http://www.cleveland.com/travel/index.ssf/2013/02/schwarzeneggers_arnold_sports.htmlSchwarzenegger's Arnold Sports Festival is the largest in the world, but how did it end up in Columbus, Ohio?
It's bigger than the Olympics. And it all got started when Arnold Schwarzenegger spoke his famous line, "I'll be back" -- years before he said it in "The Terminator."
"It" is the Arnold Sports Festival, a four-day showcase of athleticism that gets under way later this month in Columbus. And yes, it's the largest multisport event not just in the nation, but also in the world.
During those four days, 18,000 athletes will compete in 46 sporting events of all kinds. That compares with 10,000 athletes who participated in 36 events in the London Olympics last summer. Twelve of those Olympic sports will be among the many taking place at "the Arnold," as folks in Columbus have come to refer to the annual event that brings 175,000 visitors from across the globe to central Ohio.
At its core is one of the world's top bodybuilding events, the Arnold Classic, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. Considered one of the top two bodybuilding competitions, the classic is the professional event that stands at the pinnacle of several amateur physique competitions taking place in men's and women's bodybuilding, as well as all-female contests in fitness, figure and bikini.
But bodybuilders constitute only 400 of the Arnold's 18,000 athletes. Visitors can expect to see other world-class competitions in sports as diverse as archery, boxing, fencing, gymnastics, martial arts, track and field, wrestling -- even cheerleading, table tennis and dance sport.
How did this major event land in Columbus? And how has it stayed there all these years when larger cities all over the world have been clamoring -- and offering substantial sums -- to have the festival moved to their locales? That's where the "I'll be back" part of the story comes in.
Back in 1970, a Columbus man, Jim Lorimer, was organizing the World Weightlifting championships in Columbus. A vice president at Nationwide Insurance, Lorimer also did sports promotions on the side and had served as chairman of the U.S. Olympic Committee for Women's Athletics in the 1960s.
Lorimer wanted to hold a bodybuilding competition in conjunction with the weightlifting championships. He invited several of the world's top bodybuilders but had his eye on a then-unknown Austrian bodybuilder with a long and unusual last name.
The only problem? Schwarzenegger was having some scheduling issues. He had committed to appearing in a bodybuilding contest in London the day before the Columbus event. But Lorimer is a man who knows his way around a problem. "I'll send a plane," he told Schwarzenegger. And so he did. A private jet was sent to whisk Schwarzenegger to Ohio, where he proceeded to take first place over some of the top names in the sport.
A grateful Schwarzenegger has always considered that win in Columbus to be the beginning of his rise to the top, and he was also quite impressed with Lorimer's professionalism and courtesy, not to mention how well organized the event in Columbus had been. Before he left town, he met with Lorimer and said, "When I retire from bodybuilding, I'll be back, and you and I will put together a major bodybuilding competition right here, every year."
Bodybuilding contest came first
At the time, Lorimer admits to thinking something along the lines of "Yeah, right." But true to his word, Schwarzenegger returned to Columbus in 1975, looked up his old friend and told him that if Lorimer organized the competition, Schwarzenegger would see to it that top names in his sport would attend. A handshake sealed the deal.
Starting in 1976, Lorimer and Schwarzenegger ran the Mr. Olympia contest in Columbus five years in a row, followed by the Mr. World and Mr. Universe contests for several years. Then, after Schwarzenegger decided he'd like to see a contest with his own name on it, the Arnold Classic was born and launched in 1989.
And shortly after that, the event started to grow and grow. First came a "Fitness Expo" with several hundred booths manned by athletic purveyors and filled shoulder to shoulder with tens of thousands of fans hoping to spot a star or two -- Schwarzenegger always makes an appearance, and in other years celebrities including Sylvester Stallone have visited. Every hour there's a different type of entertainment at the Expo's main stage, including strongman, powerlifting and arm-wrestling contests.
Then the different athletic competitions started to be added to the roster. Those events now fill most of Columbus' convention center and have even spilled over to venues on the Ohio State University campus, downtown Columbus and the nearby hockey arena.
Lorimer and his team have committed to adding events each year, including ones where the general public can participate. There's a popular "Pump and Run," where participants combine a 5K run with a bench-press competition. Other novel directions the festival has been taking include "Art at the Arnold," a painting and drawing competition showcasing the beauty of the athletic form.
New this year are Scottish Highland Games, with five throwing events that will include a caber toss (that's a long wooden pole). Plus, there will be a Scottish dance competition and performances by bagpipe and drum teams. This event will take place Sunday, March 3, while another new event, the Arnold Survival Race, a family-focused 5K and outdoor obstacle course, will occur Saturday, March 2. The annual "Party With the Pros," held after the Saturday-evening Arnold Classic bodybuilding contest, will take place for the first time this year at Columbus' new casino.
Because of the demand worldwide, Lorimer and Schwarzenegger are "globalizing" the Arnold Sports Festival franchise. A European version of the festival has taken place in Madrid for the past two years, and this year in April, one will open in Brazil. Places as diverse as China, Australia, Russia and Singapore have also expressed interest, but Lorimer and Schwarzenegger have decided to expand their business model slowly. And they are committed to staying in Columbus.
Strong friendship is basis of festival
That's because at the core of this festival is the partnership -- and the strong friendship -- of Lorimer and Schwarzenegger. Lorimer attended Schwarzenegger's wedding to Maria Shriver in 1986 (the couple are now separated). The two have also paid calls on each other at their respective homes.
Though most of the organizational work takes place in Columbus with a small staff of six and an army of nearly a thousand volunteers, Schwarzenegger keeps in touch frequently and is party to all key decisions. Even during his busy years as California's governor, Schwarzenegger steadfastly came to Columbus for the festival.
At an appearance last spring at the Columbus Metropolitan Club, a forum featuring speakers on subjects of importance to the community, Lorimer and Schwarzenegger spoke of their high regard for one another. "Ever since I met him in 1970, he's been setting new goals -- and then he works to achieve them," said Lorimer, of Schwarzenegger. Lorimer also knows him to be a jokester but also a loyal and dedicated friend who identifies people he admires and keeps them by his side for decades.
Of Lorimer, Schwarzenegger said, "It does give me joy to work with Jim because he and I are both people who love it when people say something isn't possible -- because that makes us dig in to show them it IS possible. I feel very enriched having someone like Jim in my life. I just wish every man had a friend like this at his side."
And even though the two are no longer young men -- Schwarzenegger is a youthful 65 and Lorimer is a vibrant 86, they both are in constant motion, routinely outworking those of much younger years.
Lorimer will begin work for next year's festival the very day after this year's is over -- and will put in many hours each day attending to its every detail. And Schwarzenegger is working to revive his film career, with one new film already out and two more in the can. He also is attending to another passion, opening the Schwarzenegger Institute for State and Global Policy at the University of Southern California last year.
Perhaps the life philosophy of the two is best summed up from a quote they jointly chose to appear on a permanent statue of Schwarzenegger that was unveiled at last year's sports festival and stands in front of Veterans Memorial, the venue where the Arnold Classic takes place.
It reads, "Life's joy is in the doing." After all, getting things done is what these two men of action do best.
