What got you into lifting weights?

[IronLion2]

The bitches

 

[Ashop]

Women, without question!

 

[method2madness]

Being 5ft'1 at 13 and knowing that I wasn't going to get any taller. I saw Bill pearl pics when he was in his prime and thought, "I could be short and small my whole life, or I could be short and thick/big and strong as a brick shithouse, I chose the latter option and haven't had a single regret!

 

[Cmacchia71]

Girls, it was all about the girls in the beginning.

 

[graybass]

Reading old school Body Building mags. I used to look at guys like Arnold, Robbie Roberson, Louie, and think to my self, "How is that even possible" I just couldn't believe guys could get that big and strong! I was just fascinated with the process. So I tried to do it, read and read and read. Started Powerlifting (Man did I suck at first) Started getting big and strong after about 2 years. Now 30 years later cut out the power, train like a BB. Many years ago actually went back to school to become a trainer, and certified sports nutritionist. Still going strong.

 

[goback2013]

back in middle school(late 80s), it was basketball.. i wanted to jump out of the gym.
been lifting and still playing ever since.

 

[maldorf]

back in middle school(late 80s), it was basketball.. i wanted to jump out of the gym.
been lifting and still playing ever since.

I bet it helped you a lot. I didn't play sports and had no idea how high I could jump after lifting hard for 2 years. One night at a party we were throwing a Frisby and I had to jump up and catch it. When I did the jump all the guys there were shocked to see me jump so high. It was weird. I hadn't really had a reason to run and jump until then.

 

[johnjuanb1]

The Incredible Hulk, Conan the Barbarian, The Predator, and a girl dumped me and told everyone I was so skinny it made her want to puke!

 

[Sides]

I was an abused, bullied, nerdy, sickly little kid growing up in the '70's and '80's. My home life and school life were horrific; the cops were always being called to my house to stop my parents from killing each other or us, and I was constantly beaten up and bullied by other kids at school. I remember seriously contemplating suicide when I was in the 5th grade, as the only way out, and the thought and possibility has never left my mind.

But then...Sylvester Stallone showed me another way out, in the training montage of every Rocky movie ever filmed. The transformation gave me hope. Rocky Balboa, through sheer heart and determination and discipline, made something from himself, turned himself from a loser into a winner. And so I secretly started doing pushups and situps like a madman in my bedroom at night, and at first walking then running laps around the pond in the woods out back. And I started to change myself.

And then there was Hulk Hogan and the other WWF wrestlers. Hulkamania, the training, the prayers, and the vitamins. ;-) I bought a plastic sand-filled 110lb weight set at K-Mart after my junior year of high school, and started lifting weights, doing bench presses on my mother's cocktail table downstairs until I could afford a rickety bench. I wanted to get ready for the military, so I started knocking out 20-rep sets of pullups and running 8 miles a day. And one Saturday I walked by the black-and-white TV and saw Arnold Schwarzenegger on Muscle Beach in Pumping Iron, and I thought, wow, look at those guys, those guys actually lift weights for a living. And the possibility of that inspired me, although if I had taken a realistic look at my genetics I would have realized no way was that in my future. But I tried as hard as anybody has ever tried at anything.

I went from an 155lb high school senior to a 255lb college senior, all natural. Then at 24, I tried steroids for the first time, and that opened up a whole new realm of possibilities, good and bad. Competed in bodybuilding and powerlifting, trained with professional bodybuilders and wrestlers and world-record-holding powerlifters. Sold steroids, went to prison for selling steroids. Had a hell of a good run and a good journey.

But it all started with an abused, bullied little boy doing pushups and situps in his bedroom alone at night, because of Rocky Balboa, and believing he could change his own reality. And I am grateful to have found that path, instead of the other path.

 

[maldorf]

I was an abused, bullied, nerdy, sickly little kid growing up in the '70's and '80's. My home life and school life were horrific; the cops were always being called to my house to stop my parents from killing each other or us, and I was constantly beaten up and bullied by other kids at school. I remember seriously contemplating suicide when I was in the 5th grade, as the only way out, and the thought and possibility has never left my mind.

But then...Sylvester Stallone showed me another way out, in the training montage of every Rocky movie ever filmed. The transformation gave me hope. Rocky Balboa, through sheer heart and determination and discipline, made something from himself, turned himself from a loser into a winner. And so I secretly started doing pushups and situps like a madman in my bedroom at night, and at first walking then running laps around the pond in the woods out back. And I started to change myself.

And then there was Hulk Hogan and the other WWF wrestlers. Hulkamania, the training, the prayers, and the vitamins. ;-) I bought a plastic sand-filled 110lb weight set at K-Mart after my junior year of high school, and started lifting weights, doing bench presses on my mother's cocktail table downstairs until I could afford a rickety bench. I wanted to get ready for the military, so I started knocking out 20-rep sets of pullups and running 8 miles a day. And one Saturday I walked by the black-and-white TV and saw Arnold Schwarzenegger on Muscle Beach in Pumping Iron, and I thought, wow, look at those guys, those guys actually lift weights for a living. And the possibility of that inspired me, although if I had taken a realistic look at my genetics I would have realized no way was that in my future. But I tried as hard as anybody has ever tried at anything.

I went from an 155lb high school senior to a 255lb college senior, all natural. Then at 24, I tried steroids for the first time, and that opened up a whole new realm of possibilities, good and bad. Competed in bodybuilding and powerlifting, trained with professional bodybuilders and wrestlers and world-record-holding powerlifters. Sold steroids, went to prison for selling steroids. Had a hell of a good run and a good journey.

But it all started with an abused, bullied little boy doing pushups and situps in his bedroom alone at night, because of Rocky Balboa, and believing he could change his own reality. And I am grateful to have found that path, instead of the other path.

My first weight set was one of those plastic/sand weight sets! My parents bought it for me at Sears. The plates were silver/grey. That was in 8th grade when I started. Then as a sophomore in 1986 I got my first set of Olympic weights with a nice Olympic bench with attachments.

 

[Muay Thai]

being a gang member in san diego, I figured I'd better fortify my temple.

 

[Barbie81]

Gonna have to say, She-ra from He-man was probably my first inspiration
I always loved sports and fitness and asked for my first set of dumbbells on my 14th birthday ... which I actually still have!!!
Then I lost alot of weight as I became bulimic (wont bore you with the details why) so I started to go the gym because I knew that I didnt want to blow up if I started eating normal again after so little.... so I hammered the gym,,, but it wasnt till a few years later when I met my Ex,,, that I was introduced to lifting heavier/bodybuilding. And I've loved it more and more since,, knowing your body can change so much if you out the diet, effort and consistency in

 

[biggie260]

Bad home life, natural farm boy strength.

 

[Papa Van Smack]

I always had a very broad structure, I'm German. I started lifting to play football but I realized my gains were better than my friends...so of course I was hooked. When I was 18 I saw ronnie guest pose, off- season, 330lbs.....ish. 5 months later I had durateston and hemogenin from geherkes. Only took 5 months because he was slow AF.

 

[Biggerp73]

It was the summer of 2005, before my junior year of high school, and I was on a family camping trip. We stopped at a store and I saw a Muscular Development magazine. Had my mom buy it for me. I remember looking at pictures of Branch Warren and thinking he looked awesome. "Mom, Dad, look at this guy! It's like he has football pads under his skin!" That night I started exercising for the first time, doing curls and overhead tricep extensions with cans of food, a watermelon, stuff like that in the trailer. When we got back home I immediately got a pair of 35lb dumbbells and began doing a full body workout every morning before school.

 

[Bobik]

for me, the film Barbarian Conan with Arnold ....I can't live without exercise today.

 

[LoweRider]

Sylvester Stallone in Judge Dredd made me want to be big since I was a kid. That first scene where sly rides in on the Lawmaster and the camer pans from his feet to his head and you can see how jacked he was was the starting point for me. As I got older, I discovered guys like Frank Zane and of course from watching Arnold movies.

 

[b-boy]

Cartoons! When I was young all the cartoon character in my youth were all jacked as fuck, i wanted to look like G.I. Joe characters, He-Man, Thundar the barbarian, thunder cats, super friends, Marvel comics, x-men. This is what got me motivated to look super human.

 

[MagicTaco]

High school football.

 

[BoredStiff]

A combo of boredom and high energy. There wasn't very much to do where I grew up, the neighborhoods werent safe so I was inside all the time bored out of my mind. I wanted to play sports but I'm really not much of a team player and like to do things alone. I watched a lot of combat sport training footage and I was pretty fascinated, I had a lot of energy to burn and so so that got me started. All I did was squats, push ups and eventually I found a tree for pull-ups, I knew nothing about sets/reps, I just went until my legs and arms gave out lol. I was probably about 10.