

But I had it tougher than a lot of my teammates and companions because I wanted more, I demanded more of myself. Because of my build I'd always had it easier at sports than most boys my age. I was 6 feet tall and slender, weighing only 150 pounds but I did have a good athletic physique and my muscles responded surprisingly fast under training. They encouraged me to go into bodybuilding. Considering my age, fifteen, I was squatting with some pretty heavy weight. The bodybuilders noticed immediately how hard I was working out. I started lifting weights just for my legs, which was what we needed most for playing soccer. It was something I suddenly just seemed to reach out and find, as if I'd been crossing a suspended bridge and finally stepped off onto solid ground.

And there it was before me - my life, the answer I'd been seeking. The weight lifters shone with sweat they were powerful looking, Herculean. I found myself walking around them, staring at muscles I couldn't even name, muscles I'd never even seen before.

I had never seen anyone lifting weights before. I still remember that first visit to the bodybuilding gym. Then our coach decided that lifting weights for an hour once a week would be a good way to condition us for playing soccer. Although I did well with them, none of those things felt right to me. I ran, I swam, I boxed I got into competition, throwing javelin and shot put. The only time I really felt rewarded was when I was singled out as being best. I disliked it when we won a game and I didn't get personal recognition. However, by the time I was thirteen team sports no longer satisfied me. I threw myself into it and played soccer passionately for almost five years. I joined a soccer team that even had uniforms and a regular three-days-a-week training schedule. With my father's encouragement, I first got into organized competitive sports when I was ten. We were a physical family, oriented toward training, good eating, and keeping the body fit and healthy. I had always been involved in sports through my father, a tall, sturdy man who was himself a champion at ice curling. I loved it from the first moment my fingers closed around a barbell and I felt the challenge and exhilaration of hoisting the heavy steel plates above my head. I'm not exactly sure why I chose bodybuilding, except that I loved it. I would be the best bodybuilder in the world, the greatest, the best-built man. It was more than a young boy's mere pipe dream of a distant, hazy future - confused fantasies of being a fireman, detective, sailor, test pilot, or spy. It was the summer I turned fifteen, a magical season for me because that year I'd discovered exactly what I wanted to do with my life. "Arnold - come on!" cried Karl, the young doctor who had become my friend at the gym. I can still hear them, the voices of my friends, the lifeguards, bodybuilders, the weight lifters, booming up from the lake where they were working out in the grass and trees. His program includes a special four-day regimen of specific exercises to develop individual muscle groups-each exercise illustrated with photos of Arnold in action.įor fans and would-be bodybuilders, this is Arnold in his own words.
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It was something I suddenly just seemed to reach out and find, as if I'd been crossing a suspended bridge and finally stepped off onto solid ground.Īrnold shares his fitness and training secrets-demonstrating with a comprehensive step-by-step program and dietary hints how to use bodybuilding for better health. And there it was before me-my life, the answer I'd been seeking. Those guys were huge and brutal….The weight lifters shone with sweat they were powerful looking, Herculean. Here is his classic bestselling autobiography, which explains how the “Austrian Oak” came to the sport of bodybuilding and aspired to be the star he has become. World, Arnold Schwarzenegger is the name in bodybuilding.
