finale that aired Feb. 1.
“I’ve seen bears in zoos and on TV, and I’ve seen a couple in the wild at a far distance, off to where you could barely make them out,” he said. “I didn’t realize how big they are; seeing them on TV doesn’t do it justice. They’re like dumpsters with legs. In the wild, a human wouldn’t stand a chance. There’d be nothing you could do. I definitely don’t want to run into them in the wild.”
Jones, water and wastewater superintendent for the city of Ward, got to experience the next closest thing, along with 20 other contestants, against three ursine competitors named Bart, Tank and Honey Bump. Man Vs Bear pitted human athletes against the bears in various contests. In one, the human was put inside a giant metal hamster ball and tried to keep the bear from pushing it into a hole. In another, the human faced a bear in tug-of-war.
A third event was a race pushing a giant wooden roller.
And because the bear is several times stronger and faster than a human, the scoring awarded points to the contestant based on how long he or she stayed in the game before the beast prevailed.
Jones’ highlights included scoring the maximum number of points in the tug-of-war in his first episode and twice beating the bear in the eating competition, where humans had to down a day’s ration of bear food — including crickets, worms and chicken liver — faster than the bear did.
Needless to say, the premise of the show was so unusual that Jones thought he was being pranked when the casting agent called to see if he’d be interested.
“One day, probably in November of 2018, I get a phone call from a Los Angeles number. Normally, I would probably screen it and not answer it, but I answered it,” he said. “She was a casting director, and her response was, ‘Hey, I heard you’re a badass.’
“You get a call like that, and you think, ‘This is a joke, right?’ Then within a couple of months, I did a Skype interview with her. I guess, at that point, I knew it might actually be something. And then, approaching summer, they started contacting me more and more. I realized it was actually going to pan out.”
The show was the latest in a series of athletic achievements on Jones’ resume, starting from the time he was growing up near Beebe, where he lives today.
“I grew up a country boy. I actually grew up in Garner, a little bit outside of Beebe,” he said. “I have seven biological brothers and sisters — two brothers and five sisters. I also have three adopted sisters. There’s 11 of us total. I had a pretty crazy childhood, always playing outside, playing in the woods, always climbing trees.
“We grew up a little bit rough, playing outside. For the most part, we were rougher and tougher than the other kids, if you know what I mean.”
That natural competitiveness and a high pain tolerance led Jones and his siblings to be very good athletes in any sport they tried, he said.
“I grew up in sports, played football, and my main sport was track and field, big time,” Jones said. “I’m a lot bigger now, but I was a sprinter back then. I’ve always loved all sports. I’ve got somewhere around 50 state titles in five different sports. A lot of those come from arm wrestling.”
Jones’ introduction to that sport came in grade school, where, though he admits he lacked technique, he was unbeatable among his peers. In 2004, he met Michael “Monster” Todd, another Arkansas native and a seminal figure in the world of arm wrestling. Todd taught Jones some finer points of training and technique, and the youngster was hooked.
“I’ve competed pretty much everywhere,” Jones said. “I’ve been to at least 40 states arm wrestling. I’ve been on some pretty big cards. I used to arm wrestle with UAL — the Ultimate Armwrestling League. There are different leagues, but it was the big one at the time.”
Jones said arm wrestling is mischaracterized as a sport of sheer brute strength, when, in fact, mental toughness and technique are what generally decide matches. So, when it came time to square off in Man Vs Bear, he said he had an inherent advantage over the field, particularly in the finals.
“Being the largest guy, I definitely had a strength advantage over the other contestants, but a lot of it’s up to the bear, too,” he said. “There’s more strategy to it than just going up there and holding on with all you’ve got. The walk-up, what you say to the bears and how you approach them has some effect on them.”
“[Handlers] told us up front if you’re passive or maybe a little aggressive, it could make a difference. I’m not a super loud person; I don’t whoop and holler and any of that stuff. As the competition started, I was a little quieter. There’s some of the others who were pretty loud, and I don’t feel like it helped them much.”
Jones said he enjoyed the competition for competition’s sake but had plenty of other motivations to succeed, too.
“I’m glad I did it for my daughter to see it and for my girls to see it,” he said. “I hope that it inspires them to keep working hard and to, hopefully, do amazing things in life.”
Jones’ “girls” are members of a local 12 and under softball team, Freedom Fast Pitch. Jones took over coaching the squad after the last skipper quit unexpectedly, and since then, the team has supplanted his own competitions, including arm wrestling. Devoting himself full time to Freedom, he led them to a national-level tournament last summer. As much as he achieved individually in sports, he’s having that much more of an impact coaching his girls.
“The most prominent ideal that Bruce has shared with the girls is to ‘never give up,’” said Cherie Dulany, whose daughter Lexi plays on Jones’ team. “My daughter has taken this lesson to heart and uses it regularly, not only in sports but in all aspects of her life. He is an inspiration, and we are blessed to have Bruce and his example for the team.”
Jones was even joined by his team for watch parties of his Man Vs Bear episodes, including the finale, and he’s used this experience to further underscore his message of perseverance to his athletes.
“I like to compete, and I like adventures. I like to do stuff that’s exciting,” he said. “But I really wanted to do it for my softball girls. They work really hard. They’re some of the toughest little humans that I know. I wanted to do it to show them that if you work hard, things will pay off. Just keep grinding.
“I say to them all the time, ‘Don’t be afraid to do something extraordinary. Don’t hold back.’ Yes, you will fail sometimes, but you’ve got to be bold. Sometimes, you’ve got to take risks.”
Episodes of Man Vs Bear can be found at www.discovery.com/shows/man-vs-bear.