Written by Dorian Yates
18 February 2019

19dorianyates-inspired

Bodybuilders Who Inspired Dorian Yates

 

 

Early Inspirations and Influences

A lot of guys have told me over the years that I inspired them with what I achieved as a bodybuilder and through the physique I had as Mr. Olympia, or that my Blood and Guts style of abbreviated training influenced the way they approached training and how they thought about the whole process of muscle growth. I’d like to share what inspired and influenced me in my younger years.

 Images from Childhood

 I think all of us saw some type of heroic images in our childhood, long before we had the slightest concept of bodybuilding or weight training that inspired us with an image of power. A lot of guys talk about being inspired by reading comic books, particularly those like Superman, The X-Men, Spiderman, The Incredible Hulk and so on. I never had any comics, but I did see a lot of the old black and white Tarzan movies. The really old ones had five-time Olympic gold medalist in swimming Johnny Weissmuller, but I liked the ones from the ‘50s with a more muscular actor named Gordon Scott. A bit later on I, like a lot of other young guys in the ‘70s, was a huge fan of Bruce Lee and his Kung Fu films. Bruce wasn’t a big guy, but he did weight train and had serious muscularity and separation, as well as a pronounced V-taper with cobra-like lats and a tiny waist. He was also an incredible fighter. I was equally inspired by his mindset of seeking absolute perfection in his chosen endeavor through relentless practice and tremendous discipline. He even made me want to study Kung Fu. The closest thing we had to that in my area was karate, which I did practice for a few years as a teen.

 First Glimpses of Bodybuilders

An older brother of one of my friends had a collection of very old bodybuilding magazines that we would look at every now and then. Some of these went back to Iron Man when it was more of a pamphlet than a magazine, and the guy who stood out most to me with his wide shoulders and V-shape was Steve Reeves. A bit later, I went to some small art house type of movie theater at a university to see “Pumping Iron,” which had already been out a couple of years by that point. Seeing Arnold and the other top champions of that era was my first real exposure to bodybuilding. They didn’t seem real to me, since I had never seen a man who looked like that. I thought it would be cool to have a physique like that myself one day, but I put it in the back of my mind for a few more years. I wasn’t in a position to do it right with the training and the eating yet, and I didn’t want to start anything I wasn’t ready to do to the best of my ability. Still, I remained interested in bodybuilding and would buy Weider’s Muscle Builder and Power every now and then. The guy who stood out the most to me was Robby Robinson. Not only did he have an amazing physique with that great back and his peaked biceps, but also he was something of a rebel and an iconoclast. Robby bucked the trends and would train in ripped-up shirts and wear his hair in an Afro or dreadlocks when everyone else was looking all prim and proper and perfectly groomed.

 Training and Physique Influences

At age 20, I decided I was going to make a real go at bodybuilding, as I finally had my own apartment and a job. But again, everything had to be right first. I spent a solid six months reading every single book and magazine I could get my hands on. Lee Haney was now Mr. Olympia, but he wasn’t the man who inspired me the most at that time. Most people know I was heavily influenced by both the Herculean physique and the writings of Mike Mentzer. His philosophy of Heavy Duty training was in turn a twist on the theories of Nautilus inventor Arthur Jones, whose books I also read with great interest. For many years no one had seriously considered what was required for muscle growth, and the standard workouts were all high in both volume and frequency. Jones challenged the logic of the status quo, emphasizing that training may be the stimulus for gains, but without adequate recovery, gains would be minimal. The key was to train as hard as possible yet very briefly, as further training did nothing more to stimulate growth but would hinder the body’s ability to recuperate, rebuild damaged muscle tissue and grow larger and stronger. I would later refine that concept as Mentzer had for himself. As a competitive bodybuilder, I knew that more than just one exercise per body part was required for maximal development. For instance, Jones would prescribe only an overhead press for the shoulders, whereas I would also include side and rear lateral raises to target all the heads of the deltoids.

There were several other bodybuilders of the early ‘80s that I drew inspiration from. One was “The Golden Eagle,” Tom Platz. My favorite photos were the black and white shots that captured him in actual workouts, rather than being staged for the camera. He trained heavy and with a legendary intensity of effort. I also admired the fact that he stated he wasn’t out to build a pretty body. In a seminar I attended in the U.K, he said something to the effect that when he walked out onstage, he wanted the judges to be so shocked at the display of rugged mass that they would drop their pencils and mutter, “What the fuck!” to themselves. Platz had an inhuman work ethic and was constantly trying to exceed the limits of how far he could push his body.

 Another pro of that era with a powerful physique was Casey Viator, still the youngest man ever to win the Mr. America at age 19 in 1970. He was a protégé of Arthur Jones, who also trained him in the early years. This was a man who was known for being insanely strong and who trained like a beast. Casey also had a reputation for being something of a wild man, which I could relate to from my own youth.

 Speaking of these UK seminars, I probably attended about 20 in all. In that time long before the Internet, this was our only chance as fans to see these guys in real life and ask them questions. All the top bodybuilders in the ‘80s did seminar tours, and I saw Lee Haney, Bertil Fox, Vic Richards and many more when they came to England.

 Men of Raw Power

People are often surprised to learn that I was also quite inspired by Strongmen and powerlifters. I remember as a kid watching Bill Kazmaier on TV in some competition where the athletes were doing deadlifts with these immense boxes full of coins on either side of the bar. Coins were added until eventually no one could get it off the floor— except Kaz. He ripped it off the floor, growling like an animal, and pulled 3 reps before smashing it to the ground with a look of pure aggression and confidence that immediately made me want to be incredibly powerful myself one day.

 As it turned out, there was a gym for powerlifters and Strongmen in Birmingham called The Forum, and I would go there every now and then for a change of scenery from Temple— where I spent many hours in my duties as the owner aside from my own training. Several of the top guys from the World’s Strongest Man competition used to stay in Birmingham for weeks at a time to train at that place, including Kaz, a three-time WSM champion and Iceland’s Jón Páll Sigmarsson aka “The Viking,” who won that event four times. Bill happened to be there once when I was training— I think it was after I won the British Championships in 1988. He was the most massive and powerful guy I’d ever seen, at 6’3” and 350 pounds and not fat by any means. Bill asked someone if I was a powerlifter, because he’d never seen a bodybuilder train as hard and heavy as I did. I took that as a huge compliment, coming from a living legend like Kaz. The guy totally dominated strength competitions to the point where they changed the events specifically so he wouldn’t keep winning. Most of all I admired Bill’s attitude. The guy had total belief that nobody could beat him as long as he was willing to put the work in training and practicing his chosen sport.

 So those were the main people who inspired and influenced me from childhood on to my early years as a competitive bodybuilder. It was a bit surreal later on knowing that now I was the one so many others were looking at in the magazines and providing them with the desire to want to be bigger and stronger, but I am grateful to have had that opportunity.

 For information on DY Nutrition, visit http://www.dorianyatesnutrition.com/. To inquire about Dorian Yates Gym franchises, see http://www.dorianyatesgym.com/.

 

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