Gunnar Nelson, an Icelandic professional MMA fighter and BJJ black belt, has had an opportunity to roll with Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson – one of the strongest men in the world (who once deadlifted 1,105lbs) and a star of the “Game of Thrones” series, in which he acts as “The Mountain”. He weighs a staggering 330 lbs.

In a conversation with MMA Hour, Nelson said that the goal was to “have a little wrestle, videotape it, and just have fun”. He managed to submit The Mountain with an Armbar in the first round… But then, in the second round, hell broke loose for Gunnar.
He tried to go for an Armbar from the back, but Björnsson collapsed on him. He heard a nasty ‘pop’ and, seconds later, felt that the upper right side of his ribs was swelling.

Nelson tried to push through until the end of the round, but it was extremely difficult to do so… Especially because The Mountain collapsed on him yet again.

The injury kept Nelson away from the training for many months:

Something in me was like: “I’m not going to say anything now.” I’m just thinking: “I have to wait for him to show his neck, and we can get this over with. Because it’s too late to stop now and say I hurt myself.
It was a really fun thing, but it was probably stupid.

“I haven’t spoken to him about it. I don’t think he knows but I think this is the first time I’ve spoken about it. It happened there, it was fun, I enjoyed it but I wanted to get an armbar from the bottom.

“It was my mission because, obviously, it’s a hard thing against somebody like him and he knows a little bit. He knows how to use his weight a bit and he’s 160 kilos of pure muscle. ”

“I catch him with an armbar from the top but I want to get it from the bottom and so I try to do that in the second round, he collapses on top of me and I could feel a nasty pop and seconds after.

“I could just feel it swelling up but something in me was like, I’m not going to say anything now, I’m just going to finish the round.

“It happens again where I get curled up like this and he pulls all his weight and at this stage I’m just having real problems with my arm and breathing and stuff.

“I’m just thinking, ‘I have to wait for him to show his neck and we can get this over with’ because it’s too late to stop now and say that I hurt myself.”

In the end, he managed to tap out Björnsson twice – without getting tapped himself. He didn’t mention anything about his injury to The Mountain:

It’s hard to stop when you’re in it. Like, not that we were going crazy, but it’s just, you know… It was not his fault or anything. It just happened. He wasn’t going spastic or anything. He’s just 160 kilos. He was just trying to do his best there.

Nelson set himself a challenge to finish ‘The Mountain’ in style but his plans may have been ambitious given the size of his opposition.

Check out their rolling session below: