Tales from the Trail

President Barack Obama met his match in the fitness category at an impromptu campaign visit on Sunday.

Stopping by a pizza place — the Big Apple Pizza & Pasta Italian Restaurant — in Ft. Pierce, Florida, the president, a workout fanatic, was welcomed by the 6-foot-3, 260-pound, big-muscled owner, Scott Van Duzer.

“If I eat your pizza, will I look like that?” Obama asked, marveling at the man’s physique.

Van Duzer, clearly delighted by the president’s visit, gave him a big bear hug — then lifted him, literally, into the air.

“Man, are you a power lifter or what?” the president exclaimed after he was put safely back on the ground.

Van Duzer, whom the president praised for his work promoting blood donation, said he was a Republican who voted for Obama in 2008 and plans to do so again in November.

Asked if he was concerned the Secret Service might intervene when he picked up the commander-in-chief, the 46-year-old laughed.

“(Obama) said I was all right as long as I didn’t take him away,” he said.

Picture credit: REUTERS/Larry Downing