The 'new breed' of professional bodybuilder lives in a new world order:
- They are monstrously muscled, gargantuan sized leviathans.
- Size overpowers symmetry.
- They do not look natural.
- Often they no longer compete. Rich Piana was a former Mr. California.
- The prize for professional bodybuilding shows are rarely economically sustaining amounts.
- They are 'professional' because they promote food supplements such as protein powders or ergogenic agents such as creatine phosphate for vitamin and food supplement companies.
- Many, such as Rich Piana, also have a multitude of devoted YouTube followers. This can brings in lucrative advertising income.
- In these videos enough iron can be lifted to build a skyscraper.
- The monstrously muscled bodies are most likely due to more than just food supplements. You think?
I have watched some of Rich Piana's YouTube videos. He has this likable charisma that has made his video postings popular with the bodybuilding subculture. Unlike Tour de France bicyclists or track and field athletes, Rich Piana was refreshingly honest about his use of copious amounts of performance enhancing drugs such as anabolic steroids, human growth hormone, synthol oil and even the non diabetic use of insulin.
Refreshingly honest does not make it safe! The non medical use of such drugs can have a myriad of health consequences. Last week Rich Piana collapsed at home and was taken to the emergency. Doctors put him into a medically induced coma to allow his body and brain to mend. Sadly, Rich Piana died today at the age of 47. His death may not have been due to the long term use of these substances but it is probable that there was some correlation. Many professional bodybuilders die young these days.
Professional bodybuilding is not about health or fitness! It has become about the search to attain an unnatural shape and size of the human musculature. You have professional bodybuilders who are 5 feet 6 inches tall and weigh 300 pounds. The bones, ligaments and heart were not designed to carry around that amount of muscle. The purpose of skeletal muscle is to move the bones through a range of motion around a joint - not to get so large that movement is compromised..
Even traditional old school bodybuilding exercises are not always the best for fitness or movement. Many bodybuilding exercises isolate muscles for the purpose of hypertrophy or muscle enlargement. Fitness or sports weight training is about developing muscle movements which may require synchronization of numerous muscle groups. Some muscle size can be desirable but not at the expense of movement or function.
I don't mean to totally bash professional bodybuilding. Professional boxing or the UFC require great athleticism but it is not about health or fitness when they batter each other senseless. Football quarterbacks are usually super coordinated physical phenomenons but the goal of the opposing team is to tackle them with as much force as possible. That can't be healthy either. Hockey goalies have frozen rubber discs propelled at them at 100 miles per hour as well as 220 pound players crashing their crease. Baseball pitchers destroy shoulders and elbows .Runners can tear hamstring muscles. Soccer players can blow out their ACL joints at the knee. All professional sports carry a certain amount of risk.
The modern version of pro bodybuilding just seems to carry far more risk than reward!
| Rich Piana - larger than life! |
Until Next Time
Keep Fit!
Little Bobby Strong
Links:
www.fitnwell.com
Face it ...you are all going to die. All your pumping and puffing are going to lead you nowhere in the end...the physical body dies and all you guys are doing is trying to prolong the "inevitable".
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