Sensational at 70-Plus
An Interview With Jim Morris, Mr. America and Bodybuilding Legend
by David Young October 2007
My jaw must have hit the ground when I saw the pictures accompanying this interview. How could this possibly be a 71-year-old man? No friggin' way! Could it really be? The answer is, yes. The guy puts most 40 year olds to shame. Among dozens and dozens of bodybuilding titles Jim Morris won the 1973 AAU Mr. America and has a contest history that spans from 1959 to 1996. The photo session with Michael Neveux this past January represents Jim's 47th year of getting in top shape. That kind of longevity in the sport doesn't come haphazardly. It comes from dedication, knowledge and focus.
What struck me immediately when I talked with Jim is that he is anxious to share his years of wisdom and his enthusiasm for bodybuilding. He's got some very interesting views on how things are done in bodybuilding, and it may just get you to rethink your own strategy-so get out your notebooks and listen up. Professor Morris is about to start class.
DY: I saw the photos that Mike Neveux took of you in January. You look great! That condition would be good for a guy half your age. How did you get started in bodybuilding?
JM: One of my coworkers at the New York Public Library's main branch on Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street invited me to go to the gym with him. I was 19, and I had never been in any gym other than in school where they did not have weights. It was June and New York was sweltering, so everyone was in Speedo's. St Mary's Community Center in the South Bronx was a pretty tough neighborhood, and I was a bit nervous. I had always felt the well-built guys in school were born that way, but at that moment, looking at those well-built guys I realized they had built themselves.
DY: So what happened?
JM: Before that revelation could sink in, a couple of the guys came over and asked me what exercises I did for my chest and arms. At first I thought they were teasing me, but my coworker convinced me they were serious. I had never had that kind of attention before, and I was thrilled to be the center of attention. But it was starting out to be a murderously hot summer, so I determined to start training on Labor Day. The main branch of The New York Library had every Iron Man and Health & Strength (British) and Strength & Health ever published, and over the course of the summer I read every one of them. I preferred the information in Iron Man, as I felt it was more honest. One of the articles talked about setting goals, short term and long term. Another talked about mental attitude and focus.
DY: Did you make good progress right from the get go?
JM: I set a short-term goal of gaining 30 pounds by Thanksgiving. On Labor Day I started training and fell into a trance. On Thanksgiving Day I came out of the trance to find I had gained 35 pounds of pure muscle.
DY: Thirty-five pounds in three months is incredible. That's a trance a lot of guys would like to be in, Jim. How did you do it?
JM: Unwittingly, by spending the entire summer immersed in magazines and any other writing I could find on exercise, nutrition, motivation and the human body. I had hypnotized myself. It was a matter of all the right circumstances coming together at exactly the same moment. My living situation was perfect. I was still living at home. My job was not physical. I had total control over my diet and lifestyle, and I was obsessed. It was like a sponge that had been waiting all its life for just this stimulation.
DY: Where did your chest and arm development come from? Had you been athletic before that?
JM: I was never interested in any kind of sports or athletic activity before that. The chest and arms were natural. Everyone has a couple of bodyparts that are either naturally just there or respond easily. I think the bodybuilders who make it to the top have more than most. I gain easily, especially in my upper body. I was something of a nerd. I even went to a high school for bright students called Stuyvesant in lower Manhattan. I was the kid nobody wanted on their team when they played stickball in the neighborhood. Bodybuilding for me was my version of playing basketball at the neighborhood park. I was good at it, and I enjoyed the attention. There is a line in one of the songs in the musical "Chorus Line" which goes, "Everything was beautiful at the ballet." She is explaining how her otherwise dull life became beautiful at ballet school. In those days gyms were all male enclaves, and I had a pretty body even before I started training. The first day I walked into the gym I was an instant star. I had found my ballet school and everything was beautiful.
DY: That's a good analogy. Who influenced your training and your routines?
JM: I lived in New York in 1954 when I started training. Lon Hanagan was the first influence, and he really set the structure for what I wanted to look like. Everyone after that helped me to achieve that look. Lon Hanagan was the physique photographer everyone in New York went to. Leroy Colbert, Marvin Eder, both Tom and Tony Sansone, Chris Dickerson, Raul Pacheco, Rico Tomas, George Paine, Art Harris, Bill Cerdas and many others all posed for Lon. The famous Grimek side shot leaning back against the short column is a Lon shot. He did lots of covers for Strength & Health and other bodybuilding mags. Lon and I became great personal friends, and he took an interest in me and in my training. He always emphasized proportion and symmetry, line and form. He told me where I needed to train in order to balance my physique. Lon locked into place my taste in physiques. Lon continued to be the major influence in my training until I moved to Los Angeles in 1969.
DY: I'm familiar with that famous John Grimek photo. I guess from an artistic point of view Lon had a good eye for the aesthetics needed to build a great physique.
JM: Absolutely. Lon had an incredible sense of aesthetics. He also had great personal relationships with many of the bodybuilders who shot with him. We were all friends back in those days. We would compete one day and socialize the next.
For the Mr. New York State contest in 1966 a couple of us decided to save on expenses and we drove up to, I think it was Schenectady, or one of the upstate cities in one car. There was Joe Distinti, Ralph Ruiz, someone else and myself. On the way the car broke down in the middle of nowhere, and we sat there for a couple of hours before a kid came along and went home and brought his father back, who fixed the car. We actually made it on time for the show due to the Olympic lifting dragging on into the wee hours of the morning. I won, and we stopped at every restaurant we could find on the way home to eat.
Lon was part of that social circle. It was because he cared for me as a person that he took the time and effort to help me with my ambition to realize my full potential. None of the other photographers ever expressed any desire to take any time or interest in me. At that point I had no desire to compete; I just wanted to be the best I could be. I did not consider competing until 10 years later.
DY: I think a lot of bodybuilders think that aesthetics are a matter of genetics or happenstance. I know from my own experience in training with champions like Danny Padilla, Samir Bannout and Rory Leidelmeyer that that's not necessarily true. Aesthetics can be improved or developed with a proper training style.
JM: You are absolutely right. It would be great to be born perfect, but that's no excuse for not being the best you can be. There is a lot that is under our control in terms of shape, balance and aesthetics. People use genes or bad luck as a way to avoid taking responsibility for their own shortcomings.
DY: Did Lon have a particular choice of exercises or sequence for you that helped you develop those aesthetic lines?
JM: Lon never got into the mechanics of my workout. He would point out a particular spot and show how by developing that area it would look better. He left it up to me to figure out how to develop the muscle. He was very specific about the exact point he wanted worked. He never worked in broad areas. This caused me to find and develop exercises that isolated and developed very small areas which ultimately gave me greater control over my lines.
DY: So where did your knowledge of how to isolate those areas and control your lines come from?
JM: I learned the function of the muscles from anatomy books and found or developed exercises which corresponded to those functions. There is an anatomy book I use now to teach my clients called The Anatomy Coloring Book written by Kapit and Elson. I wish I had it when I started. It is the best I have ever seen. As an example I used the low pulleys to develop the upper pec, but it would require a picture to explain.
DY: Tell me about the move to Los Angeles-where did you train and who influenced your training at that point?
JM: When I moved to Los Angeles I started training at Bill Pearl's Pasadena Health Club. For the next five years Bill made up my workout programs. Although I had won every major title back east, including New York City, New York State, East Coast, Eastern America and Jr. USA, I felt I could learn from Bill. And I did. Bill made up a new program every month. They were versions of whatever he was doing at the moment. Equally important were the posing sessions. I always hated practicing posing but Bill would get me over to his house and grind me through session after session.
DY: I feel that posing-real posing-is a lost art. Few guys out there today practice posing. At least not like in the past. Today we have a few guys who incorporate dance routines and robotics. I think that's good because it shows innovation and the fact that a bodybuilder can move well, but when I think of true posing mastery, I think of Bill Pearl, Chris Dickerson, Jim Morris, Ed Corney, Lee Labrada, Frances Benfatto, Rory Leidelmeyer, Mohammed Makkawy and Shawn Ray. Do you think today's pros could increase the popularity of bodybuilding if they focused more on posing as an art?
JM: I don't think today's pro physiques lend themselves to any type of artistic posing. Even the language-monsters, freaky, mind-blowing, awesome-does not lend itself to artistic interpretation of the physique. Today's bodybuilding is a completely different mind-set. Whether that is progress or regress is a whole 'nother article.
DY: Yes, I agree Jim, when the fans today talk about one guy "owning" another, it's almost always about who's bigger and nothing else. Did you ever train with Pearl, Gironda or any of the guys who came on the scene before you?
JM: No. Pearl invited me to train with him, but there was no way I was going to get up at 3 a.m. in order to get to the gym and be ready to train by 4 a.m. Arnold invited me to train with him, and I would go over to Gold's to watch him work out, after which we would sometimes go for breakfast. I was doing so well with Pearl's routines I felt no need to change.
Once in a while I would visit Gironda's just to talk diet with him, but he never extended an invitation to train with him. He did give me a lot of exercise advice, some of which I incorporated into my training. The desiccated liver was a Gironda suggestion, and although it was not tasty it did improve my physique. I have heard of the Arnold-Franco training partnership, and I watched Arnold train with Ed Corney, but top bodybuilders rarely are able to benefit from the same routine or subordinate their own ego and progress enough to come to a compromise workout which would benefit both.
DY: Wait a minute, Jim. I know Vince used to advocate desiccated liver quite a bit. It's almost a forgotten secret. How much desiccated liver did you take?
JM: I've never been one to measure anything in my intake-calories, grams, anything. I'm pretty sure it would have been considered a lot. My guess would be about a half-pound a day. At one point I was taking several hands full of liver pills a day. But that was not at the same time I was taking the powder in the drink.
DY: You've talked about three people who influenced your training. You mentioned that Lon Hanagan taught you how to emphasize you aesthetic lines. You also mentioned that you made steady progress from Bill Pearl's influence and that you picked up some good tips from Vince Gironda. All of this begs the question's: What did each of these guys teach you, and what were some of the training routines like? Can you sum it up in a few paragraphs?
JM: Pearl was the only one who made up my routines. Going back to what you said a moment ago about "it's almost always about who's bigger and nothing else," Lon taught me that the absolute first law of symmetry is to match the amount of muscle mass to the skeletal framework. Once the muscle mass exceeds the limit imposed by the frame there can be so symmetry.
Gironda taught me how to work with gravity on the free weights. He was able to coax a lot of response using very little weight with his knowledge of how the pulleys and levers of the skeletal muscles work. He taught me to think for myself, to question all of the methods and systems being used and pushed by the magazines and current stars. He was a true maverick. and that was reflected in his physique. His look was unique. He went the opposite of the bigger-is-better attitude of his time. He elevated the importance of diet in my thinking. He taught me to do my own thing.
Pearl made up my actual day-to-day workouts [after I came to California]. Bill's workouts would change from month to month, moving the exercises around from one area of the same muscle group to another so as to keep the development even over a period of time. They were enjoyable because I never felt overtrained or too sore.
As for the specifics of the workouts, they were the product of what was known at the time along with the equipment available in Bill's gym, which although obviously adequate as he won the Universe on them, and I won the America, they were mostly unique and very different from what is available today. I know for a fact that if Bill were to make me a program today with all that he has learned in the ensuing years and the modern equipment available, it would be very different. So it would not serve any purpose to even discuss them. What I would prefer would be to talk about what I have learned from the experience.
DY: Those are all wise lessons. Did you have any role models in terms of the type of physique you wanted to build?
JM: I admired the Pearl physique of the mid '50s and most of the physiques of my beginning years, but it never occurred to me to try to look like anyone else. I think that was the Lon influence. He showed me my lines and pointed out my potential and the pictures he took of me in the '50s gave me confidence in my own physique.
Remember I started with Lon in 1955. By the time Frank Zane came along, I was pretty confident of my own physique. But if I had wanted a physique to emulate, it would have been his. We are about the same height, around 5'9", but I have a slightly heavier frame than he which allows me to hold a little more weight. At his best Frank weighed between 185 and 190, and I was 210 to 215. I think Frank is the only absolutely perfect physique ever to exist.
DY: Being from Rochester, New York, I was just getting into bodybuilding in the early 1970s when Danny Padilla and Pete Grymkowski were competing. I know that you competed against both of them, isn't that right?
JM: Yes, I competed against both in the 1972 Mr. America. As you know Pete had placed second for the previous two years and was being pushed by the magazines as the next coming, especially in Muscular Development. Grimek had him all over the place the year before, even on the cover.
DY: Did that influence your strategy of how to come in the contest and your preparation?
JM: My strategy, if you want to call it that, was based on my assessment of what I accomplished in '72 and in the feedback I got from opinions I respected. At the '72 A I won Best Arms, Back and Abs. Two months later at the Mr. USA in Denver I won Best Back, Chest and Most Muscular along with the title. So I was satisfied with my bodyparts, especially the upper body, having won Best in every category between the two contests, except legs. I repeated arms in '73 Mr. A and added chest.
In his writeup of the '72 America Peary Rader wrote of me, "His development is beautifully balanced and he has outstanding definition and his muscle shape is very good." Of the '72 USA Peary Rader wrote, "Jim has one of the best proportioned physiques in the world. It is perfectly balanced and though he lost out in the Mr. America contest, I believe he has improved since then and will be a hard man to beat this coming year for that title. He does not look as big and bulky as some of the others, but he makes up for it in proportion and shape with good definition." In another issue he wrote, "This beautiful pose by Jim Morris, the new Mr. USA, shows one of the most symmetrical physiques of our time. He is so well proportioned that you would not guess his huge proportions."
Proportion and symmetry were what had gotten me this far, so I did not want to screw around with them. My everlasting thanks to Lon. My calves could come up some and I increased the poundage on those exercises.
Shortly after the '72 contest I was having dinner with Frank and Christine Zane at their place, (she is a gourmet cook) and he suggested I flex more and showed me how. After a couple of months I could voluntarily cramp and un-cramp every major bodypart. He called it "detailing." It brought out details in the muscles I never knew I had. I was talking to Reg Park's son Jon Jon a week ago, and he said Reg now does as much flexing as actual lifting. So do I.
DY: I remember that posing practice in and out of the gym was touted as one those famous principles the magazines called Iso-tension. I guess I never realized that it started in the gyms and that the magazine publishers picked it up to write about it. Do you attribute this to helping you win the Mr. America?
JM: Actually, it started with Charles Atlas in his famous kicking-sand-in-the-face advertisement. He called it Dynamic Tension. Anyway, it worked. In fact, the writeup of the '73 Mr. A in Iron Man said of me, "His general body balance and proportions are excellent, and he has amazing cuts and definition, probably the best of anyone in the contest." So in Peary's opinion I had held the proportions together and the definition had gone from "outstanding" and "good" to "amazing." Grymkowski had won Most Muscular in '72, and I feel it was the definition that allowed me to win the Most Muscular in '73 because I certainly did not match his mass. He must have outweighed me by 40 pounds.
DY: Yes, Pete had amazing mass, and you had classic aesthetics. That contest was a true example where the decision was between herculean mass or aesthetics. Got any stories about the contest?
JM: At one point after the interviews [the AAU use to conduct interviews with each competitor in the Mr. America contest] I sought out a seat in the back of the now empty auditorium to try and gather myself and focus on the evening competition. A short chubby kid-I was 37 at the time, so he seemed like a kid to me-came into the auditorium and sat down next to me. He said his name was Danny (Padilla) and he wanted my opinion of his build and what he needed to do. I hadn't really paid much attention to him, but I said he had good proportions and needed to get more cut.
DY: You're right about Danny, he had a problem coming in cut. But in 1981 when he did-Wow! Plus, Danny is such a great guy.
JM: I had the great good fortune to get to know Padilla when he was out here in L.A., and he is one of the people whose character I admire most in bodybuilding. He is a genuine good soul. I always enjoyed just spending time with Danny-he was a joy to be around. What you see in Danny's smile is Danny. I always felt he was not fairly judged.
DY: Yes, Danny is fun to be around. Jim, I noticed that you competed in the Mr. America in 1970 when Chris Dickerson became the first black Mr. America, but you didn't compete in 1971. Then you came back and placed third in 1972 before winning in 1973. What happened in 1971?
JM: I also competed in the 1968 Mr. America. The '68 and '70 contests were purely contests of opportunity and could not have been less serious attempts to win anything. In '68 I had won New York State and Jr. USA, so I was qualified. I was living in the borough of Queens, and the contest was held there-virtually in my backyard. So I entered just for the hell of it. Since I was going to go see the show anyway, I figured I could see the show up close. Real close.
For the '70 show I was living in the Hollywood Hills, and the show was held in Culver City, maybe 10 miles away. I had just won the Mr. Cal a couple of weeks before, so I was in relatively good shape. And again, what better way to see the show.
I never really had serious Mr. America ambitions. After returning from winning his fourth Mr. Universe title in September '71 Pearl said he thought I had the potential to win the Mr. A and should go for it in a serious manner because he was aware of my just-for-fun attitude about competing. Things had come relatively easy for me up until then. When I said no, he said, "You never complete anything you start". The words stunned me because it showed I had a quality he did not respect, and his respect was important to me-important enough, for me to devote the next two years to regain it.
But that happened in October '71. To answer your question, after the '70 Mr. A, I spent the months barnstorming the West Cost, entering anything and everything. Contests like Mr. Golden Bear, Mr. Inland Empire, Mr. West Coast and so on, none of which endeared me to the other competitors who felt that I was stepping down in order to grab trophies. Comments like, "What the f--- are you doing here?" were not uncommon. But the promoters, who were usually the heads of the local AAU committee and almost all national judges, loved me. It was not unusual for me to give a seminar the next day at the promoter's gym. I accompanied my training partner Ken Holbert to the Mr. Iron Man in Alliance, Nebraska, in 1972, and he won. I gave an impromptu posing exhibition. Mabel Rader was a judge in the '73 Mr. A. Five of your 20 points in the Mr. A is for the interview. The interview is where the judges try to get a feel of what kind of Mr. America you would make. It helps if the judge has spent some time with you and what their impression of you is.
DY: I only met Bill once at the IRON MAN Pro/FitExpo a few years ago, but I was very impressed with what a true gentleman he was. He remembered my name all weekend and kept calling my David. It's funny how many people you meet at Expos who keep calling you "buddy" or "bro." You know it's because they don't remember your name. But here was Bill Pearl who is an icon in the industry calling me David over and over. It seems like such a small gesture, but it shows the character of the man. It's something that I'll always remember about him. So would you say he was a true coach in the sense that he knew the psychology behind motivating you?
JM: Bill motivated by example. He is legendary for not missing workouts and he gives every workout 100 percent. In that sense, yes, he is keenly aware of his iconic stature and that it was his example that motivated me and everyone around him-not only in our training but in how we acted toward each other in the gym and in the sport. Whenever Bill meets someone, he actually pays attention to that person because he is sincerely interested in them and knows how much that attention means to that person and he cares.
DY: That's a rare trait today. I remember reading something Chris Dickerson wrote about Bill training him. He said Bill had him doing a lot of ab work almost to the point that Chris thought it was overdone, but he did it anyway out of respect for Bill.
JM: Yes, Bill did put a great deal of emphasis on the abdominal area. One of the main reasons for Bill's business success is his incredible prescience about the sport and business of bodybuilding. In the '60s and '70s whenever it became known that you trained with weights the first thing they asked you was, "Show me your arms." Today it's "Show me your abs." In those days no one had ever heard of your "core." Scanning the magazine rack in the market today every single cover has the word "Ab" or "Abs" on it. Bill was one of the first to realize the importance of that area. The other being Zabo. He also was the first of the hardcore gym owners to actively encourage women to join the gym. His Pasadena Health Club split the hours of the main gym floor evenly between men and women, although he did not allow them to train together. He did though reserve three rooms in the back for the "animals" as he called them to train at all times.
DY: You must have made some tremendous improvements in those two years because you went from placing seventh in 1970 to third in 1972 to winning it all in 1973. Tell us about those two years and the diet and training.
JM: Looking back on my diet now I wonder how I ever won anything. My favorite meal during that period was a pound of ground beef, which I would brown in a large frying pan, add in a large can of Campbell's Chunky Minestrone Soup, heat and eat. Some days I would have this two or three times. Most of the other meals were KFC buckets of 15 or 20 pieces, extra crispy or BBQ, of which I would just eat until I couldn't breathe. The tuna drink was health food compared to this. For me contest prep was cutting out the pastries.
DY: That's incredible.
JM: I had the absolute best training partner of my life during those two years, a guy named Bob May. Bob put up with more s---, never once losing it or even acknowledging it. He was 1000 percent behind me. I think he wanted that win as much as I did. I'm sure of it. Getting to share that experience with Bob is what I will always remember about the Mr. America. The happiest two years of my life.
What made it possible for me to live the life of "elite athlete in training" during those two years was that I never worked. My first job in L.A. was as a cop on LAPD. I hated that job. My first shift out of the academy was "graveyard" midnight to 8 a.m. It would have taken me years, if ever, to adjust to that schedule enough to train for competition. They fired me after a couple of months for "lack of aggressiveness," which was code for, "We think he's gay." So I got a job as a sales rep for Carnation Co. Grocery Division selling wholesale into the supermarket chains. They gave you a car and you only had to come into the office once a month. As long as they saw the case movement out of Certified Grocers they were happy. All of the store managers and district managers were fans of mine. I would go over to their homes and put them and the wife and kids on workout routines. They even came to see me compete in the L.A. and Cal. So I would call them in the morning, ask them to order in X-number of cases and then go to the gym. The day was mine. The company ended up sending me on a nationwide tour after I won.
The members of the gym gave me a huge "Good Luck" card on the day I left for the '72 Mr. A There must have been hundreds of signatures on it. I still have it. They had been so supportive I could not wait to get to the gym everyday just for the adulation. Placing third I felt so hurt that I had let them down and was absolutely determined to never let them down again. So those two years were idyllic in every way.
DY: There's something to be said about having the right conditions and support team. Tell us about your training at that time.
JM: I did make great progress during those two years, but you must remember when I arrived at Pearl's the year before in '69 I had one national title, (Jr. USA), one state title (New York) and several regional titles. So the groundwork had been laid. My symmetry was in place as was the overall size.
Bill added the finishing touches and refinements to my physique. Bill's workouts reflected that in that they were very balanced. Not emphasizing or specializing on any particular bodyparts. They were two basic formats. Doing one routine on Monday, Wednesday and Friday and the second on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. The other format was three routines done on Monday and Thursday, Tuesday and Friday and Wednesday and Saturday, sets of four or five, reps from eight to 10. Usually three to four exercises per bodypart.
For example, Monday/Thursday would be chest and back, Tuesday/ Friday shoulders and arms and Wednesday/Saturday legs and abs. Bill allowed me to choose my weights and never criticized me for not working heavy enough or hard enough.
DY: Something else was going on in bodybuilding at that time. Arthur Jones started writing in Iron Man in 1970. He was advocating short, full-body training three times a week as being superior to split, high-volume routines. Casey Viator, who won the AAU Mr. America in 1971, was Jones' star pupil and the showcase for Jones' training ideas. I know that Pete Grymkowski had gone to Deland and trained with Arthur and so did Steve Michalik. Both Pete and Steve incorporated Arthur's ideas about intensity and some of his mutiexercise supersets, tri-sets and giant sets for various bodyparts, but they both stayed with high-volume split routines. How was it that you never bought into Jones' HIT methodologies?
JM: At the 1970 Mr. America here in Culver City in which I competed, Jones was setting up his pullover machine in the lobby as I was walking through on my way to the prejudging. It was June and I was in a tank top. He called out to me very loudly, challenging me not to come over. "Hey, you. You think you're strong? You think you know how to train? Come over here and I will show you how to train." Partly out of ego and partly stupidity I went over. It was plate loaded, and he had not brought the plates in yet, so he had his son stand on the platform the weights were supposed to go on. Then he told me to do as many as I could to failure. With him and the crowd urging me on like an idiot I went to failure. At the prejudging not only could I not flex my lats, I could not even feel them. At the evening show they were so sore I could hardly move.
I read all of his articles in Iron Man and all of Ellington Darden's, but I was doing so well with Pearl and I was so comfortable with his methods and philosophy that there was no need to change. There is a grain of truth to some of Jones' principles, but the system as he wants it done will tear you apart. The human body was never intended to take the stresses modern athletics demands, and I was always reluctant to ask of it more than I felt comfortable handling. There was always a point at which my body told me, enough. I really credit that to the fact that now, at 71, I have absolutely no joint problems or discomfort. I do not take any medication at all for anything.
DY: I know that Pearl and others felt that Jones' idea of training to failure on a set was incorrect. Jones came to this "principle" because he concluded that there was a direct relationship between the all-or-nothing principle and muscle growth. He said that muscle fibers contract, or they don't depending on whether it's your first rep in a set or your last. Thus his idea of intensity was train a set until absolute failure. Others felt that there are other routes to intensity. I know that when I trained with Samir Bannout, he taught me to hold back a rep or two and my muscle growth exploded. This poses the next logical question: If you don't go to failure, what is the proper time to end a set?
JM: I train to stimulate the body to grow, not to beat it into submission. It has never occurred to me to push my body to its limits. Even when I was competing in the Olympic lifts, I never went balls out. In 1955 I was doing bench squats and took a weight I was comfortable I could do. I was more concerned about doing that poundage than about how the set would make my body feel. I hit the bench and relaxed and demolished the disc and vertebra of my lower back. It laid me up in the hospital for two weeks. The doctors wanted to go in and clean it up and fuse the rest together "as best they could" as they put it. I never had the operation-and I never again pushed my body beyond what felt good.
I feel that I have a very different awareness of my body than most people. My guess would be that most athletes do. For me the workout is achieving a certain feeling. Not wiped out, exhausted and shaking, but really good and alive. I suspect others reach that at different points in their workouts. Overtraining is the most common condition in bodybuilding and it shows. The body looks tortured and unhealthy. So, to answer your question, I stop at 10. If I'm not getting the feeling I want I adjust the poundage until I do. On large muscle groups like legs and chest and lats I do a light warm up, a medium and then three heavy sets. On arms, delts one light and four heavy, making the first set of the heavy kinda easy and the fourth real hard. I don't do abs and haven't in probably 25 years.
DY: Okay, let's back up. For the past 37 years people have been told to train to failure on every set. I know Vince Gironda thought this was a mistake. Did Bill Pearl feel the same way?
JM: Yes. I have never known anyone of the name competitors in the last 37 years who consistently trained to failure. Actually I take that back. Don Ross. He died at 49 of a heart attack about an hour after leaving the gym.
DY: Hmm. Interesting observation! Okay, now I know that cardio wasn't as large a part of contest preparation during those years. What role did cardio play in your contest preparations at that time?
JM: My workouts were pure cardio. I would train with a partner and we would go at it set for set with no more rest in between than it took us to get into position. When I would get up to do my set there would be a puddle of sweat on the floor. All of the way through the workout I would be panting, with mouth open, gulping for air. I loved it. During the off season I would train with two guys which slowed it down to tolerable.
DY: I know when I train fast like that, bodyfat drops off and my resting pulse rate improves dramatically. Do you still have your gym on Santa Monica Blvd.?
JM: No, I sold the gym years ago and now make my living from my Web site Gymmorris.com and personal training. Thanks for allowing me to get in a shameless plug.
DY: Absolutely, Jim. Were you friends with Joe Gold?
JM: I first met Joe in 1961 on a stopover as I was going from tech school at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas to my permanent duty station at Elmendorf AFB in Anchorage, Alaska. I was in uniform, and he welcomed me and allowed me to train free for the week I was in L.A. When I moved to L.A. in 1969, he continued to allow me to train free. He was totally against private trainers, but he relented and allowed me to be the first ever at his gym. He never required me to have insurance, which he did of all the other trainers. He never charged me to have clients at the gym, which he did to the other trainers.
When he died, he left three dogs. The two male pedigree Australian Sheep dogs were taken by Lee Priest but no one wanted the mixed breed female, Hope, so she came to live with me and my dog James as a companion for James. James passed away last year, and now she is the joy of my life. Joe's outstanding characteristic was loyalty. Once Joe liked you, you could count on him for life. I always felt I could go to Joe for help if the need arose. Joe always treated me as though I was very special to him, and I miss him very much. Feeling the end was near, I threw a birthday party for him at the gym only months before he passed. He was 82.
DY: He certainly left a legacy in the eyes of many people in the industry. I know that Rory Leidelmeyer trained at your gym and also at Bill Pearl's for some time. Rory had a reputation for helping guys bring out their aesthetic lines. I trained under Rory guidance for about a year in the mid-'80s, and my physique really improved from the experience. I'm wondering now if you had some influence on Rory's base of knowledge.
JM: Actually, I spent more time with Rory at Pearl's gym than mine, and at one time Dr. Don Wong bought a gym in Montebello and asked me to run it. I hired Rory to work some of the hours with me. So we have a fairly good history together. Over the years we would get together for talks, but I do not have any idea whether I had any influence on him. He and his wife spent one Thanksgiving with me and Jim Brown at my home. I think it was mostly a personal friendship.
DY: I have a funny story that I've posted Ironage.us about how I read an article by you when I was just starting out as a teenager. You talked about tuna shakes with desiccated liver powder, so into the kitchen I went and mixed one up. I chugged it down and about three seconds later I projectile vomited the whole mess all over my parents kitchen.
JM: Ah yes, my famous tuna drink. I think that drink will be my legacy in the minds of most whenever my name is mentioned. One day I found myself unable to swallow a mouthful of tuna, after years and years and can after can of tuna. It just would not go down. Some years before I had mastered the art of pouring a quart of milk down my throat without actually swallowing as many college students can with beer. Determined to get that tuna down, I put it in the blender. The rest is history. The drink went through many transformations in the years following, finally ending up with peanut flour replacing the tuna and raw fruits and veggies replacing the liver as I became a vegan. Although I must admit I do have the ability to stomach things most people cannot. I do not use any seasoning at all on my foods now. No salt, pepper, nothing. My taste buds have readjusted to where I enjoy the taste of the food itself with no flavoring.
DY: Well the tuna shake thing was certainly memorable. It did give me a good understanding about the level of commitment it takes to become a champion. [Both laugh]
JM: Did you take it because you were competing?
DY: No I was just starting out and was reading everything there was. All I knew at that point was to follow what the guys in the magazines were doing and the tuna shake idea caught my attention. I did go on to compete later on for a few years.
JM: Why did you quit competing?
DY: I starting taking steroids after a few years of competing, and I was not willing to push the dosage level up to the competitive level. I never got into bodybuilding to win contests. I got into it to achieve a certain look. When my bodyfat is under control, I get compliments on my physique from people on the street, from people in the gym, etc. I knew what I wanted to look like. And I've met and trained with many pro bodybuilders who were broke or struggling financially. So when you add up the fact that I get positive reinforcement from people on the stree, in the gym-women and men-I decided I didn't need a set of judges to determine my value in life. For so many guys and girls who compete, the judges' opinions of them become more important than their own opinion of themselves. I was more interested in achieving an aesthetic physique rather than a contest physique-competing would have caused me to compromise that look.
JM: You speak for the vast majority of the population. There is no doubt in my mind that most of the people in gyms are interested in achieving a more aesthetic look than competing. I would love to see more information directed toward that large segment of the bodybuilding field. It's only a fraction of trainees who really want to compete.
DY: Let's go back to something we mentioned a few minutes ago. We spoke about Danny Padilla getting into shape for the 1981 Mr. Olympia. Interestingly Danny was not on a traditional high-protein, low-carb diet for that contest but on a high-fiber, low-protein diet. I understand that you have some views on this as a vegan...
JM: And it was the most defined condition he had achieved to that point in his career. I'm glad you asked that because I consider my ability to learn and incorporate that learning into my lifestyle as probably my greatest achievement. Training people over the past 50 years and trying to get them to change lifelong eating habits has been almost impossible. Nothing is more ingrained and locked in than eating habits. Danny was ahead of his time with that nutritional diet of mostly vegetables. I know this is not going to go over well in a magazine that sells supplements but the whole protein, protein, protein thing is way overblown. Granted Danny had achieved all the size he needed by then and his protein requirements were less, but even for growth we do not need anything near the amounts currently taken.
Back in the '60s the rule of thumb was two grams of protein for every pound of bodyweight. Total insanity. Whenever the subject of my vegan diet comes up, the first thing they say is, "I need meat to maintain my muscle." I hope the pictures of me in this interview will help to show otherwise. Vegetable protein is far better quality and requires fewer amounts to satisfy even the most extreme development and training. A vegan diet would do for the current crop the same it did for Danny-eliminate the bloat. I recently finished "The China Study" a book by T. Colin Campbell, Ph.D., and it is the most informative I have ever read on the subject of nutrition. I hope everybody reads this book. It would change the world.
My diet is constantly changing as I change-as my activity level changes, as my requirements change, as my metabolism changes, as my circumstances change. For the most part, the change is in the form of appetite changes rather than a conscious calculation on my part. My appetite will start craving something or will lose its desire for something. Once you get in touch with your body and let it take over it's self-regulating.
DY: How would your diet for the Mr. America compare with now?
JM: Consider that leading up to the Mr. A I was dealing with a completely different body than I have now. I was 36, half my current age, in heavy training, taking lots of steroids, living in the Hollywood Hills, training in Pasadena, both very warm to freaky hot. And the goal of my diet was to build as much muscle as quickly as possible along with losing as much fat as quickly as possible. Actually I talked about that diet earlier, so I will get into what I am doing now.
Obviously, I am not training for competition, so I don't require the quantities I used to eat. My goal is maximum health, so the purity of my food is of the utmost importance now. I want to counter the natural tendency to gain fat where that was not a factor then. And I live at the beach, which is very cool, a completely different climate. It's now known that the human body can derive all the essential amino acids from the natural variety of plant proteins that we encounter everyday. It doesn't require eating higher quantities of plant protein or meticulously combining varieties of plants.
My primary goal now is more an experiment than anything else. I want to know just how pure I can get my diet permanently, and what will happen to my health, body, knowledge. I want to know what the experience of being absolutely as clean of unwanted, unneeded, unnecessary substances is like. Will it make a difference? A big difference? No difference? So I no longer eat any animal products or anything containing animal products. Someone said, "I don't eat anything with eyes." That pretty well sums it up. I also don't eat anything that has been processed in any way. That means no breads or cereals. I eat from four basic food groups: fruits, nuts, vegetables and beans.
I always have a large pot of bean soup in the fridge. No seasonings at all. Sometimes I will put vegetables in it-yams, potatoes, bell peppers, red, yellow and green, white potatoes, carrots, cherry tomatoes, whatever may be around. I have collard greens, spinach or mustard greens every day. I only eat once daily what could be considered a meal. But I will snack on nuts and fruits once or twice a day.
I do not measure, weigh or count anything. I only eat when I'm hungry, and I drink only when I'm thirsty. The whole eight eight-ounce glasses of water a day thing could not be more absurd. I will sit and eat peanuts and grapes. That's my version of peanut butter and grape jelly. By doing that, I eliminate the processing, along with the added salt and sugar. I microwave everything except the beans because microwaving destroys less nutrients than any other way of cooking, including steaming and broiling.
DY: Okay, Jim, back up. You said back when you were competing you were taking "lots of steroids." I've found that the dosages back then were nothing compared to today. Can you tell us what was a typical weekly dosage back then?
JM: I had the great good fortune to have a close friend who was a doctor who was willing to administer my steroid program and monitor my bodily functions on a regular basis. I got 200 milligrams of testosterone and 150 milligrams of Deca Durabolin a week and took 10 milligrams of
There was a story about a prominent bodybuilder who wrote Zane and detailed more than 2000 milligrams of mixed steroids a day and wanted Frank to recommend what he could add to that. So, I guess it's all relative.
DY: Do you think you could have competed successfully with your current diet strategy-or, put a different way, did you eat as a vegan for your Masters Olympia over-60 win in 1996?
JM: I was not yet a vegan in '96 because I would still occasionally eat fish. Not on any regular schedule, some weeks once, some twice, and then only a few ounces. I was supplementing my diet with reduced-fat peanut flour which I stopped when I eliminated processed foods. It replaced tuna in my shake. I also was still eating processed foods, such as oatmeal, one of my lifelong favorites. I think I would have done much better in that contest if I were eating as I am now because I would have been incredibly more defined.
DY: I know that bodybuilding requires a lot of discipline. It's as much a mental game as a physical one. What keeps you motivated for your training and diet?
JM: I function best in a highly regimented and ordered lifestyle, so what for most people would be an almost impossibly disciplined lifestyle to live by is for me easy, requiring absolutely no discipline. It is almost monastic. What enables me to stay in reasonably good shape are my eating habits. Which is not really a diet but a way of eating which I do regardless of whether I'm in training or not.
I only work out when I have a goal. This article and these pictures were part of my reason for training the last several months. Before that I had not trained with any regularity and since then I have not trained at all. But that has always been the way I train. I cannot for the life of me (that may be a bad phrase to use in this context) train for maintenance. Bodybuilding for me is a creative process, and I only enjoy training when I am creating. Each creation is the result of a different motivation.
DY: I read that you were Elton Johns bodyguard for 15 years. How did you balance the travel and lifestyle with training and staying in shape?
JM: While I was on tour I rarely trained. Once in a while if I had a day off and a gym was available in the hotel, I would go do a little something. The lifestyle on the road was so exactly the opposite of my normal life that I just relaxed and enjoyed the rollercoaster. But you would never want to live on a rollercoaster. Even Elton after every tour would say, "Never again." But the thrill would draw him back. As I said, not working out for periods of time was part of my M.O. anyway, so it just fit right in.
DY: With 50 years of experience in training people, is there any way you can sum up your training philosophy ?
JM: Learn to listen to your body. Get in touch with all the many built-in systems which tell you what is going on and what to do about them. Everything you need to know for optimal health and performance is hardwired into the system. We have an incredible feedback system constantly telling us what is going on and what to do about it. It has all been hijacked by the culture and the advertising of those who would make a buck by selling you something.
DY: What motivated you to come back for the '96 Masters Olympia after all those years away from competition?
JM: In 1992 my companion of 20 years, Jim Brown, died of AIDS. For the next couple of years I sunk deeper and deeper into depression. In 1994 I ran into Jim Manion at Gold's Gym in Venice. I was not following what was going on in the game. Jim had long been a friend and fan. He told me they had instituted age groups in the Masters Olympia and suggested I consider the over-60 category. He felt I would do well.
Immersing myself into training had helped me through similar situations in the past, so I decided to do it. Building the body is a positive activity and can only be best accomplished in a positive and nurturing atmosphere and frame of mind. So it became necessary for me to put myself in that place in order to train. Forty years of practice made this possible even from the depressed state I was in.
DY: I'm sorry about loosing your companion. You mentioned training for two years for the Mr. America contest. Today guys train for 12 to 16 weeks. Were you actually eating and training in contest mode for that entire two years?
JM: Yes. Actually it was two one-year stretches, as I would have stopped had I won in '72. But I didn't, so I just continued for the second year. I was having the best time of my life. I have to give Pearl credit for keeping me from overdoing it. After losing in '72 I was manic. The programs he made up for me were designed specifically for that stretch of time and were beautifully paced. He had a great feel for how I liked to train and where my head was at any particular moment, and the workouts always plugged into that perfectly.
DY: How do you organize your training week now?
JM: If and when I go back into training it will depend on what my circumstances are, what condition my body is in, what my goal is and what amount of time I have to achieve it in. One of the factors about training for these pictures and this article is that it was open ended. Originally it was supposed to be for my 70th year, but life intervened and here I am 71. John Balik said, "Just let me know when you are ready." So that had a domino effect of taking the pressure off all the other factors. You might find it interesting that I trained for these pics at 2 a.m. six nights a week. Who knows what next time will be like?
DY: Okay, let's switch gears a little. Tell me about something you're proud of and what that's meant to you?
JM: Being the only openly gay to win the Mr. America. I feel my career helped to change the way gays felt about themselves and their bodies. I was the toast of gay society in both New York and Los Angeles throughout my competitive career, and I think my impact within the gay consciousness and psyche was positive and how the public at large felt about gays. I received countless letters telling me how they felt it was as if they were given permission to be masculine, and this is how it is done.
When I started competing in 1966, gays were not known for having great bodies but were generally thought of as physically effeminate even within the gay community. In the years since they have steadily become synonymous with well-built guys to the place where now any guy with a good body is somewhat suspect.
DY: Well I know that almost every straight bodybuilder, myself included, have gotten the suspicious comments or stares at one time or another. What is the best thing about bodybuilding?
JM: Taken in the broad sense of any activity that builds or improves some aspect of our body. Whether that is overall health, agility, endurance, balance, strength, weight loss, gain or countless other ways, it can be all things to all people. There is an exercise program that can benefit anyone, whatever their age, condition or situation, from the elite athlete to the disabled. It has physical, psychological, emotional and spiritual benefits all from less than one hour a day.
DY: By the way, I'd like to know more about your dogs. I'm an animal lover myself. Did your love for animals in any way influence your decision to go vegan?
JM: Like my eating habits my relationship with animals has come a long way, and both are still evolving. From the way I treated my first dog, Buff, during my teens to how I relate now is nothing short of a 180-degree turn. I now believe the whole concept of "pets" is a form of slavery. I believe every animal has the inalienable right to live in its own element, with its own kind in absolute freedom. Joe Gold's dog, Hope, is the ninth dog I have had. Seven females and two males. Jimmy and I had two toy poodle sisters from the same litter, but one was much larger than the other, so we named them Lavern and Shirley. So, what did you expect? Blanche had a litter of 10 on my bed in Venice in 1991. I kept one, James, to keep his mother company. And yes, he was named after me. He died on my bed last year at 15. He was my soul. Caring for him and deciding to spend the last year focused on him is what kept me from getting in shape for my 70th. I made him a promise that I would do everything I could to change people's attitude toward animals.
The scientific and biologic proof of the correctness of a vegan diet is sufficient for me. That it meshes with my philosophy of how I relate to the "other" is for me even more validating. Unfortunately whenever I mention my philosophy, it becomes a reason for people to dismiss my diet as "The Bambi Syndrome." I cannot praise you enough for the work you do. I cannot do what you do as it tears me apart emotionally. If my advocacy for the vegan lifestyle has any beneficial effect on the animal world it will be my most satisfying accomplishment.
DY: How can people correspond with you to get advice either in person or on-line?
JM: My Web site is gymmorris.com or e-mail me at jimmorris@gymmorris.com.