Can't say its recent, but maybe some of it is amusing...
TM: When and where were you born?
Ken Jones: I was born in Coney Island [Brooklyn, New York].
TM: Big family?
KJ: Yeah. Eight kids. I was the youngest of the boys.
TM: What was it like growing up with seven brothers and sisters in New York?
KJ: I was always the one that got the last of the hand downs.
TM: What did your parents do for a living?
KJ: My father was a mechanic all his life. He was a Sergeant in the Army and he worked in the military as a mechanic. My mom was a housewife. Raising eight kids wasn’t easy.
TM: I bet. Were your parents just good Catholics having eight kids or what?
KJ: Yeah, they were Catholic. Years ago parents had a lot of kids. My mother was raised in the depression. She struggled to raise us by herself because my dad was always working.
TM: What kind of student were you in school?
KJ: I wouldn’t say I was an angel because I’d be lying. I’m a Christian so I don’t believe in lying. I was a bad kid; I was a rough, tough kid. Not that I wanted to be, but the neighborhood I grew up in you were raised to be. My brothers raised me to fend for myself. I was a good student though. I listened to the teachers. A lot of the teachers liked me. Years ago a teacher could take you out to school after a movie and she wasn’t going to get locked up for it. I had two teachers that were very good to me. Miss Bloomfield and Miss Triano. They used to take me after school to the Aquarium and the movies. That was my treat for helping them in the classroom.
TM: How’d you help them out in the classroom? Clap erasers for them and stuff?
KJ: I used to help them with the other kids, keep the trouble makers in line.
TM: How old were you when you started lifting weights?
KJ: I think I was probably around 16. I honestly have to say I admired – not that I idolized anyone because I don’t idolize anyone but Jesus- but I admired Steve Reeves- Hercules. I always wanted to be built. That’s how I grew into bodybuilding. Viewing bodies that looked sculpted. These were true physiques. Pleasant to look at. Bodies like that, people want to look like that; they admire what you have accomplished. They admire that you’ve put a lot of work into it. Not that you look like a freak where it’s not pleasant for people to look at.
TM: There are a lot of freaks in bodybuilding today and you’ve been competing for a long time. Where do you see bodybuilding going?
KJ: I think that’s a really good question. I was just talking to a really good friend of mine, Toni Norman [IFBB pro] about this. She took third in the Night of the Champions [2004]. Beautiful physique. Very feminine looking. I feel if they keep on with the way they’re going, looking for someone who is big and how much weight they’ve got – if they look at guys and don’t look at them as being symmetrical complete physiques… When we’re on that stage, the public is looking at you and it’s up to you to present yourself as something that appeals to that public. But when you walk out on stage with guys who have extended stomachs, or guys with big legs and no calves, big arms and no chest – that’s not pleasing to the eye. It takes away from the beauty and the sculpture that the human form is capable of. Even Michelangelo when he sculpted a statue, he chiseled it as beauty, symmetry, as the ideal human physique. He didn’t just sculpture something that wasn’t possible, that wasn’t pleasant or appealing to the eye. His work was admired because it was pleasant to look at.
TM: There was a time his work was considered the ideal physique.
KJ: When I got into bodybuilding, I seen it go from the judges looking for a guy with a beautiful symmetrical physique to their looking for a guy and how much he weighs, or how big he is. A guy my height, yeah, I can walk on the stage at 205 [pounds], but can I walk onto that stage at 240 or 250 healthy? Would I look normal at that weight? Would people look at me and say, “Wow, I want to be like that guy and look like him”? I’d rather walk onstage at 195 and have people like what they see and want to look like I do.
I had a compliment from a gentleman in the World’s Gym in Delray [Beach] the other day. He comes up to me, he says, “I been watching you from the first time I seen you in here.” He asked me if I was getting ready for a show. I told him not really. He goes, “You have a really nice symmetrical body. It’s pleasant to look at.” He says, “You can go to any gym in Florida. There are big guys but they don’t have the types of bodies I’d want to have. You have the type of body I’d want to have. It’s appealing. It’s pleasant. You got healthy skin. You look young for your age.” I thanked him. That’s what I think bodybuilding should be. But it’s going in a totally different direction.
TM: Well, what kind of message do you think the judges are sending when they reward the huge bodies?
KJ: I think they’re sending a bad message. If you’re going to make rules where you tell people there are going to be points taken off for extended stomachs, for guys shooting snythol into their shoulders and arms—which most of the guys are doing—and then points are not taken off? Guys are placing high and winning and they obviously are using synthol and have stomachs sticking out further than their chests? These guys are doing anything they can do to get an edge. You can see lumps and growths under their skin. Cysts. I don’t have to mention names but you know there are several guys who were in the hospital and had to get it cut out of them.
TM: With female bodybuilding they’re cracking down. The judges are telling the women they have to come in 20% smaller.
KJ: That’s the way it should be.
TM: But they’re not doing that for the men.
KJ: No, no. But they should be. Look at female bodybuilding. There used to be women like Rachel McLish, Carla Dunlap, Corey Everson. They looked feminine, they had a pretty face. Women saw them and wanted to get on a stage; they wanted to get into bodybuilding. Now, when you reward women who are very muscular—they shouldn’t do that. If you say you are going to reward a certain look, you should stick to that.
The same thing goes for the men. They say you’re going to be judged on your posing. I don’t think I’ve ever been judged on my posing yet. And I’m one of the best posers out there. I was never rewarded for my posing at all, or for how I looked – condition wise, symmetry. The first round is supposed to be the symmetry round. If your first round is the symmetry round and you’re calling out guys with extended stomachs, you’re contradicting what you’re preaching.
I was in the GNC show [2004]. Some of the people there told me they didn’t understand why I wasn’t called out in the top 5 or the top 10. I was told by some of the magazine people as well that I was in the best shape they’d ever seen me. I thanked them, but what can I do? I can’t change the judges’ minds. I’m not going to go back and cry to them. I just look at it as everything they’re saying is a bunch of – excuse my language—but its bullshit.
TM: Well, you’re not going to go and do what Mohammed Benaziza did and pack on 40 pounds, right?
KJ: For me to put on that kind of weight, I’m asking for trouble. I mean, yeah, I’ll put on some more weight, my way, how I want to do it when I want to do it. I think I have a beautiful package now. If I put on 5 or 10 pounds by the next time I compete, I’m happy with that. But to go and put on thirty pounds like a lot of guys do and then find themselves in the hospital or on their death beds? I wouldn’t do that.
Remember: my whole philosophy on the sport and my place in it is that I’m there to entertain year after year. I’m there so families can come back and enjoy show after show. What good is it for me to walk onstage at 250 if I can’t breathe, if I can’t pose any more, if I can’t dance?
TM: You’re a religious guy too, so you probably look at your body as your temple and you don’t want to abuse it either, right?
KJ: Well, of course. I don’t want to abuse my body. The Lord gave it to me. For me to take advantage of what God gave me, what am I going to accomplish?
TM: You started lifting when you were 16. How about competing?
KJ: I started competing in 1977 or 1978. My first show was an East Coast show. It was put on by the East Coast Gym on the Bay Parkway. That was my first show up in the gym there. I took second or third. The first show I actually won was in Bayonne, New Jersey. I’ll never forget that. I won first place in my class and the overall. But I gave the overall to another athlete.
TM: You gave away your overall trophy?
KJ: I gave the overall to a guy who was blind. I thought he had a phenomenal physique. I thought he had one of the finest physiques on a person who was blind. Think about it. He couldn’t see. He had no way of looking in the mirror and seeing himself. Yet he had a tremendous physique. I gave him the overall trophy because I said, “I worked hard all my life at anything I ever did. But he had to work twice as hard.” I admired that. I thought that was the greatest gift: that God gave it [the overall victory] to me and I gave it to him. Because that could have been me. That could have been me. The guy couldn’t even see the award I was giving him. But he heard and he understood. I told him, “This trophy belongs to you, not because I feel sorry for you, but because God is with you and I feel you worked just as hard as me.”
TM: What did your family think when you started competing in bodybuilding shows?
KJ: To be honest with you, my family came to a couple of shows, but then they didn’t care anymore. It was just bodybuilding. The attitude after awhile was like, ‘Oh, he’s doing another show.’ I didn’t have my family behind me like a lot of young guys coming up do. I had to do it on own, struggle with it on my own. But it was like that for me as a kid with everything. I was the youngest out of the boys. I always had to wait for the hand downs. I always had to wait to be the last one to receive something. I learned to just go out there and achieve things on my own.
TM: In 1986 you were competing as a lightweight and then in 1987 you were competing as a bantam. Why the class drop?
KJ: This has always been my philosophy. I said to myself, if I do what most bodybuilders do at a young age, which is burn themselves out, whether it is with drugs or whether it’s just the training and concentrating alone…well then, where am I going to be like right now? I thought: if I burn out, where am I going to be? What I mean by that is, how many guys turn pro, step foot on a pro stage and there’s no room for improvement?
I can name a lot of guys who turned pro but after that they didn’t move up. They didn’t accomplish nothing. There’s several guys on the stage today who always look the same. Their bodies never change. I felt you need that room for improvement, so I dropped down to a bantamweight to save myself. I had longevity in mind. I knew then that ten years later I’d still be able to step on a stage, where so many other guys come and go.
TM: As an amateur bodybuilder, which other bodybuilders were you close to?
KJ: I was good friends with Jose Guzman. We trained together a lot in New York. I trained at Fifth Avenue Gym. There were a lot of guys there. There was this guy Tyrone. He had a beautiful symmetrical body. He could have been a great pro if he had stuck with it. I trained in the same gym Orville Burke did. Dennis Reuben, Robert Augustin. I trained with those guys. I went over to Diamonds Gym in Jersey. They always welcome me over there. There’s a lot of nice guys over there.
TM: What are some of your favorite gyms in the New York area that you’ve trained in over the years?
KJ: My favorite gym in New York is Dolphin Gym. My friend Andy Corenno owns them. He owns the franchise. Fifth Avenue Gym is an excellent gym. Diamond’s Gym in Jersey is an excellent gym.
TM: Yeah, John Kemper’s gym.
KJ: John Kemper is a very good man. I’ve known him for many years. I think John is a very good judge. Even though he sees things his way, you’ve got a whole panel of judges who are told to do things their way. That’s refreshing because I hear from different people that you can’t judge things the way you see it at other shows under other head judges. You’ve got to judge things the way they want you to judge it.
TM: Whoa! What do you mean?
KJ: Let’s just say I’ve heard stories where the judging panel is told, ‘Well this is going to be this way and this is going to be that way,’ but it never turns out that way. In other words, they say they’re going to take points off for the things I told you about before, but it never works out that way. It’s always judged by the person who has the last say so. He’s the guy who says, “Even though you think it’s gotta be this way, it’s going to be like this.” You know what I mean?
TM: Like the supposed synthol ban which doesn’t seem to be being enforced?
KJ: The majority of guys I’m on stage with, all of them appear to be injecting synthol in their biceps, their quads, their calves—
TM: Side delts is another favorite area.
KJ: And that’s not me. It’s not going to stay there. I mean, what do these guys say to themselves? ‘I’m going to have to keep injecting this into my arm for the rest of my life just to have a big arm’? I have phenomenal arms without it. It’s a shame that they all do that. The more I keep looking at the guys I compete with, I’m saying to myself, “How did that guys’ triceps get so much bigger than when I last saw him?” I was at the Nationals and I saw guys who were onstage with me at the GNC Show of Strength and now their triceps look like they got two inches bigger. I mean, come on! And these are guys who aren’t even in the top 5. They’re trying to get an edge over a guy like me?
TM: You turned pro at the 1996 Nationals?
KJ: Yeah. I should have won my class at the ’95 Nationals. That was when Denise Masino won. I was the one who used to train her when she first got into it. I should have won it in ’94 too. But both years they gave it to other guys. So I just came back better and better. When I won it in ’96 I said to myself, ‘I’m going to come in so much more improved that it isn’t even going to be close.’ On the score sheets I won with straights 1’s across the boards. The closest score to me was 15 which isn’t even close. But you say to yourself, I should have won years ago. I worked hard for what I got.
TM: A lot of the guys –especially in the lower weight classes- get their pro cards and disappear. When you turned pro, how did you expect to do as a bodybuilder?
KJ: To be honest with you, I think realistically. I said to myself, as long as they’re looking for guys who walk onstage at 280 pounds, no, I’ll never be Mr. Olympia. Not that I shouldn’t be. If you’re looking for a perfect physique, I mean think about it- when Frank Zane won the Olympia, what did he weigh? He weighed like 178. Yet, he didn’t look as big as some of the guys until he started posing, because he had such nice lines and separation. That’s what bodybuilding should be about.
How many of those guys on that stage, when you really look at them, how many of them have nice lines? How many of them have veins in their stomach area? Some of them are lucky that they can flex their abs because they’re so bloated. When I say to myself, ‘Who do I want to look like?’, I say I want to look like Frank Zane or Steve Reeves, a pretty body to look at. Even back then there weren’t too many physiques I cared for. I liked Mohammed Makaway. I thought he had a really pleasant, sharp looking physique.
I thought Arnold had a nice streamlined physique. He could have used better legs. Ferrigno was a big guy, but I never thought he had any nice lines. There was nothing there, nothing happening. He couldn’t pose, he couldn’t present to the audience. Whereas Arnold had a good sense of humor, a great stage presence, he knew how to present to the audience.
TM: As you do too. Have you always been as entertaining on stage?
KJ: Oh yes! Even at the Nationals level. When I turned pro, a lot of judges said they were going to miss my posing routines. I thanked them. A lot of judges that judge National shows don’t judge the pro shows. I just try to make the people happy, man. I try to keep the sport alive.
TM: How much time do you put into prepping for the night show free posing round?
KJ: I’ve been a dancer all my life. It’ something that comes from within me. I don’t have to rehearse. I’ve never rehearsed a routine in my life. Never did, never will, because I’m a true dancer, a true performer. I’ve been dancing since I’m five years old. What draws me to the music is the music itself. In order for me to really pose to something, I have to feel it. When I feel the music and I know the audience is there expecting a good performance, that’s all I need. I choreograph everything myself. A good dancer can choreograph everything in his head.
TM: How much of your routine at the 2004 Night of Champions was planned?
KJ: That was a total mess. Wayne DeMelia wanted to do things his way and not my way. I’d done a show [guest posed] in Florida right before the Night of Champions. Wayne was there and the audience went nuts. But then at the NOC, Wayne tried to take over and do things his way. He involved Bob Fuchs, he involved Denise and Dayna. And he involved the little kid to try and make it reflect on events going on with Michael Jackson in real life. That wasn’t right. I like Michael Jackson. I’m behind him 100%. I know what it must be like and I can feel where he’s coming from, growing up as a kid and never being able to play with other kids, you want to be a kid for the rest of your life.
TM: So you don’t think Michael Jackson is doing anything wrong with these kids, right?
KJ: Nah! The fact that Wayne DeMelia tried to make a mockery of the whole situation using me… Let’s put it this way, he ruined his whole show himself.
TM: Well, I think that was his last show with the IFBB.
KJ: Right. If he had let me do things the way I did things in Orlando, he would have went out with a bang. People would have never forgot it. Instead, he had to try and change things around. I was going to walk off the stage and that was it, because he ruined a good thing.
TM: Does bodybuilding pay your bills?
KJ: It never did. It should, but it never did. I’ve always worked. As a young kid after school I worked in supermarkets and I shined shoes. I used to rewind generators on ships in high school. I did construction work. I’ve always worked hard. At the same time, I was preparing for shows, dieting. I remember eating cold food out of Tupperware in houses that were half finished. There was no place to warm up the food but I was determined to do well. Right now I do landscaping and carpet cleaning. I also design shoes. I’m looking for another manufacturer to make my shoes again.
TM: What kind of shoes?
KJ: Women’s and men’s dress shoes. High heels.
TM: How long have you been involved in that?
KJ: I went to school for that. I found someone who would manufacture my shoes for me but the person was trying to steal my designs, so I’m back to scratch. I've always worked. One thing supported the next. For example, my landscaping and carpet cleaning support my shoe business as I try and get that off the ground.
TM: You’re in Florida now. How’s that working out for your bodybuilding?
KJ: I owned a building in Queens, New York, where I had my own vitamin store. I sold the building and moved to Pennsylvania because I wanted to be closer to my mother. That didn’t work out because I just got tired of the cold weather. One day I just packed it up and I said I’m going to move someplace warm. I moved to Florida and started my business from scratch.
TM: What’s it like training in Florida?
KJ: I like it down here. Do you remember John DeFendis?
TM: Of course!
KJ: I train in one of the World Gyms that he runs.
TM: How’s he doing?
KJ: He wants to compete again. Just for himself, just for his wife—she’s never seen him onstage.
TM: A few years ago there was some kind of drama going on with you and Mike Matarazzo. What was that all about?
KJ: Mike Matarazzo was on the stage with me, Don Long, Ronnie Coleman. Mike was standing next to me. I’ll keep this brief because I don’t really want to stir up the pot again. He used foul language with me. He was upset that he wasn’t getting called out, so he said something like, “Get the f--- out of my face before I punch your lights out.” Let’s just put it this way: he barked up the wrong tree.
TM: You weren’t going to sit still for that.
KJ: Even people from his hometown, when they read the article, they thought he was out of line. At the Nationals after that, people from Boston came up to me and were telling me they were behind me, that Mike was out of line. Then he comes back and tries to apologize to me. I accepted his apology but said “Just stay away from me.” I didn’t want nothing to do with him. He showed me that he was just a typical gym bodybuilder, depressed because he wasn’t doing good in a show. It’s not anybody’s fault that the judges judge you the way they see you. I’m not happy that the judges judge me the way they do, but I don’t curse other people or disrespect other bodybuilders.
TM: What’s up with the hair? You always show up with wild hair styles.
KJ: Yeah, I’ve had the braids, the feathers. I straightened my hair one time. I just wanted to add some pizzazz to the stage show, that’s all. Now my hair is growing curly and long.
TM: Are those your Pomeranians that keep barking in the background?
KJ: Yeah, I have three of them. Foxy is going to be 10 and a half. Sassy and Silver are about 9 and a half. They’re my pride and joy. Flex magazine put them in the magazine with me one time.
TM: How much longer do you see yourself competing and what do you want your legacy to be in bodybuilding?
KJ: I can’t pin down any length of time when I might stop competing. I’m 44 years old. As far as I’m concerned, I’ll be able to walk on the stage when I’m 50 or 60 years old. It’s all according to how I take care of myself, how I eat.
My legacy is this: I’m trying to promote the healthy side of the sport. Where people want to be a bodybuilder, where people want to go to the gym and lift weights, where people want to be an athlete, whether it’s a swimmer or a bodybuilder. I promote bodybuilding as a lifestyle and a sport for anyone. Working out to stay healthy and improve your lifestyle. So when you are older, you are able to go skiing and swiTMng and do what you want to do with your wife and kids. Living a clean lifestyle is what I want to model.
TM: That’s admirable.
KJ: I try. People don’t understand that life is short. No one on that stage has the authority to think they’re better than anyone else. We’re all equal. For anyone to think they’re better than someone, they’re wrong. I just want people to know that bodybuilding is not going to go anywhere so long as they’re looking at freaks.
