The Romano Factor

By the time I became one of the many Venice bodybuilders who had a membership at both Gold’s and World gyms, Arnold Schwarzenegger —World Gym’s most famous member—was well into his meteoric rise to superstardom with the smash box office success of Conan the Barbarian, which had debuted a year earlier, in 1982. While I was already a member of Gold’s Gym, a few of my friends who trained at World Gym invited me to come train with them. The outside deck with a view of the Pacific across the street, where you could train in the sun with your shirt off, was just too good a thing for a guy who grew up in New York to ignore. That alone was worth the $125 for the year. Some days I ended up training at the same time Arnold did. These were always memorable occasions, not because Arnold was a superstar, but because he was such a character. He was funny as hell. Plus, I mean, he’s Arnold. Seven-time Mr. Olympia? To a 22-year-old bodybuilder from New York, that was awesome. These days, it amazes me that I was lucky enough to be part of the early ‘80s World Gym ethos that included the most famous bodybuilder in the world.

I only wish I had paid more attention. Arnold had bags of charisma and a sharp sense of humour, and he wasn’t shy about using it. When Arnold was there, it was his gym and no one, not even Joe Gold (the owner), was going to do anything about it. One member of Arnold’s crew was a guy they called “Big Mike.” He was actually my landlord; I lived over his garage. Everyone had a nickname that Joe gave you, and that was pretty much all he and everyone else ever called you. Big Mike was 6’8” and ran 295, fairly lean. So, his nickname came easy to Joe. But not to Arnold. Not only was Big Mike big and tall, but he also had a wild salt-and-pepper fro on top of a face that was definitely not a collector’s item and wore glasses that only partially covered his acne scarring. Given those physical attributes, Arnold called him “Monster.” Big Mike, aka Mhaan-stah, was an intellectual hardcore New Yorker who never missed a chance to volley with the Oak. They truly liked each other but would sometimes trade some very creative vitriol—all in good fun, of course.

So, one day they were going at it, and I guess Big Mike wasn’t in a good mood or something because he clearly wasn’t himself. I wasn’t paying too much attention when they started, but by the time I walked past them on my way out down the stairs, it seemed like Arnold was getting to Big Mike. A little while later, I was walking down Main Street toward Venice when I suddenly heard this muffled kind of bullhorn sound coming from behind me and the revving of what sounded like a very high-horsepower V8, squealing rubber. It sounded like a car chase. So I turned around and saw Big Mike on his triathlon bikeing down Main Street like he was running from the cops. Can you even imagine the carnage all that mass travelling at almost 30 miles an hour could do on impact? Main Street in Santa Monica is a docile venue of restaurants and shops, teeming with people. I shudder to think. Anyway, Big Mike was indeed being chased, but not by the cops. It was Arnold, in one of his prized pre-Hummer-era Jeep Wagoneers with a Corvette motor stu ed under the hood. He was roaring down the street fast after Big Mike, yelling into his CB radio speaker, “Mhaan-stah! Mhaan-stah com baak!” Later, Mike told me he chased him all the way to the Rose café, yelling for him to stop and turn around and come back to the gym. Mike was cracking up so hard he couldn’t pedal anymore, so they stopped and had coffee. Fast forward 30 years to the recent video gone viral of Arnold, in a phony moustache and a ball cap, wandering around Gold’s Gym in Venice, gooing on people.

I saw the old Arnold in him again, and it reminded me of just how much fun Arnold used to have in Venice back in the day. After all of the power and success he has amassed during his long and colourful career, Arnold is still Arnold. And, he’s detectably more comfortable in a gym full of bodybuilders than anywhere else.

Except for maybe the Arnold Classic.

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