Britain’s strongest schoolboy, 10, reveals he started learning weight-lifting techniques aged 1 – as he lifts up the This Morning couch live on TV

A 10-year-old boy dubbed ‘Britain’s strongest schoolboy’, has shown off his skills by lifting up a couch on This Morning – while a person was sitting on it.

Rowan O’Malley, from Coventry, appeared on the ITV show with his parents Gemma and Ben to discuss his weight lifting prowess with hosts Rochelle Humes and Josie Gibson. 

The extra-strong lad – who weighs 8½ stone (54kg) – made headlines in March when he revealed he could deadlift 115kg (253lbs) and squat lift 100kg (220lbs).

After taking an interest in the sport at a young age and learning weightlifting techniques at the tender age of one, he later realised he was stronger than most kids his age. He has since gone on to break an astounding eight world records abroad.

Today, viewers were intrigued to see him effortlessly lift up a This Morning guest couch, while celebrity chef Phil Vickery was sitting on it – who was visibly stunned by the attempt.

Rowan appeared on the ITV show with his parents Gemma and Ben to discuss his weight lifting prowess with hosts Rochelle Humes and Josie Gibson (both pictured left). Viewers were intrigued to see him effortlessly lift up a This Morning guest coach, while celebrity chef Phil Vickery (pictured centre) was sitting on it

Rowan said to the hosts: ‘[When I was one] I started with no weights, just the techniques so I could know what I was doing first.

‘I started because my parents ran fitness events and my dad worked with someone with a brain injury and they used the gym for rehab so I’ve always grown up in a gym environment’.

So impressed was Rochelle – who joked that her children are nowhere near as fit as Rowan – that she queried how old he was when he first took the sport ‘seriously’.

‘It was like the start of last year. I did a competition at my gym’ he replied.

‘And I deadlifted the world record for a 10 year-old and I was nine, and that’s when it first started to get a bit serious’.

The disciplined schoolboy trains ‘two to three times a week’ and keeps to a strict 3000-calorie-a-day protein-rich diet, despite boys his age being advised by the NHS to eat around 2,000 daily.

On a normal day he eats three portions of scrambled eggs for breakfast and steak or fish for dinner. His parents also ensure that he gets a good night’s sleep every day. 

Although dubbed the nation’s strongest, Rowan is actually forbidden from competing in the sport in the UK, as the official age for entrants starts at 12.

His parents Ben and Gemma said they are ‘proud’ of their son who has a ‘desire to win and do well’ (Ben and Gemma O’Malley are pictured right next to their son)

Instead, he’s taken his superpower to Arizona in the US where he regularly competes and has won a whopping eight world titles.

The journey has been a physical strain in as much as it has been a financial one, with dad Ben revealing they’ve taken on funding and sponsorship to travel abroad so Rowan can perform in a professional setting. 

Both Ben and Gemma say they are ‘proud’ of their son who has a ‘desire to win and do well’. They say it’s as much about discipline as it is about the lifting.

The lad says it’s ‘amazing’ to officially hold the world record for the ‘strongest 10-year-old athlete under 56kg of all time’  and that he’s never been hurt or injured.

Josie and Rochelle encouraged the youngster to try lifting a couch live on television, to which he happily obliged. Josie looked visibly fearful.

In the blink of an eye Rowan lifts the couch to the surprise of the studio team, with Rochelle remarking ‘he didn’t even break a sweat’

Next up for Rowan is rugby, where he’ll be making use of his super strength.