Sergio Sr. has better structure than his son. Same thing with Jon Loyd and his son Bostin--the genetics got a little diluted when they were passed down to the next generation.
Agreed. Product of being 50% their mother.
What were their respective contest weights?
Junior would beat senior under current standards simply due to conditioning. Senior may look bigger in pics but in a direct comparison I think it would be the other way around. Remember the pool stick pic of senior? He was a tiny tit... when I first saw it as a kid I thought he was monstrous.
Haha, great post. I was going to quote illuminati's post, but yours is more detailed. Exactly correct - Sergio Jr. would win in a 2017, due to superiority of conditioning, no question about it. I don't think people quite realize how off bodybuilders 40 years ago were compared to those of today. If Arnold from the 1975 Mr. Universe showed up today, he would place last at the Mr. Olympia, unless someone came in considerably off, or unless they gave an invite to another Master's competitor or something like that. Sure, some of his individual body parts would be the best - although honestly, the only part I muscle group I could think of for Arnold would be chest - but he would still place last.
I think Arnold at his best would likely be able to turn pro today - as I do believe he could beat, say, Chris Bumstead he turned pro by winning the North Americans, but Arnold would not place well at the Mr. Olympia today.
Likewise for Sergio Sr. - the question asked wasn't which one had better potential, it was who would win, both in their prime? The answer to THAT question is Sergio Jr., obviously - the disparity in conditioning would be the nail in the coffin for Sergio Sr.
That being said, I heard somewhere - possibly even from Sergio Jr. in an interview - that Sergio Sr. would often eat pizza and donuts leading up to a contest. Meaning that he didn't know how to properly diet, and if he did have solely access to a modern bodybuilding contest diet - not even the drugs, just the diet plan - he would likely be able to match or surpass the conditioning of Sergio Jr. and beat him. The fact that Sergio Sr. got into the conditioning he did while still eating junk leading right up to the contest speaks volumes for his genetics, and no doubt, cutting some of those items out [assuming it wouldn't mentally stop him from competing due to feelings of scarcity] would likely vault him ahead in the placings, and under such a modern diet protocol, I do think he could match his son on conditioning, and beat him in a 2017 contest.
Let's be clear about one thing - modern drugs help the most for gaining size. Bodybuilders started growing bigger than ever when Dorian started taking home his Sandows. Prior to that, the top conditioning we have ever seen had already been achieved - Rich Gaspari being an example of that. So modern drugs have produced far bigger bodybuilders, but not necessarily far more conditioned bodybuilders. Put another way, the advantage of modern drugs is more in terms of size than in terms of conditioning. Bodybuilders have been ripped for a long time. Yes, things have been brought to a new level with modern drugs, but not as drastically as the increases in size, IMO.
So I do think Sergio Sr., with a cleaner diet, could have had the conditioning necessary to beat Sergio Jr. today. But in their respective *actual* iterations, I would have to give it to Sergio Jr., based on conditioning. Also, Sergio Sr. was 5'9 or 5'10, whereas Sergio Jr. is 6'0 with bigger legs. Put them next to one another and, yes, Sergio Jr. would be bigger than his father. Sergio Sr. could still win as the smaller bodybuilder assuming equal or better conditioning - think Phil Heath vs. Big Ramy, where Phil wins, largely on the strength of his conditioning - but since Sergio Sr. never achieved that conditioning, we have to compare the two based on what Sergio Sr. actually brought to the table - and on the strength of that physique, Junior beats Senior - not to say that Senior wasn't amazing, because he definitely was.
The question asked wasn't "Which Sergio has the better structure?", in which case, I think the answer is obvious - Sergio Sr. Also the same answer as the question "Who has the better potential in bodybuilding?" But we need to compare the two Sergios for what they actually are/were, not what we think they/Sergio Sr. could have been.
