When I was a young skinny teen as opposed to now being an old skinny man,my training partner Ray Harris and I made the transition from training in our cellars and set up headquarters at the Springfield YMCA....there were not many gyms at all back then unless you went to a heath club with leopard spotted naugahide covered benches and chrome nonsense.....the calf machine went up to 100 whopping pounds so it was the "Y" for us.
It was a hardcote gym mostly populated by powerlifters and I later became a powerlifter in the minute weight class of 123 actually weighing 126 pounds......I could do a touch and go bench at 123 with 230 pounds at the time.
I weighed less than the 98 pound weakling in Jr. High and when I left high school I was a whopping 105 after training if you want to call it that, for 2 years......me and Harris followed Arnold and Sergios routines.
Needless to say I gained jackshit but I was very strong for a little guy while on the other side of the coin,Harris was getting huge.....he could have been a Sergio clone and I`m not exaggerating..... but I digress.
Another guy who we saw there was the great Dave Mastorakis who returned my call from last night and is calling me tomorrow as his wife and he had to stock up on wine and food as a major winter storm is heading their way.
Anyway,we were so shy we were scared to approach Dave just being the kids thst we wre.
Dave was fuckinh huge and thick and had to tie a tape weight to the globular dumbells just to enable himself to train heavy enough.
As a tiny powerlifter I always had the best official powerlifting bench in the 132 pound class in every meet I entered. but only weighed 126 pounds......I was too fucking dumb to figure out that if I missed a meal I would weigh 123 of less and even do better.
Our mentor became a guy named John Pezzotte. who had an official 515 bench,650 squat,and 650 deadlift in 1974 or 1975...Carl Snitkin trained there also Google him.....800 pound official squats.....John showed us how to perform the 3 lifts and said he was gonna` start a powerlifting team which we joined and did OK at .....I also entered odd lift contests at the famous Mt. Park Amusement Center put on by the great Ed Jubinville.
Anyway again.....fast forward one day me and Harris were at the mall and saw Dave and both Mentzer brothers.....we followed them at a distance just amazed at their sheer size.
Fast forward to around 2000 -2001....Dave had long been gone to California to become on of the first personal trainers......training such clientele as Jane Fonda and Leonard Nimoy just to name 2 of many.
Well anyway at our gym,and I hadnt ever truly gotten to know Dave but his training partner Ken Knapp knew me and Harris so Dave knew who I was.....Glen Chabot was going to try to bench 650 for a triple that night and the lower floor of the gym was packed.....glen was a pretty good friend of mine but I scanned the crowd and lo and behold I spotted Dave Mass.....well fuck Chabot though I did see his 650 for a triple like a hot knife through butter, but the bulk of the evening was me talking to Dave who miraculously remembered me.....we talked about what he was doing and had done out in Cali ,the Mentzers who were a lifetime friends with Dave and often times training partner,the late Gene Massey who I had the pleasure of seeing
before his tragic plane crash,a Prime Srnold and Franco,Len Archambault,Leon Brown,Don Moddzelewski,Katz, Pete Caputo,Elliot Gilchrist,Skip Robinson,Warren Fredericks,Pat Hayes,Joe Ugolik,The Mentzers,and a host of others.....this was where my famous movie debut was filmed for Pumping Iron.....LOL
.......Mountain Park,Ed Jubinville and Leon Brown and Katz another local heroes and the first time I saw the asshole Louie.
On that night I finally, after decade of knowing but not knowing Dave, forged a lasting friendship to this day....a great guy who got robbed a lot and I`ve seen his old photos as I modeled his shirts and clothing line "Lords Of Disciple" with my then training partner another little freak named Greg Robbins.
If you search the board and type in "Golds Gym how it really was" or something like that....,not that I ever trained there.....another long story you will find a lot of stuff on how hard we trained like freaks and my best friend Ray Harris who was a teen prodigy and lots of funny shit.
Look it up if you are so inclined.....it`s a great read with lots of funny shit about a load of fucking funny animals.
