Spoiler warning: this covers the whole of Physical 100: Italy, including the final.
Tommaso Nisi finished runner-up on Physical 100: Italy, one push away from the €100,000. He’s a 36-year-old firefighter from Ancona, and before that he was one of the best gymnasts in the country on the high bar. That’s why, when the final came down to pull-ups, nobody could stay on the bar longer than him.
Here’s who he is, how a man his own team cut came back to reach the final, and what a gymnast’s body brings to this show. For the whole series, see our Physical 100: Italy winner guide.
- Age: 36, from Montesicuro, on the edge of Ancona
- Job: firefighter with Italy’s Vigili del Fuoco, in the Ancona area
- Sport: competitive artistic gymnast until about 20; Italian runner-up on the high bar; now a CrossFit coach
- Height and weight: 183 cm, 84 kg
- Physical 100: Italy: runner-up; won the final’s pull-up test, then lost a push-of-war to Emanuele Bruno
Who is Tommaso Nisi?
Nisi has been in a gym since he was four and a half. As a boy he trained up to five hours a day, and he competed as an artistic gymnast until he was about 20. “I was Italian runner-up on the high bar and competed in the top-level championships,” he told CentroPagina.
Then he joined the fire service, “the job of my dreams” (Il Resto del Carlino), and gave up competing. He didn’t stop training. He taught gymnastics to children for years and now coaches CrossFit, and he still trains five times a week (VeraTV). He works in the Ancona area, after two years posted in Cremona.
He’s a father too. He dedicated his result to his family and his daughter, Emma.
How he finished runner-up on Physical 100: Italy
“What am I doing here?”
A hundred athletes started, including Olympic champions, rugby internationals and a lot of fighters. “At the start, faced with huge athletes, I asked myself: what am I doing here?” Nisi said. “Then, test after test, I saw that my body worked.”
The hardest moment, he says, was the opening grid plank, held on bars above a pool: a piece of kit he’d spent his childhood on. “The physical pain was enormous, but in my head I never gave up.”
Cut by his team, then back with the rejects
Episode 5 came with a twist. While Alvise Rigo won the Pillars of Hercules to bring his team back, the captains of the four teams already through each had to cut one of their own. Nisi was one of the four dropped, along with judoka Emanuele Bruno, Pietro Checchi and Sara Del Prete. They were thrown together as a team of “rejects”, with Bruno as captain. For how each round worked, see every Physical 100: Italy challenge explained.
Pacing the chariot
The rejects won their heat of the episode 6 chariot race outright, hauling a chariot loaded from 100 kg up to 145 kg. Nisi’s explanation is a lesson in pacing: “I did better than the others, who set off at full speed. By splitting up the effort, I managed my energy better. It’s important to understand your body’s limits.”
He survived episode 7’s hang above the pool too, and went into the final six alongside Bruno, judoka Manuel Lombardo, surf champion Edoardo Papa, footballer Matteo Sartori and DJ Giulio Domi. Lombardo, who got to pick his heat, avoided Nisi and Papa, naming them as the real threats.
The final: first on the bar, second overall
Nisi came through the obstacle course, then the final turned into a pull-up test with no upper limit. This was his event. “There might have been someone faster than me,” he’d said of the show, “but when it came to hanging from the bar, I beat them.” He outlasted both Bruno and Sartori to take the first place in the decider.
The decider was a push-of-war on top of an aqueduct, the two men driving a movable wall towards each other. According to The National, it went on for nearly two hours before Bruno pushed him back. Two of the team nobody wanted had finished first and second. Read how Bruno won in our Emanuele Bruno profile, and how Sartori got to third in our Matteo Sartori profile.
Nisi watched the final with his family at the Festival dello Sport in Trento. “A great emotion, feeling the warmth of the crowd and signing my first autographs,” he wrote on Instagram.
Why a gymnast went so far
Gymnastics builds exactly what this show keeps testing: strength relative to bodyweight, grip that lasts, and control of your own body when you’re tired. At 183 cm and 84 kg Nisi isn’t small, but he isn’t built like the wrestlers and strongmen around him either. He’s built to hang, pull and move.
He also thinks the job helped. Firefighting and the show have a lot in common, he said: “keeping fit, sacrifice, teamwork”. Fire crews depend on the group, and so did the team rounds.
The pattern holds across the franchise. Mexico was won by an obstacle racer, Ángel Quintero, and Italy’s top three were a judoka, a gymnast-turned-firefighter and a footballer. The biggest bodies keep going out early.
Train like Tommaso Nisi
You can’t go back and do 15 years of gymnastics, but the qualities that carried Nisi to the final are trainable at any age:
- Pull-ups for reps. The final came down to them. Our pull-up guide takes you from the first rep to sets of ten and beyond.
- Hang time. Gymnasts live on the bar. Build up your dead hang, and remember that grip is one of the best simple markers of how well you’re ageing.
- Bodyweight control. Start with our beginner calisthenics plan or the free 28-day military calisthenics plan.
- Pacing. Nisi beat the chariot by not going out too hard. Practise even pacing on sled pushes and carries, the same mix as the HYROX stations.
Tommaso Nisi FAQ
Who is Tommaso Nisi on Physical 100: Italy?
A 36-year-old firefighter from Ancona and former competitive gymnast who finished runner-up on Physical 100: Italy.
Where did Tommaso Nisi finish on Physical 100: Italy?
Second. He won the final’s pull-up test, then lost a push-of-war of nearly two hours to Emanuele Bruno.
What does Tommaso Nisi do for a job?
He’s a firefighter with Italy’s Vigili del Fuoco in the Ancona area, and he coaches CrossFit.
Was Tommaso Nisi a gymnast?
Yes. He competed in artistic gymnastics until about 20 and was Italian runner-up on the high bar.
How old is Tommaso Nisi?
He’s 36, according to Italian press reports from September 2026.
How tall is Tommaso Nisi?
183 cm, and he weighs about 84 kg.
