SEQUIM – In a two-hour funeral leavened by laughter, some 600 mourners gathered Wednesday afternoon to remember Jesse Marunde’s paradoxical life.
Marunde, a Sequim High School alumnus, was famous around the world for his dominance of strongman competitions.
He organized and won this year’s Sequim Irrigation Festival strongman contest, stunning spectators by hoisting a car off the ground and hauling hundreds of pounds’ worth of Atlas stones.
At just 27, Marunde collapsed and died July 25 following a workout in Sequim.
Results of an autopsy are pending.
At 6-foot-5 and close to 300 pounds, Marunde might have been a frightening figure.
He spent about a decade developing a musculature that could lift staggering amounts of weight, and went around the world flipping enormous tractor tires, hoisting boulders, pulling trucks short distances and raising laden barbells above his handsome face.
He took second place in the 2005 World’s Strongest Man competition in China, while fans on the other side of the globe watched his feats on television.
