BONNEY LAKE, Wash. \u2014 Eric Shuty first started lifting weights about 34 years ago in Shelby\u2019s Mad Dog Gym.<\/p>\n
Fitness has remained a steady part of his life ever since.<\/p>\n
Shuty was born and raised in Shelby and is a 1998 Shelby High School grad. After attending college in western Pennsylvania, he joined the United States Army in 2004 and was stationed in Washington.<\/p>\n
He decided to stay in the Pacific Northwest state after exiting the Army in 2011. Shuty currently runs his own business known as Imperiya Barbell,<\/a> providing coaching and training for youth and adults.<\/p>\n The focus of his fitness journey has shifted over time, Shuty said. It began as a way to grow stronger for high school football and has since evolved into competing on national and global stages.<\/p>\n After centering his efforts around powerlifting for several years, Shuty gained an interest in the Official Strongman Games<\/a> \u2014 the largest international Strongman event in the world.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s kind of gone all over the place (Shuty\u2019s fitness journey),\u201d he said. \u201cBut it\u2019s always returned to absolute strength, as in what can you do, because Father Time is undefeated and there\u2019s a limited window as to when you can test out what you can really do.\u201d<\/p>\n Shuty has consistently competed in the OSG for the past five years. He most recently claimed a national title in the 2025 United States Strongman<\/a> competition and finished in the top 10 during the three-day OSG world championship event in November.<\/p>\n The events are a mixture of competitiveness and camaraderie, he said.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s for the love and the challenge,\u201d Shuty said. \u201cThey are always a lot of fun.\u201d<\/p>\n Below are photos of Eric Shuty. The picture on the left was taken during the Official Strongman Games in 2024. The middle photo was captured during this year\u2019s OSG. Photos courtesy of Eric Shuty<\/p>\n Shuty shares his passion with others<\/p>\n Shuty\u2019s experience training other athletes dates to his time in college. He said his first job after the Army was as a personal trainer for a LA Fitness.<\/p>\n But he never had the desire to start his own business necessarily, he said.<\/p>\n \u201cIn 2019, I got a chance to do some coaching for someone else and came up with the idea to do my own thing,\u201d Shuty said. \u201cIt was a chance to offer some things that other training and gyms don\u2019t offer.\u201d<\/p>\n Imperiya Barbell offers training for anyone from high school athletes to older folks who may just want to get or stay fit, he said.<\/p>\n Shuty specializes in athletes training for strength sports. He frequently takes groups of athletes to strength competitions.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s probably the most exciting thing to me, is when someone who is not familiar with it (strength competitions) at all gets hooked \u2014 which happens fairly often and then I get to help them out,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Maintaining a healthy and fit lifestyle is automatic to Shuty, who is now in his 40s, he said.<\/p>\n \u201cTo me it\u2019s second nature. But for others who may not have that experience, it\u2019s one of the most important things you can do,\u201d Shuty said.<\/p>\n Community investment made this reporting happen. Independent, local news in Shelby and Northern Richland County is brought to you in part by the generous support of Phillips Tube Group<\/a>,\u00a0R.S. Hanline<\/a>,\u00a0ArcelorMittal<\/a>,\u00a0Lloyd Rebar<\/a>,\u00a0Hess Industries<\/a>, and\u00a0Shelby Printing<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"OPEN SOURCE We published this story in response to a reader suggestion. Do you have a tip for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":371374,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[49,48,60,407,84,158818],"class_list":{"0":"post-371373","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fitness","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-featured","11":"tag-fitness","12":"tag-health","13":"tag-shelby"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371373","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=371373"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/371373\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/371374"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=371373"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=371373"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=371373"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/ericshutycoach1.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/ericshutycoach2.jpg\")
\nEric Shuty has coached several athletes at competitions. Photos courtesy of Eric Shuty<\/p>\n