Sandbagging is ridiculously prevalent in this sport

Something I've noticed after years of pulling is how often people misrepresent their own experience to boost ego / perceived talent, oftentimes at the expense of the confidence of new pullers. I really feel this needs to be talked about.

I'll start off with a bold claim: the story of the guy who showed up with less than 1 year experience and won nationals is a total myth and instills false expectations in new pullers. I'm not saying this doesn't happen...I'm saying that these types of people have typically been doing some form of highly-specific training or labor with huge carryover to armwrestling for years prior.

If you have been swinging hammers for 15 years in a quarry before ever being on a table, describing yourself as "brand new" without mentioning your background is downright dishonest. You're not a 1/1,000,000 genetic phenom; I don't know a single person who does manual labor or strength sports that wasn't at pro-level within months. An actual genetic phenom is a person who has never touched a weight or done manual labor in their lives and is instantly killer on the table regardless: this type of person is exceedingly rare and most people who claim to be him, are lying. When you engage in this behavior, you're actively discouraging new pullers who measure up their own experience and progress with whatever you've told them at face value. It's f-ing toxic.

Another variation of this is people who only give the number of years they've been training "seriously" when asked. "Oh yeah I've been on the table my whole life, casually pulling tournaments since I was 6, but I only really started seriously training about 2 years ago"...except they leave out the entire first half of that sentence. Leaving out that information is LYING. You are lying by omission to inflate your ego. When I find out somebody does this, immediately all respect is gone. Minimizing their past to maximize the perception of talent.

Another cringy example that comes to mind is lying about age. It's not as common as the other types, but I've seen kids deflate their age by a couple years on purpose when asked. Correct me if I'm wrong but some upcoming armwrestlers were doing this as well (Rino?). It's childish and petty.

I meet people who do this at every club and event I've been to. It's almost as prevalent as lying about height and probably MORE prevalent than lying about natty status. The difference is, it's the hardest to detect, and typically only comes out in passing conversation with their friends. Our goal as a community should be to inspire and teach, bring new people into the community, not gaslight and discourage people to protect our own egos.