How Arnold made and ruined bodybuilding

I was asked whether Arnold Schwarzenegger began as a lifter or a bodybuilder. The answer is neither and both. Arnold's goal was always bodybuilding. But bodybuilding and strength were not considered as distinct and separate things until the late 1970s onwards.

The history is a big lengthy and many of the details argued, but basically bodybuilding competitions started in the 1930s. You got extra points if you participated in a sport, and the most common sport was weightlifting, since practicing baseball doesn't really give you big gunz. US weightlifting was basically run by Bob Hoffman out of York barbell club - yes, York weight plates, etc, the name continues to this day. He thought bodybuilding was odd, he only cared about strength. But it was popular so he got into it. 

Then Joe Weider came along, he only cared about looks, not strength. He used to publish magazines of naked bodybuilders, this appealed to women of course but also closet homosexuals (it was the 1940s and 1950s, they were all in the closet then, and most of them married). Weider didn't care since firstly he wasn't homophobic, and secondly he just wanted money and fame and didn't care where it came from. Weider started up bodybuilding competitions with no extra points for a sport. 

It was function vs looks, old conservative commie-hating red-blooded Americans vs young liberal gay-loving Americans. Weider won.

Anabolic steroids first popped up in the 1956 Olympics. Hoffman sent his weightlifting team there, the team doctor Ziegler was having dinner with the Soviet coach, who got a few drinks into him and asked Zeigler what drugs he was giving the Americans. Ziegler thus heard about steroids in sport, went home and invented Dianabol, and used Hoffman's lifters as guinea pigs. These were small doses and most tried it for several weeks, felt no difference and stopped. But they were fully into it by the 1960 Olympics. 

Weightlifting used to have snatch, clean and jerk, and clean and press. The first two are more like javelin or discus, strength is important but skill matters too. The press was more pure strength. Nowadays people ask how much you bench, they used to ask how much you press, so much so it's even given as example to illustrate the "Strength" attribute in something as unsporty as early edition Dungeons and Dragons. After 1972 they got rid of the press for various reasons. Then a few years later Pumping Iron came out, and Arnie had enormous chesticles. So the bench press became popular. 

Thus, form won over function. 

So Arnie built most of his size using basic barbell lifts and a small amount of anabolic steroids, but his career and fame has helped contribute to people doing less basic barbell lifts and using shitloads of anabolic steroids. This is how in fifty years we went from Steve Reeves to Jay Cutler.

Physical training can change how you look, feel (health) and perform. I think in order of importance they are 

1. health, 

2. performance and 

3. looks. 

But most people come into the gym with the order reversed. 

Enough patronising

We need to stop patronising women and older people in lifting

They don't want it, and they don't need it. In recent meets in different federations, I have noticed bad lifts get passed. Shallow squats, hitched deadlifts and so on. I see the same with personal trainers at commercial gyms, loading weight on the bar their clients can't handle and then congratulating them for a job well done. Crossfit has made the shitty lift followed by a backslap famous, but it was around before them. 

"Good girl!" Fuck off. She's 40 years old, not 4. Stick to, "Well done," or "good effort, now here's what you have to fix." 

People need encouragement, they don't need bullshit. We need to be strict with our lifters in training and competition. Yes, even if they're from some under-represented group like women or older lifters. 

Nobody is going to quit because you redlighted their lift, they go away and cry or swear and then come back and do it properly next time. They have to lift with good form over a full range of motion. This will make them better lifters and get better results. 

We don't need to write articles telling women or older people why they should lift. We don't need special persuasive tactics to deal with objections. They know as well anyone does. Just talk to them as people, don't assume you have to convince them because of what's in their pants or how many rings in the tree. Stronger is better. 

Yes, there are differences in where you start and how many reps you do and how quickly you progress, but as Mark Rippetoe has said, "shit's just complicated... except, you gotta squat." Fundamental human movements are fundamental. 

We need to treat EVERYONE seriously as trainees and athletes. This is what they want and deserve.

Managing Compromises

Rip has been kind enough to let me share my experiences of training people effectively in mainstream gyms.

"Managing Compromises: Intermediate and Advanced Programming Applications for Personal Trainers"

"I believe that the Starting Strength model presents an ideal to be striven for. But if your limitations of personality, gym equipment, or time prevent this ideal from being reality for you or your clients, then the above are some approaches I’ve used with success. My reasoning is quite simply that progress is progress.”

Training with joint problems

With everyone I believe the movement is more important than the load. Build quality, and the quantity will come. This is simply more true for people with relevant injuries than for entirely healthy people, especially since entirely healthy people are vanishingly rare. Almost everyone's got something wrong with them, it's merely a matter of degree. 

Getting people to begin is the first big issue. But if they do begin then at some point later on it gets hard, getting them past this is not easy. At some point come the grindy reps and the prospect of being buried under the weight. Everyone thinks about weaseling out at this point, whether they have previous injuries or not. "Kyle actually I'd like to work on cardio for a while... also I'm getting a twinge just here... and... well training is kinda expensive... and..." 

The barbell works. But it's not easy. But then, as we were told in the army: the easy way is always mined.

bulking up

Is often a good thing. "I don't want to bulk up." Maybe you should, you can be more awesome.

progress is progress

There are many ways to show progress when lifting weights.

1. better technique
2. more weight
3. more reps
4. more sets
5. all the above the same, but less pain or no pain doing it

All these things are progress. Progress is progress.

Now go progress.

the sea of wannabes

You don't need a university degree to do personal training well. You do need one to help high-risk people, those recovering from strokes and so on. But this is a tiny minority of the gym population. The best personal trainers have the following,

• Have hired a trainer themselves. They actually believe in and value PT.
• Have a background in movement - doesn't have to be weights, could be gymnastics, tennis, a martial art, etc - in which they've done moderately well over 2+ years. Having moved, they are used to watching movement, and thus understand movement better. This is the beginning of the "coaching eye."
• Have set modestly ambitious physical training goals taking 6+ months to achieve, and achieved them, eg a young woman deadlifting 100kg, a guy running 5km in under 20', either going from healthy bodyfat to sixpack abs, got a black belt in a martial art, rehabilitated an injury requiring surgery, etc. They've done something physically challenging and in which they'll have fallen back along the way (as opposed to the easy newbie gains).
• Some general life experience - other jobs they've been successful at, been married, had children, screwed a few things up, etc. This gives them perspective and empathy which helps them get and keep clients, and get them results.
• Enthusiasm for deeper or broader knowledge of health and fitness, ie they keep studying, including trying out things they think are stupid, so they can have an informed opinion on them. This is quite simply professional development, ie getting better at your job.

Not everyone will have them all, the best will though, and most can be developed over time. There are other things that matter but this will do for a blog post which few will read. 

Think of the trainers you know and ask yourself which of these traits they display. In the US, the number of personal training clients is estimated at 6.4 million; 51.4 million are gym members and 12% or 6.1 million use PT services. That's less than one client per trainer. In Australia, it's estimated that we have twice as many PTs as IT professionals entering the workforce every year. Evidently there are rather a lot of unsuccessful trainers out there. Now consider the above list again and see if you can connect the dots. 

It's easy to get the title "personal trainer". It's not easy to get a job and be good at it.