Uncensored

Certain events and dates in history mark the change of an era. One of the most significant is the birth of Jesus, which the Gregorian calendar uses to distinguish A.D. from B.C. Others include the fall of the Roman Empire, the births of Mohammed and Buddha, and the signing of the Magna Carta. Of less significance to the world at large but extremely important to those in bodybuilding is the rise and continued success of Arnold Schwarzenegger. Before Arnold came on the scene in the late 1960s, bodybuilding was very much a marginalized sport, a joke to the majority, where there wasn’t much money to be made by competitors or anyone else. In 1965, the prize money for the first Mr. Olympia champion, Larry Scott, was $1,000. All this changed when Arnold came to public prominence. Aided by expert promotion from Joe Weider, he was the first bodybuilder since Steve Reeves to become well known to the general public. He began his movie career with the films Pumping Iron and Stay Hungry. A series of major hits such as Conan and The Terminator propelled him to become the number one box office star in the world.

He then moved on to political success by becoming governor of California. Nowadays, the total prize pool at the Mr. Olympia is one million dollars! This is the world that Arnold Schwarzenegger helped create. Keep this in mind when you hear the opinion that bodybuilding is dying. It is not. It is evolving. There are thousands of bodybuilding physique contests at all levels, pro and amateur, for men and women, all over the world— and tens of thousands of competitors. The problem isn’t the actual state of bodybuilding, but its public perception. Steroid use had a lot to do with the current negative public view of bodybuilders. The sport became so identified with anabolic use that much of the media turned its attention from real-world issues such as poverty, health care, and climate change and made the sport of bodybuilding its whipping boy. This has been made worse by the fact that bodybuilding competitors often lack the public relations training necessary to counter negative publicity from mass market media and the general public. But bodybuilding itself is stronger than ever, and more good bodybuilders are coming along all the time regardless of the opinion of the general public or the media. And every bodybuilder who receives a cheque or trophy, every promoter who counts box office receipts after an event, and every bodybuilding magazine publisher who sees a new issue hit stores should give a nod of thanks to somebody who helped make this possible— Arnold.

To read more about the bodybuilding world now vs. the Arnold era, click here!