Tickets to the gun show?

This weekend, my wife and I watched Pumping Iron (25th anniversary edition) for the first time in a long time. Man these guys looked great. Sure they had size, but they looked great year round. They weren’t fat most of the year and then super ripped like today’s bodybuilders. I found myself asking “Were these guys the original Primal behemoths?” They actually almost look like primal/paleo in a symetrical, healthy physique way… just supersized (possible probably due to the steroids).

You may immediately discredit this argument but hear me out.

First, food. During the course of the movie and the making of documentary… you get to see Arnold eat 2 meals. The first meal (during the actual movie), he eats what looks like 6 fried eggs and a cup of coffee for breakfast. The second meal (during the making of feature), is at a restaurant where he eats what looks like 2 large hamburger steaks, a couple eggs and a leaf of lettuce. These sound like pretty primal meals to me. I also remember hearing Arnold quoted once as saying “bread is poison”.

Second, Training. Sure these guys were able to train in a volume that would be considered overtraining for most due to the steroids that they were taking but look at the WAY they trained. They would lift super intensely for a while and then they would relax and all hangout and practice posing or chat it up for a while and then they would train super intensely again. I would even argue that it was almost a form of super interval training on a grand scale.

Third, Play. These guys played. They would go right out to Venice beach and frolic and play and swim in the ocean. They would lay in they park and just heckle each other for fun. They would compete with each other in posing and feats of strength all in the nature of good competitive fun.

Pumping Iron is credited with starting the booming fitness industry we have today. So, it seems that these guys had it right… where did the message get skewed? Well you can blame business guys like Joe Weider in my book but thats another post all together. The original guys were just living the life they enjoyed. Originally they weren’t doing it for the money… lets take the TRUE healthy messages that can be learned from Pumping Iron.