back to talk about Arnold. He had the perfect body in the early 70s. Everything was balanced. Huge but balanced. When he won on 1980 i was shocked at how he looked. He didn't look like i thought he should of to win. But then i realized i was expecting him to look like he used to. I was comparing the 1980 arnold to the previous version. That's why people are having issues with him winning. Comparing him to the old arnold. His thighs from the front was down for sure but in every other pose they were good. So then i started comparing him to the others. And yep he wins when he is compared to them in a line up. People like zane and mentzer etc look good all by themselves. BUT when next to arnold they vanish. He was just to much for them. In fact standing sideways those 2 didnt even look like they worked out!! &guy walker in my opinion got robbed. He should of been higher. Rugged and huge. Padilla of course was awesome and should of been higher. Dickerson should of been farther down the list.
I remember joe weider said something along the lines of "you all should be glad Arnold won because if he had lost he wouldof came back with a vengeance and won for 10 more years" (or something like that). And i believe he would of. Arnolds best body part was and is his mind. He had awesome mind power. He was determined to become a success. Now we were talking about genetics and being able to tell etc. Looking at Arnold as a youngster he looked like he would never have genetics for anything. But once he started training he grew. Plus he used his mind to develop the ultimate body. No one came close really and certainly these pos guys nowdays. I believe it was casey viator who once said "Arnolds pre contest training would kill most humans". The man left nothing to chance. And for training advice if you ask Arnold what exercises he did he will reply "all of them".
Arnold was so great because he developed genuine passion for the sport at a very young age. We speak of the man with such reverence because most of us (i think) have similar stories. What I mean is starting out young and skinny and falling love with being sore and getting bigger and stronger.
He was also so great because early on he built his foundation and then bodybuilded what he had created into a masterpiece. As you poimted out he was super thick from the side which set him apart from the other guys. It was his years of heavy deadlifting pressing rowing squating etc that got him there.
That he did every exercise conceivable was probably not the huge advantage you think it ought to have been. Speaking from personal experience my body made almost unbelievable progress when I started keeping a log like Dorian talked about. Every workout I could check to see what i did the week before and simply add more weight reps or both.
This would not be practical if every week you are doing totally different movements. Training in such fashion you're never really able to give a set 110% because its hit or miss with the amount of weight you're putting on the bar. Sometimes you nail it most of the time you cant get a real set in because you guess too high or low and the only way to compensate is by adding more sets. This is very inneficient and outdated.
Anyway somebody should get a thread going on Padilla at the 80 Mr O. His arms were out of this world! I dont know much about him
