Why did you actually start in bodybuilding

[gridlock]

I was just reading in a thread about how it has changed from a lot of the guys who have been lifting for years.

in my 11 years of training its changed a lot and i think its mainly why people got into it. So can you post up why you initially started training. I want to hear opinions from the experienced guys on the board like Dale, Phil, Pesty etc as well as the younger guys that are just coming through.

 

[bkronald]

Interesting question !

Well I'm an old fuck now with about 30+ years under my belt, I'll be 48 in Oct.
doing my first powerlifting contest in 1981 and my first BB show in 1991.
Anyways I must have been about 11 and I was taking a summer school class to stay out of my moms hair. I left class early and a guy approached me, showed me a fake police badge and said I had to get in his car. I tried to peddel away but he grabbed the bike. I hopped off and ran, the only street away from there was a guy sitting in a car watching the whole thing so if I ran that way he could get me.
I ran thru the woods and into a neighbors back door and called police, they never caught the piece of shit.
I wanted to feel more confident and safe. I wanted to feel like I could protect & defend myself from then on.

 

[doug1]

Conan the Barbarian...what more does a young lad need?

 

[Flex2019]

I grew up as the fat kid. Embarrassed to take my shirt off in public, even while swimming. There came a point when I became tired of being picked on and ridiculed (not to mention the fact that girls wouldn't even look at me) so I started training around 14 years old. I loved the way my body looked and felt, and it became a bit of an addiction. In high school I became friends with a national competitor who taught me a lot about diet and convinced me to try competing. Now I'm 29 and can't imagine living my life any differently.

 

[notsobig32]

The girl i had a crush on in high school was with the captain of the football team. He was a pretty big fella, so i decided that muscle was the way to win her heart. I followed my diet exactly and trained the right way. I eventually did win her over but honestly muscle had nothing to do with it, it was my ability to make her laugh So i just kept going with bb'ing because it had become a stabilizing force in my life.

 

[musicmann89]

always admired arnold when i was younger saw the movie commando haha

 

[zephyr22]

I watched commando....

Also the movie predator. I bought a muscle n fitness with arnold on the cover from the Predator movie. I looked through it and thought the guys looked "cool" and I wanted to look like that. I asked my mom "do the muscles stop the hair from growing on there legs??? I saw Berry Demays legs and at that time I thought they looked, Inside out. I thought he looked cool but didnt know who he even was. My father was short and stocky and he was my idol before he passed away when I was 8. I took after my mom who was short and skinney. So in my eyes I wanted to emulate my dad so I figured I would put on muscle so I could look like he did. Also he was a action movie junkie who loved the rambo, rock moveies etc....I sure do miss my father.

 

[VanR__]

I grew up as the fat kid. Embarrassed to take my shirt off in public, even while swimming.

Same here but I grew into a fat man.

 

[Pharm_Fed]

I was always skinny as a teenager and wanted to be more muscular. Now as I'm in my mid twenties I still want to be more muscular but being healthy is more and more important all the time.

Muscles are great but I don't want them bad enough to compromise my longevity to obtain them.

I enjoy training, and the way I feel after I know I've pushed myself hard during a good workout. I also enjoy the satisfaction of having the self discipline to stick to a diet, by consistent with training and how that feeling carries over into other aspects of my life.

 

[7_Deadly_Sins]

I got tired of being small/weak...it's fun to do..a hobby lead to a life style, and the best one at that.

 

[hawkmoon]

Picked up my dad's weights. Wanted to be like him...
Grew like a weed. I think I went from 12 to 15 inch arms in about six months. Fell in love with it and never looked back.

 

[topfuel]

Great memories

I was a swimmer that did circut training on machines to enhance my performance. But one day watching television Howard Cosell came on and introduced what he called the "Supermen of sport" the camera cuts to a guy that looks like Clark Kent and then shows him fade into posing trunks and hits a pose that man was Bob Birdsong and the compitition to follow showed him competing against Boyer Coe. It was the first and last competition to be shown by A.B.C. sports but all I could remember was how could I look like that and for the last 30 years that is all I have been trying to become.
Great memories

 

[aviatrix]

My fiance.


Not actually.. I was always a pretty small guy. (Not just muscles, have a small frame as well) It always bothered me in high school when some of the bigger guys (particularly a certain group) would do stuff like gang up on people they didn't like and videotape one of their buddies kicking the crap out of someone half their size. I never dealt with this directly but some friends did.

Nowadays I just like the way the lifestyle makes me feel. I wouldn't eat as healthy as I do or watch my sleeping habits if I didn't lift. I joke about it being for my fiance, but I want to look good for her too. And it's always nice being able to toss her around with minimal effort. <-- I mean that in a gentle loving way. I'm not abusive.

 

[madmick]

Chicks

 

[robot]

bodybuilding... what's bodybuilding? Someone told me strong people are harder to kill.

 

[gamesguru]

I felt weak and insecure so I started lifting, that kind of transposed into bodybuilding.

 

[r4id3n]

my brother drag me to the gym,in order to accompany him.Unfortunately,he stopped after a year.

 

[pesty4077]

Well, started doing drugs, smoking and drinking alcohol at 12. I was skinny to the point I look anorexic. I always thought there was something better than the miserable life I was doing. At 20, I got fed up and went to a gym. I met Marty Vranicar, former Mr. Universe, 2007 Masters 50, overall champion. He look at me and took me under his wing. I stop smoking, drinking and doing all those drugs, with in 6 months. I started at 6"1" and about 145-150 pounds. In 2 years I went to 200. This gym was a hard core powerlifting and Bodybuilding gym. I started in 1980, and never looked back. I contribute BB to my sucess in business, family and other things. It helped me get out my destructive lifesyle. If only we would use our focus in BB on other things that are important.

 

[Lenny]

My brother was training for the military and forced me to do endless amounts of push-ups with him, so I thought to myself that there is more to all of this than just push-ups...from that point I got into sports and actually enjoyed the resistance training side of it more than the actually game time...I know wierd. I was hooked to lifting weights, but still had a lot of learning to do first!

 

[Armageddon]

Love football more than anything, and I wanted a scholarship and then whatever. So in the 7th grade I started working out alittle and in the 8th grade I was in the high school weight room. We just got a new athletic director then and he was a ND grad and played for the Chiefs. His previous job was a Hammer Strength Sales rep so the school got a hook up. He would have me in there doing alof of high rep stuff. I remember 100 rep sets on leg press back in 1990. It reall got me going, I remember every workout I did in high school started with pullups, chinups, and maybe dips haha When I turned 16 I asked my parents for a gym memebership for my birthday. It was a blur after that. I went from wrestling 125 as a freshman to as much as 200 as a senior.