I don’t see pictures or video of you doing deadlifs. What do you think of deadlifs for bodybuilders?
I do deadlifts sometimes. But I don’t do them from the floor. Look at most powerlifters. They do deads of the floor and look at their waists. Their waists are very thick. That’s partly where their power is coming from their waists and hips. You’re using a lot of synergy throughout the whole body when you’re pulling a weight from the floor. That’s great for some people to build that power. There are athletes who should be doing deadlifts of the floor to get that whole-body efect.
But bodybuilders have to remember they’re pulling with abs and hips and all that in the middle. When that gets expanded, how are you going to make it slim again? It’s going to be very tough to get your waist and hips back if you build that area up. I’ll do deadlifs of the rack sometimes, starting each rep with the bar just above my knees. That works mostly the back and traps and keeps the lower body and middle body out of it. The days of pulling deads of the floor are over for me. I want to keep my waist and hips as narrow as possible. The last thing I want to do is grow anything in my middle.
You’re all over the social media. How important is that to you and your body-building career?
It seems as if my rise to the top in bodybuilding and the popularity of Twitter and Instagram and things like that came about together, so I got out in front of the social media. People know I’m on Twitter a lot. I’m the first Mr. Olympia to be this accessible to fans all over the world, because the technology just wasn’t there before. I’m just trying to reach my fans directly. I’m very talkative, and I like to engage with people, even some of the haters. It’s an open forum.
As far as my career goes, social media have helped out a lot. We’re in a different age now. You can see how things have changed with the Internet over the past decade and how things are going to just keep moving more and more in that direction. I’ve had nothing but success with this. But I understand that it’s a give and take. I’m not just posting selfies in a mirror or plugging my stuf for sale. I’ve actually had people complain that I’m not posting progress pictures. But I look at Twitter as a place where you can get a view of me beyond what’s in FLEX magazine. If you want to see photos of me and get my training routines and diet info, FLEX magazine is the place for that. Twitter is more about what I’m doing today. Where am I at in the world? What am I eating? What shoes am I wearing? I’m giving people an idea of what my life is like on a daily basis and even sometimes minute to minute throughout that day. – FLEX
