Weight training, the best form of exercise (call me biased). I will always be an advocate of weight training over any other type of exercise. Weight training for me, saved me. Mentally and physically and still remains something I just cannot live without. The fact that PBs (personal bests) are endless, there are so many varieties of exercises that it’s hard to ever get bored, the overall sense of fulfilment is unbelievable. I love it and I will carry on for as long as I can to lift the metal. But where did it come from? Who came up with all these exercises? If you love it as much as I do, then you should want to know how it came to be…
THE HISTORY OF STRENGTH TRAINING
Apparently, even ancient writings from Egyptian times, to Ancient Greece all tell the story of humanity’s obsession with pushing the body to the limits. A common theory is that the background of weightlifting was not necessarily to do with health but more to do with testing human survival. I hate to be like the father in ‘My Big Fat
Greek Wedding’ but apparently progressive resistance training has been thought of as far back as Ancient Greece where the wrestler Milo of Croton carried a newborn calf on his back every single day until the calf grew bigger. Could be a myth, might not be, who knows, but the story came from somewhere.
The earliest similarity to the dumbbell was described by the Greek physician Galen who mentioned the halteres as early as the 2nd century. Still on the subject of Ancient Greece, a lot of Greek sculptures have depicted men lifting stones, but later the dumbbell and barbell in the early 19th century. The original forms of these were hollow globes filled with sand and by the end of the century, replaced by what we now know as the dumbbell and barbell.
Going back to the subject of stones, it has been discovered that a block of red sandstone was found at Olympia weighing 315lbs with an inscription on it: ‘Bybon, son of Pholas, lifted me overhead with one hand.’ The stone apparently has a cutout looking very much like a kettlebell.
Fast forward to the 1896 Athens Olympics, weightlifting was introduced. It was officially recognised as a proper event in 1914.
It was only until the 1960s, machines were becoming very popular thanks to the man himself Arnold Schwarzenegger and the release of his movie Pumping Iron. It wasn’t until the 1990s women started to weight train more and women’s weightlifting became an Olympic sport in 2000! 22 years later, I do believe women are weight training more than ever! Maybe social media has had an impact….
THE EVOLUTION
Initially, contests did not have any weight divisions and lifts included those of one and two-handed dumbbell and barbell lifts. It wasn’t until 1928 that it became more standardised and so the birth of the snatch, clean and jerk and clean and press came to be.
In terms of equipment, the word ‘dumbbell’ is said to originate from a device in the early 18th century whereby it was used to ring bells-actual bells like church bells.
POWERLIFTING
Not going to lie, powerlifting has always been something in the back of my mind, maybe one day I will have the guts to do a comp. What makes it so appealing is the fact that unlike bodybuilding comps, you are not judged on your aesthetics, you are only judged on how much you can lift. With powerlifting, it is all about the heaviest weights of the 3 main compound lifts: the deadlift, bench press and squat. It’s still strange to me that although very popular, powerlifting is NOT an Olympic sport.
BODYBUILDING
So, in a nutshell: you train for a long time, build up your muscles, cut down to an unhealthy bodyfat percentage, show your physique on stage in the form of a posing routine and get judged.
In the late 19th century, a geezer called Eugen Sandow allowed audiences to view his muscular physique in muscle display performances. So, you could say he was the father of bodybuilding. Men would display their bodies to audiences as part of strength demonstrations and even wrestling. I’ve not seen it, but apparently there is a 1936 musical film called The Great Ziegfeld which tells the story of bodybuilding and when Sandow used to display his body for carnivals. Sandow really did make it. Several businesses were created because of him with products branded in his name. He can even take credit with inventing and selling equipment such as machined dumbbells, spring pulleys and bands.
Sandow organised the first bodybuilding contest on September 14th 1901 referred to as ‘the ‘Great Competition’ and held in the Royal Albert Hall. Of course, Sandow judged it himself along with Arthur Conan Doyle (who wrote Sherlock Holmes for you literature lovers like me) and another random guy who also judged the show. The winning trophy was of course a gold statue of Sandow. The earliest known bodybuilding show in America was years later in New York.
So, whether you train for shows, comps or just for your health. Just remember, weight training has come a long way since Ancient Greece times and is VITAL for longevity of life.
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