Scoring systems — does the system change the winner?

People often argue what would happen if strongman used a different scoring system. We re-scored 15 real strongman competitions (Arnold, Rogue, SMOE, WSM — both men’s and women’s) under 7 real-world scoring systems (current strongman, multiple eras of F1, MotoGP, plus a custom MotoGP variant) to see what would actually happen.

Of course this is not fair. If athletes knew the scoring system was different, their whole approach to prep and events would be different and results won’t be the same. Keep that in mind when browsing this data, because while it’s a fun little “what-if”, it doesn’t work like that in reality.

Data sourced from Strongman Archives. Math verified against official published totals.

How often the winner changes across systems

Counts of who wins each comp under each system, across 15 comps over 3 years (10 men’s, 5 women’s).

Bold = actual real-world winner (under current WSM Linear scoring). x/7 = how many of the 7 tested scoring systems crowned that athlete.

Men’s

Comp Winners under different systems
WSM 2026 M. Hooper (4/7), R. Nel (3/7)
WSM 2025 R. Nel (1/7), T. Stoltman (6/7)
WSM 2024 T. Stoltman (7/7)
Arnold 2026 M. Hooper (7/7)
Arnold 2025 M. Hooper (6/7), L. Hatton (1/7)
Arnold 2024 M. Hooper (7/7)
Rogue 2025 M. Hooper (7/7)
Rogue 2024 M. Hooper (7/7)
SMOE 2025 E. Singleton (1/7), L. Hatton (6/7)
SMOE 2024 M. Hooper (5/7), H. Björnsson (2/7)

Women’s

Comp Winners under different systems
Arnold 2026 O. Liashchuk (1/7), I. Carrasquillo (6/7)
Arnold 2025 I. Carrasquillo (7/7)
Arnold 2024 A. Jardine (7/7)
Rogue 2025 I. Carrasquillo (7/7)
Rogue 2024 I. Carrasquillo (7/7)

Pick any individual comp from the sidebar to see full standings under all 7 systems, podium-by-system, and winner-flip analysis. The Cross-comp details sub-page has the same data sliced by system: which athlete dominates each scoring system, 1st-vs-2nd gaps, and per-system winner distributions.

Findings

Men’s

  • 6 of 10 men’s comps are uncontroversial — same winner under all 7 systems. Arnold 2024, Arnold 2026, Rogue 2024, Rogue 2025 all give M. Hooper the trophy regardless of scoring philosophy; WSM 2024 hands T. Stoltman the title under every system.

  • In the comps Hooper won under current WSM scoring, he also wins under most other systems. The systems that take wins away from him are the steepest top-6-only F1 variants (F1 1961-1990 and F1 1991-2002), where mid-pack consistency scores zero and event wins matter most. Hooper is a “place 2nd-3rd in everything” athlete, not a “win 3 events outright” athlete — flatter scales reward his style.

  • The biggest reshuffling is at the close finals. WSM 2025 (Nel by 0.5 pts) and SMOE 2025 (Singleton by 0.5 pts) each have actual winners who only prevail under 1 of 7 systems. Under every steeper system, the runner-up takes it. SMOE 2024 also flipped under 2 systems despite Hooper’s clean 9-pt margin.

  • WSM 2026 sits in the middle — Hooper won by 2 pts but only takes 4 of 7 systems. Nel wins under any system with a 1.39x or higher 1st/2nd ratio.

Women’s

  • 4 of 5 women’s comps are uncontroversial — same winner under all 7 systems. Only Arnold 2026 flips.

  • I. Carrasquillo is the dominant figure across the women’s dataset — she wins 27 of 35 system-comp slots (5 comps × 7 systems = 35), including all 7 systems for Arnold 2025, Rogue 2024, and Rogue 2025. Functionally the women’s-side equivalent of Hooper.

  • Arnold 2026 is the women’s outlier. O. Liashchuk took it under WSM Linear, but I. Carrasquillo wins under every other system tested. Same pattern as WSM 2025 on the men’s side: a real-world winner who only prevails under one specific scoring philosophy.

Scoring systems tested

System Scale (top 10) 1st/2nd ratio Origin
WSM Linear 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 1.11x World’s Strongest Man, current. Equal gaps.
F1 2010-present 25-18-15-12-10-8-6-4-2-1 1.39x Formula 1, current. Steep top, drops off.
F1 2003-2009 10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1 1.25x F1, mid-2000s. Top 8 only.
F1 1991-2002 10-6-4-3-2-1 1.67x F1, Schumacher era. Top 6 only.
F1 1961-1990 9-6-4-3-2-1 1.50x F1, Senna/Prost era. Top 6 only.
MotoGP 25-20-16-13-11-10-9-8-7-6 1.25x MotoGP, current. All 10 score well.
MotoGP Extended 25-20-16-13-11-10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 1.25x Variant: MotoGP extended to 15 positions for bigger fields.

How ties and edge cases are handled

  • Scale length follows the comp’s full roster, including DNS athletes. A comp with 10 athletes uses a 10-position scale, regardless of how many actually competed in any event. DNS always scores 0.
  • Tie averaging: athletes sharing a placement (e.g. all T2) split the points across the positions they consume. Three athletes tied at T2 → positions 2, 3, 4 → each gets the average of the points for those positions.
  • Scale truncation in big fields: systems with short scales (F1 1991-2002 has 6 positions) zero-pad. In a 16-athlete comp under F1 1991-2002, positions 7-16 all score 0.
  • No-lift / withdrew rules vary across comps. WSM 2026 treats (No lift) as DNS. SMOE 2024 treats no-lifts as competing-but-last. The data encodes whichever interpretation matches each comp’s published totals.

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