Geoff Capes Geoff Capes Geoffrey Lewis Capes (born 23 August 1949) is a British former shot putter, strongman and professional Highland Games competitor. As an athlete he represented both England and Great Britain in field athletics, specialising in the shot put an event in which he was twice Commonwealth champion, twice European champion, and three time Olympian. As a strongman, he twice won the title of World's Strongest Man, was World Muscle Power champion on two occasions, and also had numerous other titles including Europe's Strongest Man and Britain's Strongest Man. As a Highland Games competitor he was six times world champion,
Track and field could compete. Track and field continued to be a largely amateur sport, as this rule was strictly enforced: Jim Thorpe was stripped of his track and field medals from the 1912 Olympics after it was revealed that he had taken expense money for playing baseball, violating Olympic amateurism rules, before the 1912 Games. His medals were reinstated 29 years after his death. That same year, the International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF) was established, becoming the international governing body for track and field, and it enshrined amateurism as one of its founding principles for the sport. The National Collegiate Athletic Association