Jones, 6'10" and 341 lbs., who prefers to be known as Megaman, will represent Australia this month at the World's Strongest Man competition in Nassau, the Bahamas (to be televised at a later date). Given his performance at the World Highland Games in Scotland in March, he should be among the favorites to carry home the title—and pretty much anything else he wants.
At the Scottish games, Jones, 26, won the "heavy events" title by acing six of 12 competitions—including the truck pull, the boulder carry and the wheelbarrow push. (The nine women? They were in the wheelbarrow.)
Nine years ago, Jones was facing weighty matters of another sort. Reared in Geelong, Australia (near Melbourne), Jones says, at 17, he "got involved with the wrong people" and took part in a string of armed robberies. That got him a 12-year sentence in Brisbane's Boggo Road Jail, from which he was paroled in 1993 after six years. "I'm trying to put it behind me now," he says. "I was young. I was immature. I was silly."
Happily the time in stir wasn't a complete waste. "I was educating myself in there," he says. "I've now got my weight-lifting coaching and referee's certificate."
Since his success in the Highland Games, Jones, also an asphalt salesman, has greater ambitions. Once he finishes the Nassau competition—which includes such feats of strength as the 200-pound slot-machine carry and comes with a $16,000 first prize—he hopes to pursue a film career. He already has a bit part as a bad guy in a spy movie, which is gross miscasting, according to Stacy Hunt, 26, a shoe salesperson and Megaman's girlfriend of two years. "He's not like the stereotype of a big man," she says. "He's so kind and gentle."
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
