My five-month prison sentence is over— the light at the end of the proverbial tunnel— and the incredible fact is, I didn’t miss a thing. However, the insights I gained and lessons I learned far outweigh all the years of formal schooling I’ve been through in my life. I’ve competed for the last 15 years. I’ve met innumerable interesting people along the way and I’ve traveled the world as an ambassador for our sport. And best of all, I’ve survived to tell you about it. All the recent deaths in our industry— Anthony Clark, Paul DeMayo, Don Youngblood and Charles Durr— saddened me because in all likelihood, they were innocent victims of the ego-induced abuses of our lifestyle.I’m lucky; I made it out…and with a greater perspective on what’s real and what’s not. Bad times will do that to you. It weeds out the weak from the strong; the real from the fake, the fearful from the loving and what’s left is simply…the truth.The day before I was going to be released from prison an inmate named “Ra Ra” approached me and asked, “Jumbo, what are the three most important bodybuilding tips you can think of?” To be honest, I was caught a little off guard, but then I thought for a second and came up with the following:1. Be consistent2. Don’t allow the words of others to negatively influence you.3. Set goals for yourself. Dave, how did you preserve your muscle while in prison?First of all, I’d be lying if I claimed to weigh the same coming out as I did going in. The truth be told, I weighed 265 pounds when I entered Morgantown Federal Prison on February 4, 2005. In the first few weeks, the shock of a marginal weight-training facility (“The Pit”), the unavailability of enough protein and having to walk all over the large, hilly, compound resulted in my weight dropping rather quickly to 250 pounds. In fact, at one point it dipped under the 250-pound mark. After four weeks, I learned to budget the $290 per month spending limit imposed on us— using virtually every penny on bags of chunk light tuna (cat food grade), mackerel and blanched peanuts. I also figured out the most effective ways to utilize the limited free weights available. Put it this way, improvisation became the rule rather than the exception. I did dumbbell flyes while lying on cruddy benches, concrete ledges and even straddled across a hyperextension machine. I’ve squatted on uneven floors, using bent bars, with 45-pound plates weighing anywhere from 43 to 55 pounds and I’ve done most of the exercises one arm at a time because there was only one of every dumbbell. Eventually, due to careful plotting, eating eight small meals a day, consuming whatever vitamins were available (multivitamin, vitamin C, vitamin E and fiber pills) and getting lots of rest, I was able to bring my bodyweight back up to 255 pounds— a small miracle in and of itself. The bottom line was discipline, planning and my refusal to give up— qualities ingrained over the last 15 years of living a bodybuilding lifestyle. In prison, ingenuity ruled the day. I never knew food could taste so good using marginal ingredients and a microwave oven. As a tribute to all the master microwave chefs in prisons around the country, I’m including my all-time favorite prison recipe. Anyone who thinks they can outdo this one, send your recipes to me at the address below (include name and address please): Mackerel CakesMix the following ingredients: 8 packs of mackerel (3-1/2 ounces per pack) 4 whole onions 3 garlic cloves (cut up) 10 whole eggs 2 packs of crabmeat 2 teaspoon of Mrs. Dash 4-1/2 teaspoon Goya seasoning Place 2 tablespoons of the mix onto a plastic sheet separating each “cake” by an inch on each side. Microwave for approximately 5-7 minutes. All I constantly hear from bodybuilding experts is to eat more protein. What exactly happens when I don’t consume enough?To the bodybuilder and athlete alike, dietary protein is a precious commodity. When broken down into its fundamental building blocks— Amino Acids— protein can be utilized for the synthesis of peptide hormones (like GH, insulin, thyroid hormone and IGF-1), digestive enzymes, hair and nail protein (keratin) and most importantly, new muscle tissue. The problem with ingested protein is there’s no desirable storage facility in the body for use when Amino Acids are scarce. On the other hand, fatty acids are stored in adipose (fat) cells and carbohydrates are stored as glycogen (starch) in muscle and liver cells. However, when the body requires Amino Acids, the only available resource is muscle tissue.
Therefore, as amino acid levels drop in the bloodstream (which occurs every three to three and a half hours after your last protein meal), the body cannibalizes precious, hard-earned, muscle tissue to harvest the necessary Amino Acids. When this occurs, the body is in a “catabolic state” (state of breakdown). For the bodybuilder wanting to optimize muscle gains, this becomes a very undesirable scenario. To ensure muscle gains progress only in a positive direction, I suggest consuming six to eight small meals (30 grams to 50 grams of protein per feeding) per day. This practice not only secures an anabolic (or positive nitrogen) state, it also provides the body with essential raw materials needed to build additional lean muscle tissue— the obvious goal of most weight trainers, young or old. From the prospective of a bodybuilder, what was it like going to prison for five months?Working out in Morgantown was a new experience for me because in all my years, I’ve never had to deal with training in zero degree snowstorms, torrential rains, or 99 degree heat waves. To say the weather in Morgantown was temperamental would be kind; schizophrenic is more accurate!When I arrived, I assumed weight-training jargon was universal; however, I soon learned prison has a language all its own. Triceps are known as back arms while biceps are known as biceps. Training partners in your workout group are called “passengers in your car” while “Champagnes,” “Pee-Wee Hermans” and “Lawn Mowers” are all names of actual weight-training exercises I learned to cringe at the sight of.And if I thought the language of lifting was foreign, the exercise form I saw was downright dangerous. I watched guys crumble under 405 of the squat, nearly blow out vertebrae trying to round-back deadlift 495; perhaps the most horrifying act of all was watching 150-pound novices bounce 405 off their chest in the bench press.
For every near disaster, though, there were guys who impressed the heck out of me. I watched a guy named Ced the Gorilla do Good Mornings with 405 for eight reps; Bear, the self-proclaimed “strongest guy on the compound,” bench-pressed 405, squatted 500 and deadlifted over 500. Two other die hards, Big George and Akk, trained their chests six times per week (twice a day on Monday, Thursday and Saturday), yet still routinely benched over 500 pounds. And for every super strong guy in Morgantown, there were an equal number of muscular, ripped, guys like Ramos, Ford, Price and Sherman— guys with incredible genetics and potential to be successful competitive bodybuilders when their release days eventually arrive.
Aside from the thrills of victory and the agonies of defeat, there were innumerable characters that proved to be incredibly entertaining. One good friend, Mike Krupp, never failed to amuse with his incessant desire to get big, ripped and tan (despite always looking red) so when he’s released, he can hook up with all the babes. Attention all available women! Mike gets out in November!
What was the first anabolic steroid cycle you ever did? What kind of results did you get?
Your best muscular gains are always made during your first cycle of anabolic steroids— that’s a fact. In the natural lifter, steroidal receptor sites are extremely sensitive. This sensitivity can be explained by the fact that physiological testosterone secretion is so low (only about five milligrams per day) that receptors need to be unusually sensitive to be able to detect their presence. However, as my friend Doug Wentz used to say, “Once you cross over to the dark side, new gains are never quite as easy.”Personally, my first anabolic cycle was a 10-week stint of 200 milligrams Primobolin depot (100 milligrams Monday and Friday) and 150 milligrams Winstrol depot (50 milligrams Monday, Wednesday and Friday) per week. During that cycle (which pales by today’s standards), I went from a respectable 210 pounds to a solid, ripped, 230 pounds. The greatest part was that, because I didn’t suppress my body’s natural testosterone production with highly aromatizing drugs like testosterone or Anadrol, I kept all the gains when I came off the drugs. However, never again throughout my entire career, even when using GH, IGF-1, and testosterone, did I ever gain a solid 20 pounds of muscle in 10 weeks. Honorable Mentions“I ain’t cheating like all these other guys. I don’t eat no protein and I still got hard, ripped, muscle. That’s from working out three times a day; seven days a week.”— This quote came directly from the mouth of Keith “Ri-Dick-alous” Wilson. At the utterance of this statement, Keith and I got into a heated discussion about eating, training, and supplements; then the following day became friends. As we say in prison, Keith’s “i-ight!”
I also need to mention my die-hard training partners, Scott Tucker and Cheyne Kilbourne (with honorable mention to Andy Rohira, Mike Shype and Sam Petrony) without whom the past five months would have been boring, uninspiring and uneventful. In addition to our Mentzer-style weight workouts, Scott, Cheyne and I brainstormed and methodically crafted an original movie script (entitled, “Around Infinity”), centered on life in a minimum-security federal prison. Attention all Hollywood producers reading this, give me a call!
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