The Black Prince: My Life in Bodybuilding: Muscle vs. Hustle by Robinson Robby

Author:Robinson, Robby [Robinson, Robby]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781630017583
Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
Published: 2013-03-16T18:30:00+00:00

9

PUMP FICTION

Back in Venice, sitting in my beautiful apartment in Windward Circle, I felt I was getting my feet on the ground. My win at the Mr. World put more logs on my fire and kicked my training up a notch. I assumed that after taking the whole show, I would be offered a contract. Instead, I was only asked to do a photo shoot for the magazine. In my confusion and anxiety, I still felt like I couldn’t be stopped. I saw it all as a test of strength, stamina and determination.

With Denny, Arnold and I battling it out with the weights, I was training, eating and tanning with the best bodybuilders in the world. Even though my skin was black, tanning helped even out my skin tone, and the camaraderie bonded us together as a group. Mostly I kept quiet and listened to the guys talk about their bodybuilding approaches, particularly what they were eating.

With 12 weeks out until next competition, their meals were simple and bland and dominated by protein. The magazines hadn’t started writing about a specific bodybuilding diet, but somehow they got it in their heads to eat a lot of protein and very little carbohydrates, if any at all. They ate beef and eggs in the morning, and more beef, eggs and maybe one slice of toast after training, and yet more beef and eggs for lunch and dinner. There was no fried chicken, cornbread or collard greens on their menus. This was new to me. There was no plan to my eating. I’d never thought there was anything more to a bodybuilder’s diet than keeping the foods natural and tasty. At a dinner out one night, Denny looked at the potato on my plate and said, “That’s too heavy of a carbohydrate, you’ll get fat eating that.” The concept of getting fat was foreign to me. But I was curious to give their special diet a try, so I started eating a six-ounce New York steak and three whole eggs, four times a day. Probably the only thing that kept my bowel movements regular was that I kept eating apples, bananas and melons throughout the day. The plan seemed to work for me, because I was getting more muscular and stronger. So I stuck with it right up until the show, making no changes.

About this time my lady Ashley came west to join me. It took some time to persuade her to follow this new way of eating, and it caused some tension between us. Here, I’m taking away what a Southern girl believes is her power and her way to a man’s heart: her cooking. No grits and eggs and toast? I had to take over the skillet until she came around and agreed it wasn’t so bad after all. She learned to prepare these new meals as well.

In the gym a couple of days later, I was approached by Arty Zeller, a photographer Joe Weider said would be contacting me. He wanted to photograph me down on the beach for Jan ‘76 issue of Muscle Builder.

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