I Was Your Size Once

“I was your size once.” anyone else hate hearing this statement? I get this all time in the gym, and in the back of my mind, Im thinking “No you weren’t, no Im sorry, but you weren’t.” this statement might be a little more believable if I saw more 6 foot 230lbs (built) men walking around, but since there are maybe 3 or 4 that come close to this standard in the big “small” town of Saratoga Springs, population 34k. I find your statement very hard to believe.

When I look at the men in my family I see my future. We all have the same facial structure and the same build. I am 19 y/o and look identical to my 65y/o grandfather (you know what I mean), he is still a giant. I plan on never uttering the words “I was your size once,” becuase I don’t plan on getting any smaller.

Since there are so few of “us” “freaks” “gym rats” I honestly find it hard to believe anyone who says these words. In order to be one of “us” you make a lifelong pact with yourself to be bigger and better then the rest of “them” the average.

So don’t compare me to yourself back when you THOUGHT you were in shape. You did not dedicate yourself to the lifestyle that “we” live, you did not work as hard in the gym as “we” did, you did not force down that last bite of a meal made for 4 like “we” did, you did NOT use to be my size.

thats my rant feel free to add

A lot of people just say that shit either to get you down, build themselves up, or both. In your case, it sounds like unfit people are trying to tell you that the only reason you are fit is because you are young, because after all, they were too (or so they claim)!

I am a little shorter than you are but a whole lot smaller. If a big guys says to me “I was once your size” I usually take it as a compliment and extend it to mean “Everyone starts somewhere, so just keep working hard”. I guess for you its more of an insult. Fuck them, your RMP thread speaks volumes about your physique, strength, and hard work.

I hear, “he was even bigger than you!” all of the damn time. I met one of those people once…and he wasn’t. I think people say shit like this just to have something to say. I don’t even think they mean much by it other than as some attempt to bring you closer to their level.

I also know way too many out of shape middle aged guys who all claim they looked like clones of Bill Pearl and Ronnie Coleman “once” and that it somehow turned to fat.

I don’t mind hearing this, as long as they don’t follow behind me, playing a tuba as I walk.

I was your size once

when I was 12.

They may have just let themselves slip into middle aged flaccid mediocrity.

Not knocking you at all, you’ve got a great physique. But in all honesty, the work world and additions to your life (wife/kids) post-college can really cut into gym/nutrition stuff. Got to really be proactive and tedious or else you will get shitty looking. That’s why so few look built into their middle ages… it certainly does get tougher when it’s not just a few classes then gym time.

so maybe a few of those guys were built back when they were football playing young guys… but certainly not anymore.

Another one that kills me is ‘my brother looks like you, he’s just bigger and stronger than you, but he doesn’t work out’.

If only more people were like Oliver Wendell Holmes…

‘We do not quit playing because we grow old, we grow old because we quit playing.’

[quote]TKOWKD1 wrote:
Another one that kills me is ‘my brother looks like you, he’s just bigger and stronger than you, but he doesn’t work out’.

[/quote]

…or cousin. There is some island somewhere filled with people who look like regular lifters but are just “a little bit bigger” who barely work out.

[quote]Professor X wrote:
TKOWKD1 wrote:
Another one that kills me is ‘my brother looks like you, he’s just bigger and stronger than you, but he doesn’t work out’.

…or cousin. There is some island somewhere filled with people who look like regular lifters but are just “a little bit bigger” who barely work out.[/quote]

Samoa?

[quote]PRCalDude wrote:
Professor X wrote:
TKOWKD1 wrote:
Another one that kills me is ‘my brother looks like you, he’s just bigger and stronger than you, but he doesn’t work out’.

…or cousin. There is some island somewhere filled with people who look like regular lifters but are just “a little bit bigger” who barely work out.

Samoa?[/quote]

Best comeback today.

[quote]Professor X wrote:
I hear, “he was even bigger than you!” all of the damn time. I met one of those people once…and he wasn’t. I think people say shit like this just to have something to say. I don’t even think they mean much by it other than as some attempt to bring you closer to their level.

I also know way too many out of shape middle aged guys who all claim they looked like clones of Bill Pearl and Ronnie Coleman “once” and that it somehow turned to fat.[/quote]

im glad im not alone in this. another one when a girl is trying to describe her boyfriend. " hes your build but a little smaller." yeah bullshit “a little smaller,” hes a twig.

[quote]msd0060 wrote:
They may have just let themselves slip into middle aged flaccid mediocrity.

Not knocking you at all, you’ve got a great physique. But in all honesty, the work world and additions to your life (wife/kids) post-college can really cut into gym/nutrition stuff. Got to really be proactive and tedious or else you will get shitty looking. That’s why so few look built into their middle ages… it certainly does get tougher when it’s not just a few classes then gym time.

so maybe a few of those guys were built back when they were football playing young guys… but certainly not anymore.[/quote]

If anyone was truely dedicated, they would make time.

[quote]msd0060 wrote:
They may have just let themselves slip into middle aged flaccid mediocrity.

Not knocking you at all, you’ve got a great physique. But in all honesty, the work world and additions to your life (wife/kids) post-college can really cut into gym/nutrition stuff. Got to really be proactive and tedious or else you will get shitty looking. That’s why so few look built into their middle ages… it certainly does get tougher when it’s not just a few classes then gym time.

so maybe a few of those guys were built back when they were football playing young guys… but certainly not anymore.[/quote]

So why tell someone you once were big/bigger?

Trevor Smith wrote a good piece about this…

Brothers Cousins and Sons

Where are they? Are they all living in a compound somewhere on a remote island with Elvis, Jim Morrison and Bruce Lee? And on this Island is there the absolute greatest gym ever assembled with the best machines and free-weights known to man? Are there rivers of Ultra-Pro 7 (shameless plug) that flow freely on this paradise along with sustenon, deca, GH and anadrol that grow on the various plant life?

You are probably wondering what it is that I am actually babbling about so I will clue you in. I am talking about every person that as a bodybuilder you meet that invariably has a Brother, Cousin or Son that “is bigger than you”. Now please understand that I do not have an ego that is so needy that everyone must notice my size and be in awe of it. However, I think all bodybuilders can relate to the fact that every “Average Ed” that you run into on the street will wind up doing a few standard things.

  1. They ask you if you want to arm-wrestle
  2. They look at you and do some sort of exaggerated pose for a humor effect
  3. They ask you how much you bench.
    And, of course, my favorite thing that they will tend to do: They will look you up and down and tell you that they have a Brother, Cousin or Son that is as big if not bigger than you are. In other words they look you in the eye and let you know just how “unspecial” you are in their eyes.

Now my purpose in this article is just to try and figure out why that is the case.

I have had old men tell me that there 45-year-old son “is built just like you”, but no longer lifts weights. Or better yet that their 15 year old son is “big like you”. All this does is leave me wondering what I have been doing wrong over the past 15 years of my life if a 40 year old accountant with 3 kids has more muscle mass than me without lifting weights and living on Krispi Kreme or if a 15 year old kid who’s balls have only dropped within the past 8 months is somehow walking the planet carrying large amounts of muscle mass that take years to develop with only 3 months training under his belt.

I recall an interview that I.F.B.B. Pro Mike Francois did a while back where he mentioned this very topic. He said people would come up to him all the time and say “my son is bigger than you” or “my brother is built just like you are”. Mike’s response was classic as he thought to himself�.Yeah, who’s your son or brother? Mike Mattarazzo? Dorian Yates?

His point is the point I am addressing in this article. Why are people so insecure in themselves when they see somebody with muscles? (and I am not talking about the assholes that walk around thinking they are better than everyone else cause they have a 19 inch arm, that is another topic altogether) Why is it so intimidating to themthat rather than just give a compliment and go about their business or better still say nothing at all, they feel the need to strike up a conversation with you for the sole purpose of tearing you down?

I’ve had people stop me and tell me all about their friend or son or whoever, and tell me how they are just like me, which is fine if they believe that or even if that is the case. But then they will end the sentence with “but he doesn’t use steroids or anything like that”. They just can’t leave it alone. They have to try and put a dent in your self-esteem so that they can feel better about their own. They go back to their pathetic lives, sitting in front of a T.V. watching Monday Night Football, telling everyone in their presence how badly the other teams quarterback sucks and how he should be playing, all the while having to concern himself with just how on earth he is going to fit his ass (which is the width of a 52 inch projection screen T.V.) through the kitchen doorway to grab another beer without having to apply 3 layers of Crisco to his hips.

Sadly, the majority of people will look at someone like a bodybuilder and feel insecure about themselves rather than get motivated to get their own bodies in better shape and look and feel better about themselves. So what do they do with this insecurity? They hurl a verbal, backhanded missile to try and psychologically damage that which is causing them their feelings of insecurity.

Now as an offshoot of this topic, I have to say that the Internet has brought about a drastic amount of people who do this very same thing. In cyberspace there seems to be a proliferation of massive bodybuilders that have only been training for a year or so, are very young and know more than anyone else on the planet when it comes to training, nutrition and drugs. They tend to be over 300lbs with less than 10% body fat and are usually natural to boot or they take ridiculous quantities of steroids and brag about it. They hang around on bodybuilding websites telling everyone how great they are and how badly everyone else sucks and how all pro bodybuilders use 10 times the amount of steroids that they due which is the ONLY reason that they themselves aren’t a pro�.YET!

The reality of the situation is that these people are no different than those individuals that get carried away with role playing games like dungeons and dragons. They invent these personas in cyber-space and live the life they preferably would like to exist in. How sad for them. To spend valuable time telling everyone you look like Ronnie Coleman only bigger and that everyone else sucks compared to you. Brag about the amount of drugs you take and how fucking huge you are going to get and treat any and all within the realms of message boards and emails with total disrespect and disregard. All because there is no accountability with the internet and it gives any and all complete and total anonymity. What is most disturbing is the number of people that are seeking information that actual give credibility to these idiots and believe what they are saying. Just as every guy hanging out in internet chat rooms trying to have cyber sex with a girl (or at least what they believe to be is a girl) half-way across the world has a 16 inch cock, every loud-mouth wannabe bodybuilder on the internet looks like an off-season Dorian Yates. If you only knew who was actually sitting behind those keyboards�.it would be UNDER-whelming as friend of mine would say.
Insecurity is the ultimate reason for both of the above mentioned behaviors. If someone stops you in the street because they see you have muscles and they proceed to tell you just how big you aren’t cause their Brother, Cousin or Son is “much bigger” then they are acting out of total insecurity. For if they were secure in themselves they wouldn’t say a word and if their Brother, Cousin or Son was “much bigger” they would probably not even take notice of you because of the fact that they are used to seeing lots and lots of muscles. As for the internet and those who hide behind the keyboard claiming to be the next Yates�again it is insecurity at work. Telling everyone how great you are is a hell of a lot easier than actually being great and until you shut up and start acting great, talking about it won’t mean a damn thing. Rather than go out and live it, it is far easier to sit behind a computer and pretend.

In closing I would like to point out that whenever you come across any of the above people remember a few things. First, you should have pity for them because they keep the focus on everyone but themselves and in doing this will be doomed to a life of mediocrity. Second, people who are the real deal and legit never, ever have to run their mouths off. If you were truly a huge bodybuilder with a tremendous amount of muscle mass, you would be secure enough in yourself to not have the need to go all over the Internet and tell people what a fucking animal you are. If you truly train with insane levels of intensity that cause mere mortals to roll over and die, you don’t have the energy or the time to run around telling everyone about it. If you truly are a badass, you have no need to try and instill fear in others so they think you are one. And when someone tries to knock you down by saying they know somebody bigger than you understand that they are intimidated and insecure by your presence and the “somebody” they are referring to doesn’t exist…unless you happen to run into Ronnie Coleman’s mother at the local supermarket LOL.

Keep the focus on yourself

Yeah, everybody and their brother can dead 405.
Ive heard stuff like this before. Friends that don’t work out trying to throw out their fake stats. One of my friends told me one time “I’m 130 but I can bench 160, I think thats pretty good” And i guess it is. Problem was when we got in the gym and he got under the bar, he couldn’t even bench 135.

i agree, and want to add you dont have to be “big” to even get these comments. ive only recently gotten back into serious training, but in my early twenties i was fanatical, i made a lot of mistakes but i had a good “beach physique”. seemed evryone and there father had a comment. my boss brought in a picture of himself to show me (for some reason i was supposed to care he had abs at one time).

i carried a table from the back to the front of the store, a fellow employee felt the need to do all sort of hulk hogan poses in front of me while smiling stupidly (i guess not being as weak as he is was somehow comical). hell, my own brother joined in. once i grabbed him in a bearhug from behind, and instead of messing around a bit he sarcastically said “yea yea, i know your stronger…”

honestly, i hope to get back to that point again very quickly. not the mistaken ‘beach physique’, but the muscles that pissed people off to look at, the ones that made people snear and deride with jealousy. i cant wait until i hear it again, and can respond, at least in my head with “yea, you wish”

[quote]elano wrote:
Yeah, everybody and their brother can dead 405.
Ive heard stuff like this before. Friends that don’t work out trying to throw out their fake stats. One of my friends told me one time “I’m 130 but I can bench 160, I think thats pretty good” And i guess it is. Problem was when we got in the gym and he got under the bar, he couldn’t even bench 135.[/quote]

Just for the record: Benching 160 at a bw of 130 is weak.
It would be ok for a 10 rep set, though.


I was warm for her form, once.

Once was a long time ago.

scott m, fantastic post! now i can laugh at these fuckers that say this crap

Nice post by Scott M.

(prints copy)