6 November 2004 saw historical fights with world-class chanmpions. Over 50 fighters from 16 countries came to the Marriott hotel in Warsaw, to fight all out in the Professionals's World Cup - Nemiroff World Cup. Those who weren't there – be very sorry! Those who were - will remember this day for a long time. In the opinions of observers and experts, those were the best armwrestling bouts in recent years.

No doubt that the biggest attraction of this Cup was the arrival of the USA team, with an armwrestling legend – John Brzenk – in the lead. It is him that Alexey Voevoda, as he said before the fight, was the most afraid of. Of course John had no equals in his category (up to 95 kg). His techniques, strength, calm and experience awed everyone.

The audience gathered in the hall awaited the giants' fight excitedly.

When those two finally approached the table in the Open category, everyone stood up and held their breath. The setup was long ...and break-up! The ref put the straps on... and Alex pulled John with huge might! You could see huge disappointment on John's face. But even his loss to the younger Russian fighter cannot change the fact that John Brzenk was and still is to this day a legend, and fighting him in a professional bout and win is a true honor.

The strongest man in the world was again the archmaster – Alexey Voevoda of Russia. We had hopes back then that John Brzenk of USA or another fighter tries to take the title from Alexey soon. How did things turn out? Read on in the next articles!

Paweł Podlewski