HN Books @HNBooksMonth

This is a fantastic book. Buy it if you haven't already. Fantastic book. Really, one of the best books written in any field. Written by Arnold Schwarzenegger. Highly recommended.

http://www.amazon.com/The-New-Encyclopedia-Modern-Bodybuildi...

I'm excited for you. You're embarking on a great journey, you don't even know! Or maybe you do. :)

It wasn't Arnold's one, was it?

"The kind of people who train alongside you in a gym makes a difference. If you are surrounded by people who are serious and train with a lot of intensity, it's easier for you to do the same thing. But it can be pretty hard to really blast your muscles while the people around you are just going through the motions. That is why good bodybuilders tend to congregate in certain gyms. By having the example of other serious bodybuilders constantly in front of you, you will train that much harder.

That is what made Joe Gold's original gym in Venice, California such a great place—a small gym with just enough equipment, but where you would constantly be rubbing shoulders with the great bodybuilders against whom I had the privilege of competing-like Franco Columbu, Ed Corney, Dave Draper, Robby Robinson, Frank Zane, Sergio Oliva, and Ken Waller. Nowadays, it's rare to find that many champions in the same place, but if you aren't sharing the gym floor with great bodybuilders like Flex Wheeler, Shawn Ray, Nasser El Sonbaty, or Dorian Yates, it can be very motivating if there are pictures or posters of these individuals on the walls or championship trophies displayed.

In 1980, training at World Gym for my final Mr. Olympia competition, I showed up at the gym at seven o'clock one morning to work out and stepped out on the sundeck for a moment. Suddenly the sun came through the clouds. It was so beautiful I lost all my motivation to train. I thought maybe I would go to the beach instead. I came up with every excuse in the book-the most persuasive being that I had trained hard the day before with the powerful German bodybuilder Jusup Wilkosz, so I could lay back today—but then I heard weights being clanged together inside the gym and I saw Wilkosz working his abs, Ken Waller doing shoulders, veins standing out all over his upper body, Franco Columbu blasting away, benching more than 400 pounts, Samir Bannout punishing his biceps with heavy Curls.

Everywhere I looked there was some kind of hard, sweaty training going on, and I knew that I couldn't afford not to train if I was going to compete against these champions. Their example sucked me in, and now I was looking forward to working, anticipating the pleasure of pitting my muscles against heavy iron. By the end of that session I had the best pump I could imagine, and an almost wasted morning had turned into one of the best workouts of my life. If I hadn't been there at World Gym, with those other bodybuilders to inspire and motivate me, I doubt that day would have ended up being so productive.

Even today, when I'm training for other reason, such as getting into top shape for a movie role, or just trying to stay in shape, I absorb energy from people working out around me. That's why I still like to go to gyms where bodybuilders are training for competition. Even today, after all this time, it still inspires me."

p. 87 in the 1999 edition of /The New Encyclopedia of Modern Bodybuilding/, by Schwarzenegger and Bill Dobbins. http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0684857219/ Great book, and actually quite pgesque, because to a large extent it's an indirect discussion of how the world works and what it's like to effectively pursue excellence.

⬐ vive-la-liberte

I unintentionally began reading the quote in Arnolds voice, noticed what I was doing and attempted to keep doing it but found it too tiring imitating his voice to be able to finish reading the quote. Serious question, is there an audio book version of this book read by Arnold himself? That'd be neat.

> My opinion is that while it's super nice, socially, to be around people who are into what you are into in person, it doesn't make that much difference when it comes to getting actual work done. Now, sales? raising money? all that bullshit where you have to interact with business people? face-time matters a lot. But for purely technical work, hell, I'll be working in the same house as someone and I'll communicate via IM, because it's less disruptive.

As far as I know, the case for being on the ground with your fellow enthusiasts and competitors in California was best made in 1985, by Arnold Schwarzenegger:

"The kind of people who train alongside you in a gym makes a difference. If you are surrounded by people who are serious and train with a lot of intensity, it's easier for you to do the same thing. But it can be pretty hard to really blast your muscles while the people around you are just going through the motions. That is why good bodybuilders tend to congregate in certain gyms. By having the example of other serious bodybuilders constantly in front of you, you will train that much harder.

That is what made Joe Gold's original gym in Venice, California such a great place—a small gym with just enough equipment, but where you would constantly be rubbing shoulders with the great bodybuilders against whom I had the privilege of competing-like Franco Columbu, Ed Corney, Dave Draper, Robby Robinson, Frank Zane, Sergio Oliva, and Ken Waller. Nowadays, it's rare to find that many champions in the same place, but if you aren't sharing the gym floor with great bodybuilders like Flex Wheeler, Shawn Ray, Nasser El Sonbaty, or Dorian Yates, it can be very motivating if there are pictures or posters of these individuals on the walls or championship trophies displayed.

In 1980, training at World Gym for my final Mr. Olympia competition, I showed up at the gym at seven o'clock one morning to work out and stepped out on the sundeck for a moment. Suddenly the sun came through the clouds. It was so beautiful I lost all my motivation to train. I thought maybe I would go to the beach instead. I came up with every excuse in the book-the most persuasive being that I had trained hard the day before with the powerful German bodybuilder Jusup Wilkosz, so I could lay back today—but then I heard weights being clanged together inside the gym and I saw Wilkosz working his abs, Ken Waller doing shoulders, veins standing out all over his upper body, Franco Columbu blasting away, benching more than 400 pounts, Samir Bannout punishing his biceps with heavy Curls.

Everywhere I looked there was some kind of hard, sweaty training going on, and I knew that I couldn't afford not to train if I was going to compete against these champions. Their example sucked me in, and now I was looking forward to working, anticipating the pleasure of pitting my muscles against heavy iron. By the end of that session I had the best pump I could imagine, and an almost wasted morning had turned into one of the best workouts of my life. If I hadn't been there at World Gym, with those other bodybuilders to inspire and motivate me, I doubt that day would have ended up being so productive.

Even today, when I'm training for other reason, such as getting into top shape for a movie role, or just trying to stay in shape, I absorb energy from people working out around me. That's why I still like to go to gyms where bodybuilders are training for competition. Even today, after all this time, it still inspires me."

/The New Encyclopedia of Modern Bodybuilding/, by Arnold and Bill Dobbins, p. 87 in the 1999 edition. http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0684857219/

⬐ lsc

I... hate how people re-package the anti-intellectual culture around sports. "Give 110%" - It's all about effort.

I mean, for some things? that's great. It's annoying even in sports, if you ask me, but it's effective there, and hey, that's what matters, right?

But for technical work? the "give 110%" attitude is extremely destructive. Extremely destructive. you will get far more done working a 30 hour week than you will a 70 hour week. Far more.

It's not about how many hours you put in. It's not about Tony Robbins style emotional bullshit. We aren't bodybuilders, and while many people here /are/ sales (and like I said, for them, face time matters) technical people aren't sales.

⬐ leoc

... Well. To begin with, the reason Schwarzenegger was up and in the gym at seven in the morning was so that he could train—with massive intensity, yes—for maybe two hours ... and then spend eight to ten hours relaxing and doing nothing strenuous in order to recover in time for his second and final session in the evening. That's what he did six days a week with Sundays off, a routine that makes G.H. Hardy's schedule with its afternoon cricket http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/Biographies/Hardy.html look packed, and comes to probably significantly less than 30 hours of iron-pumping a week. Keeping your schedule clear for months on end to focus on your work while not actually working all that many hours a week? Sounds more similar to technical work than sales to me.