Dorian Yates: Bodybuilding Legend and 6x Mr. Olympia Who Changed the Industry Forever

one of the greatest bodybuilders of all time and the only non-american that hasn't just won the iconic mr. Olympia competition once but he's done it six times in a row after closing the chapter on his body building career he now puts priority on spending time with his family his sports nutrition company and inspiring people around the world so for a lesson in how to create a legacy please join me in welcoming mr. Dorian Yates to the escape your limits podcast welcome Dorian thank you thanks for having me on mate thank you for also you know coming down here and give me give me your time I appreciate no problem mate no problem it's been a busy couple of weeks but yeah I've been filming a documentary with generation iron so a lot of time on that so pretty busy at the moment enough to Kurdistan tomorrow right to do appearance for the nutrition company so busy days what what are you doing out there then what well I got my nutrition company do whi nutrition and we got distribution in Iraq and Kurdistan so I'm going out there to do promotions which is interesting because I didn't honestly really know where Kurdistan was on a map until they invited me so it's North in Iraq just below Turkey apparently so I'm gonna be going out there and do promotions and meeting the governor I think and so on so it's somebody haven't been before so I look forward to that it's a different I guess a different life from what you started from I guess absolutely absolutely different I said I grew up in in in Birmingham and I think the people around me where I came from like their imagination of what's possible was not that great and I think it was one of the things that I always wanted to do I wasn't sure how I was gonna do it what was to experience and travel around the world so I ended up through through my war through bodybuilding like going all around the world to do promotions as appearances seminars and so on so I achieved that goal through through the sport in the end yeah so because there was we were talking off camera there's some similarities I was in a spa in junior bodybuilding no in there to your level but I guess one of the things that I didn't have at the time that you seem to have at an early age was that the drive and the determination to kind of take it so far what what do you think gave you that but you know based on well because there wasn't people around you that yeah I hope you've done anything like that were there I think it's it's somewhat genetic you're like your personality a basic personality is probably somewhat in genetic and then it's also influenced by your environment so I lost my father when I was quite young and then we moved to Birmingham just with my mom and she married a new guy and and he also died quite quickly so it was pretty pretty tragic time yeah and then my mum decided to leave Birmingham when I was 16 and I decided to stay so I didn't have anywhere to say I was sustained at friends houses and stuff like that and being a teenager with my mates we got into a bit of trouble and 18 years old I was sent to a detention center for a few months and I had already done a little bit weight before when I was at school and I'd done karate and I've done all the push-ups and squats in my room had a bull worker and all this so it was always already interested in that and physical and when I was in the detention center you know part of the process is hard physical exercise which a lot of the kids didn't like well I loved it you know and it was there was something for me too how their being in this place to kind of escape for a while and I was good at it I was good at the circuit training I was beating everybody on that and then we had weight training but it was more like powerlifting so we just concentrate on bench press squat and deadlift and again there I was was a couple lads that probably bigger and heavier than me but I was as strong as them and I already had what you could term as a physique looking body I had good abdominals had a good shape so the foundation of a good physique was there and even the prison officers noticed that and they they encouraged me when I you know when you get out of here go and do a lot of thinkers could be a good power lifter but I already know that I wasn't interested in powerlifting I was interested in bodybuilding because I've already seen the magazines from Joe Weider and I was familiar with some of the bodybuilders like that's the route I want to go so as an individual I think I was already much more determined and tunnel vision than the average person and then I had all this adversity around me and in no real future you had no family around me no qualifications from school nobody you know there to advise or help so my prospects were not that great and I saw a bodybuilding as a way to improve those prospects if you like and do something positive and where exactly that was leading when I started I didn't know but I knew I'm doing this I'm gonna give it a hundred percent and something's gonna be good from it and maybe all I'd really like to be like British champion one day I think that's probably as far as I was thinking at that point anyway right that was as far as your imagination yeah that point could go because that's what I you know I've gone to watch a British championship and I saw the guys I'm like they were great boy maybe in a few years I can I can do that and of course the story turned out differently yeah yeah it's it III heard that you originally when you use with your father you was sort of like in the countryside living and then you came into like a council estate was that quite thinking about was that quite a shock to go from a you know change of life it was I went from what we call a small hole in England which is not really a farm but you know he got fields you got stables you had some horses there dogs chickens dogs this kind of thing was kind of an idyllic upbringing for a kid out all this space and my friends live you know one mile this way or one mile this way and so on so you got to ride your bike oh you got to walk everywhere so it's a good healthy lifestyle and then when my father passed away we moved to Birmingham it wasn't actually a council estate was okay it was after after 16 more more mum left I was living lived quite a few places live with friends on a council estate lived in bed said and eventually after when I came from the Detention Center I didn't have anywhere to stay the city housed me in our Council as I say in England so they gave me a council flat on a very notorious council estate in Burma at the time called Casa wail and they offered me this place because not many people accept it and go there but for me it was fine so yeah that's that's that's where I was living for probably five years when I was started training right so I was still living there I remember getting to the point where it was British champion I was British champion I won the British championship at Wembley but I still came home to castle Bell to this council flat they had no carpet I don't have a proper bed add a mattress and on old TV and I came back with my Troy friend I put it top on the top of this old TV and I'm thinking great and British champion but there's no there's no newspapers outside there's no TV I haven't got a car I've got no money for you know I wasn't thinking this in a bad way I was actually wasn't you know all my friends had cars and more material things but I was happy because I was just had this goal that was all-consuming I was pursuing and doing well at it and I kind of knew that things were gonna come but at that point British champion but still still broke right so I just distinctly remember that what would you like and what would your mates have said you're like as a teenager were you sort of fairly because I've looked at some of your videos and you almost took a little bit shy oh yeah yeah it was that yeah I was not comfortable I was shy are you is even thinking like wow getting on the stage in front of all these people how is it going to be but that was okay actually when I got on stage it felt like natural it felt like it was my home so but talking to people a lot of people that I didn't know and we're not from my background I was uncomfortable with and definitely talking on camera very uncomfortable because I've never been exposed to that even having my picture taken it took me probably until after I retired from bodybuilding to be able to just smile for the camera I couldn't smiles let just take the picture man I can't smile and less on feeling like smiling right now I feel like smiling so that was a even Joe Weider try to get me to smile in there and it's like look just let this guy do what he wants because that's what he's gonna do there you know in the end they just accepted me and that's pretty much the story I do pretty much do things the way I want to do them yeah so yeah shy kid bought already mentally much stronger than everyone around me I believe I stood out and a few people that grow with me when were teenagers they're like it wasn't really a surprise for us that you did that you know it was in a way but it wasn't because you're something different about you always like more focused and determined so yeah that's that was the young Dorian and over all the this experience I've grown massively I mean I'm you know you learn to be comfortable talking to different people you learn to be comfortable talking on stage on a microphone and I can go and speak now with two three thousand people it's not a problem but I was it you know initially I was terrified I remember doing my first seminar when it was I think was a British champion or just before and I was super nervous and I you know prepared I had all these notes and these cues and everything like that and I did that you know I did the job but now if I do a seminar I don't I'll just you know I could be sleeping five minutes earlier and just get up and do it second nature for me and to talk to people and to talk on cameras it's not a big deal so my you know my personality growed massively through from all this exposure and traveling and their life experiences you just get more more confident yeah and do you think that's what it is confidence cuz I spoke to was Frank Zane actually have you we did a podcast with him and he mentioned that a lot of body builders kind of it's a bit a shield they carry with them absolutely and it's very difficult to let go of that and see what's inside does that is that absolutely it wasn't a problem for me like people say oh don't you miss those days when you're huge and how do you feel like you're not as big an elephant now I'm like no I don't miss it at all and you know for me it was not as I said it was in a detention center when I was a teenager and I had no problem with anybody because they could see I was stronger and bigger than and tougher than than average so I didn't start bodybuilding from the point of view of I feel insecure right so I'm gonna build myself up and then I feel more secure and I'll feel better and everyone will treat me differently I did it as a as a pursuit as a sport and as a way to improve my life and I almost viewed the the physique the body that was building as not being me it was almost like a project a sculpture something that were separate from me and it needs to be like this and it needs to be as massive as possible as ripped as possible and balanced and that's the criteria and that's what I need to present now I'm no longer competing why do I need this massive sculpture now I need my body now for functioning I need to live inside this thing I need to do things and when you're at that massive body weight it's not that functional no it's you know it's difficult to tie your shoelaces let alone do yoga and you know cycling up mountains and swimming and things that I enjoy doing now so now I've got the body that I need for the life that I lead now I need a functional body a healthy fit body that's I'm gonna give me a quality of life and that's what I trained for now and I'm very proud of what it did in the past and it's there I did it and I did it to the maximum and nobody couldn't do it anymore so that chapter is now closed yeah and if anyone's interested in in bodybuilding and competing and training then I will I will say there's nobody better nobody with more knowledge in that area than me and that's why I'd now give to other people that want to do it but that train is not relevant for me now know when with the sort of bodybuilding as a sport it is slightly different to business in some ways I'm trying to sort of compare them together but when I started bodybuilding I had a belief that I could have been you know I could have been to us you know certainly as a junior I believe they have potential but with bodybuilding I've heard you say you know it's all about genetics and you know if you've not got the right genetics you're wasting your time if to compete how what was the point that because that you realized that you had the potential that you could make this something that was going to change your life as opposed to just you know doing local competitions and things well fortunately very very quickly I got that feedback just to correct the statement I think is not all about genetics right but if you haven't got the genetics to reach this potential you won't right but you could have the genetics to be mr. Olympia well the other import is not correct okay maybe you're not that dedicated and you're missing some of the other factors I believe some people are competed against perhaps they had as good as or a bit better genetics than me but they didn't beat me because I had more input I made the most of my genetics so I maximise where maybe they didn't so yeah you can't be mr. Olympia and without the correct genetics and genetics are very important but just because you have the best genetics doesn't mean that you will the outcome you will be number one because somebody else could just be smarter and work harder and make up that difference was there anyone you ever knew that probably had some really good genetics that you know if I'd have applied themselves like you could have you know around that time may have been able to beat you do you think well I did make a statement at the time about flex wheeler because he was second to me in 93 and it was great amazing potential not different physique to me and that he was very light like his bone structure very light but very full round muscle bellies that all look great well just because I knew flex not very well but we were friendly and I knew him and I knew enough about him to know that he was not 100% all the time whereas I was so if he had it been 100% if you had had done everything that I did well maybe a different outcome but that wasn't a case so potential is one thing but maximizing its another and would you say that carries across in all areas of life from business that you know absolutely it's like you're starting with some basic material of potential and it's what do you do with that that that's important so if you've got great genetics you might have a head start on somebody well they might cut you up if you're missing days you're breaking your diet yeah you're not training quite as hard as you could do you know or you're letting life factors interfere and that's why I was a very good at I just totally show off from everything and why if my house is on fire like to call the fire brigade what can I do about I'm still going to the gym it's like that was literally it I lived in a tunnel which was was pretty extreme but trying to be the best in world is pretty extreme so you need extreme measures before you started your you know you get I guess accelerating your bodybuilding career did you I've watched a lot of the anger that you put in it seems an anger aggression here did you have anger as a sort of a young teenager that you were carrying with you well now I realize absolutely yes I did you know my father died when I was young nobody really seemed to like help me with that so I guess I was pissed off about that and then my mom left and I was left in Birmingham my own maybe was pissed off about that and just being a teenager too pissed off anyway so so yeah yeah I had this that I could call on yeah anger and light determination to like show everybody that was a lot of it I'll [ __ ] show you yeah I'll use that energy I'm gonna show you what I can do so that I always until I was mr. Olympian or something I struggled with a little bit initially I always had this underdog thing like I'm the underdog and nobody like thinks I'm can do it so I'm gonna [ __ ] show you I'm gonna do it so I use it that I call it [ __ ] you energy you know here's some [ __ ] energy in the workout so there's a combination of air of anger and determination and like wanting to show the world that you know I'm worth something I guess yeah I guess that's in a positive way because I suppose you know as a teenager you can easily put that for a cure energy into [ __ ] other people a lot of people do that that's that's what happens and that was kind of the phase I was in a little bit really when I was a teenager you know as a skinhead on weights or skinheads or punks and that was the environment I was in so it's quite often a few little fisticuffs and so on going on there you've got a lot bunch of angry kids and this is early eighties and if you remember early eighties in Britain was not a great time as a lot of unemployment you know there's not much for people to do so drinking and fighting was kind of like a British pastime really yeah yeah do you think for younger people you know like as I suppose we're talking to a lot of people that are in the fitness industry you know how important is it do you think to try and sort of channel young kids that maybe from that area into some kind of sport or fitness or bodybuilding kids I think it's great you just put your got all this excess energy and you put it into something positive now something instead of putting into something negative it's it's just energy so I think it sports are a great way to channel that and you know they say Sports is like sanitized warfare almost anyway so it's taking the place of that and in letting that given a good outlet for that energy a positive outlet yeah yeah yeah I I certainly see that we've interviewed some people from all different areas and I you know it seems as though if you've not got something to folk your mind and even now I'm sort of however my 48 if the times are I've not got something to occupy myself I'm I then start looking for not trouble but you're looking for stimulus your brain is looking for stimulus and it might be the wrong you know a good positive outcome for you the stimulus that's what it is I think yeah and and and when in terms of your focus when you were competing then what you know well how did you do that you know what will you sort of do you have this vision of British Championships and did you write things down did you have a kind of a wall of you know like posters RPP wanted to follow how did you get that control because I guess I think and I tell people all the time whatever is your training business even relationship anything write things down if you've got a goal or you know promise to yourself write it down on a piece of paper and sign it right I intend to stop smoking and I'm going to stop today and write your name and if they're right so I did that with bodybuilding I had break it down and to first of all I got every workout that I ever did from 1983 to 1997 logged down every exercise everywhere every way everything is written down so every workout used to write it down and then I would write down short term goals which usually were a month okay long term goals that were 12 most of which is usually with me at that at some point was ending with the contest right so I'd write down a few things like body weights a few key exercises like you know bench and squat and deadlift and curls or whatever you know write them down this is what I'm doing now this is a goal for next month and reasonable achievable goals like you know if you're going to put something ridiculous that you can't achieve then it's not going to help you it's going to demotivate you so little goals little steps but all the journeys that we make are made of little steps so let's say that you want to climb this mountain Mount Everest if you could see the top you probably can't see it but let's say you can see the top it's just so far away it's daunting alright so why don't you concentrate yeah I will get to the top one day but first of all I will get to that ledge there and when I get to that ledge there I'll get to that ledge there and let me focus on that so breaking it down into little achievable goals so it might have been I don't know let's go back and I was bench pressing 200 pounds for eight reps my goal for next month might be two hundred and ten pounds for eight reps or 205 yeah I don't seem a lot but if you if you added five pounds every month to your own stress for a month there'd be 60 pounds at the end of the earth so that would be a big increase yeah and of course the diminishing returns the bigger and stronger you getting the more advanced than just small of those goals the gains are going to be right so I think it's important to break have a long-term goal and break that into small achievable steps to get there so you focus you've got the old the big one but you're focused on the little ones they're keeping you keeping your focus if you just focus on the big one you'll get you'll get daunted and you'll get distracted so break it down into little little steps how often did you use to look at your short and long-term goals and used well I used to sit down I used to take ten or fifteen minutes before I went to the gym to drive to the gym I'll sit down in my house and quiet place and I'd get out my log and I'd look what I did last week and a look at the goals and look what I did last week that's what I did last week so I did 200 pounds on a bench rest for eight reps today I must do nine that's my goal it's solid it's there it's in my head and I going to the gym I know what I'm doing I know what my goal is most people wonder into the gym oh I'm doing chess today do a bare chest then with no real goals in mind you're not going to get very far doing that I've got this observation I make with people in the gym so when you start training it's a stimulus that you're not used to so you will get you will react yeah well it's pretty soon your body will get used to that level of stimulus and that's when you've got to really push it and you and you've got other plan and most people don't have that so you see them progress for the first year maybe 18 months and that's pretty much it they don't really move after that they're just going to the gym spinning the wheels because they haven't got this structure in place they haven't got the goals if you haven't got the goals you're not gonna push yourself you know to push yourself to real failure which is what I recommend that people do for a limited amount of sets short hard workouts it's [ __ ] uncomfortable it's gonna hurt you're gonna be out of breath we're gonna feel nauseous most people that train with me first time they vomit it's that extreme so why are you gonna do that to yourself why are you gonna push through that because you've got a goal that's very important otherwise when you get uncomfortable you normal reaction is to [ __ ] this I'm stopping you need the goal to push you through that pain so my goal is greater than a temporary discomfort that I'm gonna experience and I know that so I'm going to go through that discomfort because I want the goal greater than I want to feel comfortable yeah it's basically like that was that when when you were thinking about those things like your motivation was their motivation to move get away from where you were at the moment or was it like a motivation on on where you were going to it was a motivation purely on the physical on the training on the body on the outcome where I rest would fall into place right it's what I was thinking you know and you're asking me how long did it take for me to realize that I got what it takes I had been training for 18 months 18 months have been training prepared from a first contest which was a novice contest West Coast championships in Morken I think you're on the other coast right when you were competing in juniors it's West Coast in Morecambe novice contest I remember going there and pumping up backstage and I'm thinking it's a couple of good lads here right I reckon I might be better than them that was it yeah I went on stage I posed I came off and everyone was just freaking out had Ron Davis there who was the head of the IFBB in England and he judged that the mister Olimpia and it was in him and that some other judges just freak like where do you come from the light will come from Birmingham what why are you in the novice class I'm like because I'm an obvious haven't competed before I'm I don't think I'm good enough for the heavyweights they're literally almost laughs in it nah no put enough for every weight say let me tell you something kid you're better than all the heavyweights who have got in the country right now you're the best heavyweight we've got mates I couldn't really take it in at first so he said look in two weeks time or a week's time I think was a week's time there's the world Games in London which is World Games is like Olympic Games or the sports and not yet accepted into the Olympic Games so they had bodybuilding there and this was a world championship level so if you won this you turn pro and they said we won't we want you to come to some trials in a couple of days because we're gonna choose the team for the British team to go to the world games why is this really happening is that are they serious so I went to the trials for the world games and I got selected so one weekend I'm in a novice contest the next weekend I'm in a world championship and competing against Barry Damai who you probably familiar with he won the contest Matt Mendenhall was second so that was the standard watch I mean look at their in flex magazine and Isaac so there were 13 guys in the world championship heavyweight class and I was 7th place and I just been in my first novice contest so and he now had these people that could be you know there weren't some guys at the gym was blowing smoke up my own this guy has been judged there mr. Olympia he sat me down and he had a German Burman at the one time he sat me down and he went through a list of pros and he's like you're bettin this guy you're bettin this guy now I think I was still not really believing him but you know is that now I need to be much bigger but the goods were there people could see it I didn't really have much weak points I had I had good legs structure which most of the heavyweights didn't have at that time I mean I can look back now my old photos and blatantly see like amazing potential there but I couldn't I didn't really know at the time no did anything switch in your mind like after that was it like after that conversation or something where you said suddenly realized that your life was probably gonna be a bit yeah I did I met wag Bennett who wagon Diane Bennett they were running the Federation at the time or involved and they're quite well-known because they're the ones that they bought Arnold over when he used to compete in the Nabin Universe in London he he moved to before he went to California with Joe Weider he was in London living and training with the penance so they knew Arnold as well and they were you know they were talking to me as well so it was great that I got all this feedback early on that what I'm doing and what I'm dedicating myself to is really worthwhile so let's get on with it and do more yeah and you just made that that was you made that decision then and I guess yeah you never turn back yeah and then I won the British championship the following year and then because I was British champion I had somebody that was willing to back me in and open in the gym and that's when I opened the the temple gym which was my training base eventually for all that mr. Olympius right and very different from the American gym environment hoisting it was a basement down some stairs into a dark basement with no windows and no cardio is just just iron you know Frankie clanky sort of cast yeah you know you'd heard the iron rattling down there people were scared to go down there because it was had a reputation which was not totally justified yeah quite friendly once you got to know us well I would catch people all the time at the top of the stairs looking down because you couldn't actually see anything down there's just like you're going into a black hole you could hear rock music people screaming weights banging and a lot of people are intimidated just to step down the stairs like come on I was gonna eat you down there so you were sort of running the gym and working out and yet the same yeah III open the gym and I was in in 87 well that's when we opened so then that was giving me a decent income that I could you know really focus on this without any financial stresses managed to buy myself a car all that stuff so is it right he didn't have your first car until he was 26 yeah 25 20 25 because when I opened the German started making a decent salary I took my driving lessons and right n'gou car Ford Cortina 600 pounds 115 that was my first car had a Capri classic Cortina and at 26 Wow yeah all my friends had cars from 18 19 20 and but as I said I really didn't feel like I was missing out because I think internally I knew why some things come in and this is don't worry about this so I had that confidence especially after their 85 when I got all this feedback yeah so maybe I'm thinking about the mr. possibility of being mr. Olympia but was very very remote at that point didn't want to push my vision too far and be unrealistic so I was like I want to get to be pro at that point I think I can be a good pro yeah my future's looking better than it was a couple of years ago and with that vert like I know you've read a lot about it in business and setting goals and anything that you want in life how was you've obviously gone up to be the best in the world at a sport which very few people ever get in their life at being the best at something in the world what would be your advice and if somebody does want to achieve any kind of go like how how far should you look because I you know they say set big audacious goals and their you you obviously your big goal would have been to be mr. Allen yeah what sort of how did you go through that in your mind and as you've got into it did you set bigger and bigger goals or what was always I always worked on like a yearly basis right so this is my EUR okay and then I break the euro down in two months so little segments throughout the year but what I'd like to say about whether this is a sport or it's a business or it's a relationship or whatever it is in your in your life and your human experience what you're going to receive back is what you focus on so if all your focus is going into your business it will be successful do all your focuses are going into picking up hot women in bars eventually it will be successful because all you're thinking about it's all you're projecting out there yeah it will come back to eventually so you've got to be very careful what you're thinking about and what your thoughts are yeah and most people are not even aware of what their thoughts are they just run around in the head and they've got no control over them so that's why I'm a big believer in meditation now I didn't meditate when I was bodybuilding but I did goal set I did visualize I mean all day I was uh visualizing it's always thinking about literally all day I remember having dreams I'd be dreaming about my leg workout the night before I did my leg workout so I've always done it twice I did it in my dream and then I'd sit down office and do it my head as well so I've already done that before I go to the gym it's like mental rehearsal it's already programmed into me so I went to the gym with absolute goals I knew which exercise I was doing in which order how much weight I put on the bar how many reps I was trying to get I would even have certain shirts that were down to wear on certain days and certain pants I would wear on leg days all little rituals and things like this that all my energy was going into that so you get what you focus on if you if you focus on wow I'm broke and my girl just left me and I'm [ __ ] you're gonna keep getting more of that right so you've got to be very careful what you're thinking and what you're focusing on and I've been reading about that recently and I because I sometimes I think people think they're thinking about what they want but when you sort of write down your day and say how much time have you spent on it you're probably spending more time on like what you don't want yeah but you think you want something and do you think that's that's the case then like as you sound as though you as obsessively just thinking about it and thing else was coming in your mind yeah did you ever doubt yourself and think oh you know do you think I'm gonna win this competition or did that was just was just oh never never never there were some uncertain times when I didn't know what the outcome would be my first pro show because I'm going from being an amateur champion to professional ranks and that's a big leap we all know guys that were good British champions or German champions or American champions or whatever and they looked outstanding in that field then they went to the next rank and it's quite a big jump up and they got lost so my first pro contest I was uncertain and I'd never been on stage with any of these guys before so I didn't know what the outcome would be what actually I gave myself an ultimatum really I said considering the way I'm doing this and the amount of sacrifices I'm making and I had a wife and a kid as well so they're losing focus and time with me and all these things and let's be honest fresh Nevada building you're taking steroids which might not be that great for your health so all these factors has to be justified and I had seen a lot of people sacrificing their family sacrificed their marriage the job to do bodybuilding but yet they were not getting anything out of it so I don't want to be that guy know so I know I know aware of the history of bodybuilding and who's successful in bodybuilding they got what it takes you can see when they go to Pro there they're up there yeah they might not win straightaway but they're up there so I said okay if I've got what it takes to be a good Pro and competing the mr. Olympia may be mr. Olympia maybe if I don't place in the top five in this contest list beyond it I haven't got it takes let's be honest yeah so if I don't place in the top five I will not be continuing as a competitive bodybuilder I've already got one little gym giving me a nice salary I could open more gyms and there were not a lot of gyms around in the 80s it was it was new right so gyms were making money now the gym was not that great at all these big corporations fifteen pounds a month and this you know it's hard for people to make money in a gym so like I'll still body build are still doing it but I won't do it to this extent then I won't be taking this there always and everything because I'll just do it for myself now maybe I'll open some more gyms something vague in the background what I was hoping that wasn't what's not going to happen but they opted you not to be there so I went to Night of Champions in New York and got pretty close second there on my first contest and it was not the guy that won Mohammed Ben Aziza he won right it wasn't him that we'd a flew out to California to do the photo shoots it was me right because I had a look or something that maybe it was more interesting or more marks to Walt I don't know but anyway I got flown out to California and you know everybody build his dream at that point to go to Venice Beach go to Gold's Gym get your picture in a flex magazine that you know obviously there's no internet or anything then said the magazine was was God you know if you've got in the magazine then you've made it yeah so yeah 19 1990 first contest and flew out to California and then after that was at Night of Champions a game which r1 and then first mr. Olympia gained a little bit of uncertainty Lee Haney was already seven times mr. Olympia winner and I was going up against him yeah and he was mr. Olympia when I started so I was aware that I had to change my mindset as far as my attitude toward Lee Haney he's not like a guard now yeah he's a man with two arms and two legs and he lifts weights and at this point my confidence was building because I knew what I've been pointing and how hard I was training I start to observe that nobody else is really doing it not to this extent I thought they were but they weren't so I know that I'm training harder than him I know I'm putting him more so why not so I went to compete in my first semester Olympian again I got a close second on my first mr. Olympia and then the next year I won it so those two contests were uncertain because they were new ground yeah so I didn't go into those thinking yeah I'm definitely gonna win well I went in to the first one probably more tentative and not really knowing yeah the second one I was going to try and beat Lee Haney whether I was going to do it or not there's another thing but I definitely think I've got a chance and I'm gonna go and I'm gonna go for it and it turned out to be a close second and then after that not wanting to sound arrogant because I don't think I was but I was fully confident every year that I would win right there was not even an iota of doubt so that in order to take a couple lessons from that there's a couple of things that stood out for me one is it sounded as though you were you had this honesty with yourself because I guess a lot of people get caught up in the dream even though whether it's business and it's like I'm gonna do this and it's like well you've got one most bring yourself down a question yeah it's good to you know people say to me I wanna be a multimillionaire great how how are you gonna do that where's your route to that destination show me yeah well you don't really know do you so you're not gonna happen yeah it's just a vague goal but tell me how you're gonna get there it's like a physical destination if you wanted to go from here to Madrid you'd need a Groot you'd need a map when you know otherwise you're just going a road and start wandering and you'll never get there so you need a plan you need a route and it needs to be doable together yeah that's right and I accept there's some things you wouldn't believe it possible but it's certainly in the bodybuilding field and maybe in certain sports there's gonna be certain physical limitations yeah listen it doesn't matter how positive I am about it I will never be a 7-foot tall basketball player yeah Crysta not in my code so there are limitations to what you can do physically you know with your body and everything but it's probably more flexible than people maybe think that and I think that's a key point it's just being you know that honesty to say like I'm going to set myself because you know in business and spa you are gonna sacrifice everything yeah I guess and it's just knowing when to be smart which you obviously did make that decision with yourself and make that agreement with yourself and then once you've done that it's like right now I know I can I can yeah one yeah and then your confidence builds on itself yeah and then what about when you went into those negative situations you know the two times the first mr. Olympia and the second there what was it was a competition but the first night was unknown and this the first mr. Olympia was not unknown for the newest competing against but it was still another level that I hadn't been to so it was a little unknown it wasn't negative the more very negative situations I had to overcome were injuries that I had I had an bicep tear in 1994 six weeks before the contest which really I believe anyone else would have dropped out and I did think about it for a couple of days like I was totally devastated it happened I'd 192 I'd won in 93 and in 93 just raised the bar so high that you know people couldn't believe it so now this guy's is you know it's gonna be really really hard for anyone to beat in the foreseeable future yeah so that was what was ahead of me and now bang I've got an injury that this is definitely possibly a career-ending injury it's not a little injuries a big tear and six weeks before the contest so I was just for a day I was devastated and like I'm gonna have to drop out there's no way I can do this and then the positive is start to take over and say well how do you know that how do you know you can't do it until you try so you've got a handicap and you you can work with that you can work around it and let's say a week out from mr. Olympia if it's just things I'm a little town you look so terrible that you don't want to compete then drop out there mate don't do it now let's see what we can do so there's a lot of exercises I couldn't do I have a lot of therapy on the injury to try and get the swelling down and everything like that so there was definitely less than ideal going into that conscious which I managed to win and the same or not the same but very similar thing happened in 1997 had two big injuries in my career and they were both coming into a contest because I just pushed myself too much going into a contest my problem was never needed any never needed anyone to tell me to push harder or I needed somebody actually to say hey like bring it down a little bit so I was still training with the same intensity and trying to still the kind of lift the same weights getting ready for a contest as I was doing in the offseason and of course getting ready for a contest you're lowering your calorie level you're losing body fat you're probably slightly dehydrated you're more exhausted you're not sleeping properly you're doing more cardio all these things became too much stress and you know now I know in hindsight that's why I got injured so I advise people now that I coach for contests to like change the training going into a contest so twice I had to deal with the very and that's the second injury was career-ending right it was three weeks before the mr. Olympia tricep tendon tear on the left elbow here and literally now I couldn't train nothing no weight training for three weeks and it was the same thing like you can't compete you're gonna have to drop out why it would tell you can compete well the thing was I didn't tell anybody right my wife knew obviously my training partner of the gym and two friends of mine that I trusted are the only ones that I told because I don't want to become public knowledge because then when I went onstage people will be really looking for it yeah you know I'm so if they don't know about it it's better and there was no internet then it would be impossible to keep this a secret now if I injured myself in a gym and somebody heard and I'll be on the internet within two minutes but then you could kind of keep things under wraps so I didn't even tell anybody and going into the concert all I did for that concert last three weeks with cardio no weight training which is not you know for a bodybuilder that's that's very strange yeah and when that conscious as well you wasn't at my best because of all these factors going in I don't believe I was at my best but I won the contest so the two injuries getting ready for a contest with the probably the biggest hurdles that to overcome in the whole of my training career and what was your did your mindset going into that that final Olympia then were you just adamant that because kids you know it must have been like I suppose even in bodybuilding you know having your arms swirled up I understood that yeah I was you know just syringe some blood out where I had a friend that was a physio so we had like a big balloon device that goes over your arm and it inflates and deflates so it's constantly pumping all the time to try to get moved that fluid out of the injury I had that on for like a couple of days like sitting in the room and then the night before the contest he came to my room and it was still kind of swollen around the elbow so he put a syringe in there and just pulled out a lot of blood and fluid so it was less visible it was still a bit black and blue actually and I try to cover it with a tan but you see very slightly I went into that contest in a state that I'd never been before vulnerable feeling weak and vulnerable not even being able to practice my posing because I was scared to like pose too hard it could I didn't know the extent of the injury till I went to the States because funnily enough in England we had MRI machines but they were like a tunnel right in a New York to have an open one and I was so big I couldn't even fit my shoulders into this MRI in England so we went to New York and they said basically you got like a 95% detachment of attendants so it's hanging on by a little a little bit so you better be very careful so even posing I was nervous and I didn't carry that energy that I normally had of like invincibility of power of energy that a couple of people have said I think Chris Cormier is compete against me and flex wheeler they said they could feel that almost of like a force field around me that energy was so high and that's that's their words that's how I felt and going to 97 I didn't feel like that at all I couldn't train I was worried about even on stage further damaging this or something like that so not my new usual confidence and level going into that at all it was very hard for me to focus and after that then was that essentially your bodybuilding career well I didn't know if it was wasn't I had surgery after this after the contest to reattach the tendon and it was successful in that it reattached but the surgeon told me the tendon was very badly torn and some of the muscle was torn as well so not only was it functionally weak it looked a little different as well well I was hoping for the best outcome and I was thinking actually going into 97 before the injury I was thinking it's getting to be a job now I was losing that passion that drive and not surprising in the way I've applied myself and like miss town everything else in life because of this goal so I was feeling like I'm gonna need a change so and I'm not sure how long I want to do this but after the injury and not being at my best I thought if I have the surgery and everything is great I would like to do one more because I'd almost like to redeem myself and go out on you know on a better note but after the surgery in a couple months you know rehabbing and I'll start training it was pretty obvious to me that there was a big strength in balance now between the left and right side which made it impossible to train in the way I wanted to train and train for mr. Olympia so that was it my decision was made and now this was traumatic because this was a decision out of my hands yeah I would have liked us I strategize and planned everything through my career every contest everything and people tried to sway me this way and that way and the other and they always wanted me to compete in the Arnold Classic contests which is a big show and good prize money what I knew that that was in the middle of the earner throw mail for the mr. Olympia which was always my goal to be mr. Olympia so everything I planned and strategized and did myself and now it's like boom you're finished and it is you know you can't control the situation and that was very difficult for me what what's that been like mentally like having so much focus on how you're going to be told it's over and you can't do anything about it devastating I mean I you know I went into a really deep depression to be honest and it wasn't just the retirement forced retirement from body bill there was other factors in my life that were going on but they all seemed to happen at the same time I almost didn't know who I was like without this without this all-encompassing go I don't know what's gone I'm know what am I gonna do now what really what am I gonna do and Who am I and it took some time to answer those questions how long did it take you - I guess rebase yourself and say well set yourself a new goal and I did so it was just an ongoing process well I think I really couldn't put a time on it you know after some time I said stop focusing on what you've lost focus on what you've gained what have you gained you've gained freedom now all the things that you couldn't do before you couldn't stay up at night you couldn't do this you couldn't travel you couldn't go on holiday all these things the world's you can do what you want now so I started to slowly realize that and discover that did you did your sort of thought process play a big part in I guess did you you must have mentally struggled for a while and then did you have to start training your mind like he did your body to sort of focus on what you wanted again yeah almost and I had to you know was involved in supplement business so I had some duties for that which was still keeping were traveling and I think through this dark period what saved me as I always went to the gym right so I always had that that out I was still training but now is just really for my health mental health more than like a goal so I was going and you know going to the gym and you got contact with the guys the gym I'll do my workout so you feel a bit better exercise is so important for your for your mental health I think if people have depression problems and so on and they don't exercise as you got it it doesn't matter what you do as long as you're exercising you get those neurotransmitters up your dopamine and everything like that I don't think it matters what you do with your running lifting weights or doing yoga or whatever but I think is important to do something and human beings are meant to move yeah you know our body's meant to work it's meant to move and the more you wait and move away from nature I think the worst it is for us yeah did you get depressed oh absolutely very depressed for I don't know what period of time it's like it was very intense and it slowly eased off as I involved myself in the business and realised that there's other things to do I can go out and socialize don't go to nightclubs and all this stuff I couldn't do before so I kind of like got a bit into that you know party scene and going out and was a distraction I suppose I mean I had fun until it wasn't fun anymore and I was doing something else yeah but throughout everything I never stopped training and I think that's really what saved me from being worse yeah and it sounds like you decided to focus on although you could have focused on what you'd lost which is yeah probably an amazing career you were focusing on what you could do yes yeah and who is Dorian right outside over this goal and outside of being mr. Olympia because it almost it becomes like you are representative for the sport it becomes entwined in your identity yeah but you can't play that role forever so what role do you play now and that took me a time to find that out yeah because it's I guess it's again I can only compare it to business but I guess the business or the career becomes who you are and you lose especially when the to the extreme that I did it I didn't have time or focus for really anything else I had some interest and one of the first things I did when I realize you've got time now you know you got time got a bit of money behind you now from a career and everything so you can do what you want and I went down to South Africa and when I was so far away for a couple of weeks because I always had a passion for animals and wildlife and so I was one of the first things I did which I wouldn't allow myself to do before because it was too much time out my schedule has no gyms in the you know the savanna in in Africa so slowly got in you know to enjoy my flexibility yeah my freedom yeah well that takes time as well to be flexible like because you're so regimented for so many years I used to do this mental exercise which used to drive me crazy because it was automatic and I wanted to stop doing it I'd go into a restaurant and whatever meal was in front of me I would be doing mental calculations so steak there 200 grams of steak that's how much protein and that some of the calories there and cut shut up man you don't need to do that anymore [Laughter] did you did you think did you have to replace some of those habits and rituals with other ones because you sound like you're a fairly sort of habitual Richard yeah I suppose I have over over the times now I have some routine in the morning where I do breathing exercises and meditation and of course I do my physical exercise they do yoga a couple of times a week I do some functional training once or twice a week and I do cycling at outdoors here of the mountains so at least five days a week I'm doing something physical so that's kind of my routine and I have my routine time to do emails and phone calls and stuff like that but I also now have flexibility in there like you know I've got free time sometimes and don't do things at certain times so I'm more flexible well I learned the value of having structure and having routine whatever it's for so I still keep it yeah and I've read that you you you your belief now is that you know kind of things where you meant to go you know you attract these things into your own into your life absolutely it's all about energy and that's what I was doing not as consciously as I understand it now that's what I was doing for mr. Olympia I mean or for bodybuilding it was all I was thinking about what is the most important thing was for thinking about and focusing on and literally to the point of obsession I suppose but few people that I admire they were obsessed with what they were doing like um since I was a kid I've been a huge fan of Bruce Lee and he was super focused I remember this story that I heard Dan you know from France's wearing name properly done in a son so he used to be trained or trained with Bruce Lee anyway they got this wooden man you know with the little arms coming out and everything so Bruce's practice and a move on there bum bum bum bum bum um for you know whatever an hour or something and Dan said to him that's like that's perfect you're not gonna get any better than that as I know it's not perfect yet so carried on doing it I said so I went out you know do some chores and stuff come back a couple of hours later guys still there the floor is soaking with sweat and eventually it stops I said now it's perfect and another story I like is about Jimi Hendrix is not a sports person but it was outstanding of what it did or the best guitar player of all time he used to take his guitar in a toilet when I was taking a crap we had a guitar with it like as part of his body like yeah so I enjoyed those stories about people that were obsessively focused but you've got to be in order to do something really unusual yeah that takes unusual focus yeah how do you now with your decisions about where you go and yeah I've come in where I heard or what ready for it was about you need you had an idea about when it's a go in a certain direction I think was to do a yoga teacher or something and he just he kind of you know the right situations yeah what happened is I decided that would be good to do yoga and instead of going into you know a studio or something like this I'm I'm just gonna focus no I want to do a yoga and I'm looking for a good teacher and just put that out there and I spoke to a few people I just spoke to a friend of mine it's all yeah and then I know this girl she does yoga and we did one together and it was great and that's that's how that came about and getting all the little kinks and what tight areas are and lack of mobility and flexibility that you get from doing years of weight training although I did do some stretching for legs and so on so probably I started with a better base but my mobility was was pretty bad like as far as being able to rotate and things like that cuz you never do that at all and my balance was terrible I couldn't stand on one foot without falling over all the time and because I had also taken in that kind of mentality from the gym I remembered trying to do the tree pose where as you're standing on one foot and doing things and I kept like fall and oh I love [ __ ] okay yogi teachers like durian [ __ ] is not a yoga word stop trying so hard just relax and breathe and and do it don't try to get to the end because that's you know what I'm used to doing so in yoga is if you try too hard you just make it harder so you're gonna learn to relax and I'll learn that's kind of like life when the stressful periods come along with start to tense up and I get and it doesn't really it doesn't really help you know I also tried to like that stormy period comes try to like relax a little bit through it so I think I took a bit of that I'm not saying them 100% an expert on that yet still get stressed out but it's I handle it a lot better than I used to I guess it's like using that energy like you did in your training you know you had that aggression from your children yeah channel ban yeah and once you used it I don't know what that alchemy how come here turning on something in one thing into something else yeah it sounds like you've done that yeah yeah yeah I guess I learned early on to do that and early on writing it yeah and early on I learnt to kind of have to look after myself so I had that independence there yeah and so on my training is totally different now but my lifestyle and my goals and needs are different also so I've learned to be more flexible and I think most of the people I know in the bodybuilding game they just continue to do that training because it's what you know it's what you're familiar with and maybe at some point they need to consider some other things as well yeah as you get older having huge muscle mass is not the main thing you need more mobility and flexibility and making sure you don't have joint pains I've got pretty badly damaged AC joint I had torn by support on tricep very little cartilage in the left knee from rola leg training I did some wear and tear on my hip well it happens absolutely no discomfort no pain no anything and my mobility and everything is greatly improved I've been doing yoga for about two and half three years so just feel great I feel my body feels you know I couldn't do pretty much anything apart from lifting heavy weights because my shoulder joints damaged so I don't do that yeah it sounds like you've always been a bit of an innovator like even back in the 40 building days your your style your look yeah your approach on camera and even now and I suppose if you put it back again the power those in business you know you you can't stand still and you've always been you've always seem to have done things against the grain yeah that's pretty much it dorian does the things his way and i always ask why that's a big thing with me why squats are the best things relax everyone says why i let me try to do something else oh I did believe that until squats I damaged my hip so I had to try and do something else and I discovered you can do it another way you don't need to do squats and everybody was training six days a week and then 20 sets and all this stuff from the Arnold area and it didn't make sense to me I read Arthur Jones's writings who is the guy that build the Nautilus machines and looked into the real science of muscle building and so on and Mike Mansur of course that carried on that high-intensity training so it made logical sense to me and then when I applied it in the gym I've very in keeping notes and so on I've got very good feedback from day one I noticed that if I increase by train more often or I've increased the volume in the gym and the time in a gym I stop progressing I stopped okay so let me take a couple of days rest and go back to a more abbreviated routine on a train three days a week no more than an hour warm start growing again so there's the feed baby three days a week I was training initially when I first started training because I was working a job as well and I couldn't recover training more often than that that's what the feedback showed me so I listened to it later on trainer for mr. Olympia I was training four days a week and maximum one hour in the gym what is it people struggle with that because they don't understand the key the key to stimulating muscle growth is the intensity of the exercise and the fact that you're progressively overloading and you're giving your body something that it's not used to and it needs to react muscle growth is just a reaction to a stress that the body's trying to protect it's all from so you're giving it stress you making lifts these weights and work - it's out of its normal capacity so now it's going to try to build itself a little bigger a little stronger to cope with that stress in the future so that's very basically the process that's three to four days a week and that's that's quite incredible you know looking at some of the training programs yeah now I guess you've built the beast I say you know proofs in the pudding as they say this is a good lesson there because I was going into the gym and absolutely hammering with intensity not with volume with intensity - absolute failure positive failure negative failure static failure absolute failure destroying the muscle then you need to go and rest right yeah this is the process stimulate overload recovery after recovery after recovery over compensation growth okay so if that recovery period is not sufficient you're not going to grow if that stimulus period is not sufficient you're not going to grow so there needs to be a balance between all that intensity and recovery period so if you're going in and you're training legs and you're hammering your legs and you're breaking them down and you're damaging it and they saw right and then four days later you go and train them again and they're still sore still damaged how are you gonna get any we're not really getting anywhere or you again you know your body as I said you're a year and a half whatever you do is going to work and after that then you need to get smart about what you're doing and would that apply to say you know someone like a female that just wants to get you know a nice bikini body or a guy who just you know wants to she you know sharpen up a bit with those say if you want to build muscle this is the best way to do it if that's your goal so if you're a lady that wants to build muscle which will help you lose body fat by the way ladies yeah because when you build muscle it's like putting a bigger engine in a car just sitting there ticking over it requires more fuel so instead of starving yourself to try to lose fat what's gonna happen when you starve yourself you generally lose muscle as well so now your metabolisms are getting slower so that's why you just get into this whole cycle of losing weight putting weight back on destroying your metabolism if you're a lady and I want to lose fat build the muscle use weight training to build them all and then you will be burning the fat because you require more color as you put a bigger engine in your car so whether you're a woman a man doesn't matter the same principles apply what will be a variable factor in there is your recovery ability so somebody may have out to train legs and be fully recovered and able to go in there after six days or seven days that's about average I would say if you train really hard what somebody else might have a full recovery system genetically so they need to rest a bit longer somebody else might be super recover they might be able to train more frequently so there's a variable factor in there that you have to take into account a person's metabolism their lifestyle are they taking performance-enhancing steroids and things like that which enhance your recovery all these factors need to be addressed but in any case that's the structure stimulus recovery growth so needs to be sufficient stimulus there needs to be sufficient recovery period and materials to build with ie you diet and then your body can get bigger and stronger so that's that you know there's a basic format yeah but for the average person who's just wants to you know get in shape yeah what piacere then you could read doing more is probably not going to help you at all less is better apart from effort and intensity so average person split your body into three workouts Monday Wednesday Friday choose the photos that they've got non-consecutive days train your whole body over one week and that's a good starting point right maybe you can do or more maybe you can do less and you need feedback to see that so if you've got a trainer that's why you should be doing or if you're doing it yourself make notes see you know are you progressing or you only once you get to be very advanced yeah you've almost reached your potential so these gains are going to be very very small well I'm talking about somebody that's not at that stage first year or second year of training yeah if you've trained for a month and you've seen zero progress on your weights on your reps on everything what's going to happen next month exactly the same right so if you haven't progressed for a month something needs to change don't keep doing you're gonna keep getting what you're getting right if you don't progress in a month do exactly the same the next month you will get exactly the same results zero so you need to reassess things if you're not progressing something needs to change what it may be it's your diet maybe need more rest whatever that factor is you need to look at it and try and find out what it is and with your cardio would you get that in the way that your training is oh I've seen some of your workouts in you you know you don't seem to have any oxygen left do anything is that leg work I was definitely cardio taxing yeah well I'd probably do a couple of separate cardio workouts as well and what I'm been doing now and what I believe is the best way to do cardio because long drawn-out cardio has a negatives to it yeah if you're running you're wearing your joints also you you know you're producing free radicals when you exercise so if you can get the benefits of increased cardiovascular efficiency without producing too much and without wearing yourself out too much that'll be the way to do it and what I've been doing is intervals different time periods but one example is like one minute moderate cardio so you could use a rowing machine you could do the cross trainer my favorite is the the air bike the spin which because this you're pushing pulling and you're using your legs at st. so every muscle is working on there that's what I like about [ __ ] hate it this is so taxing yeah so I do a minute you know normal moderate pace and then 20 seconds absolutely like your life depends on it absolutely all-out twenty seconds and then you drop that down to a minute normal again do that about five times what's that five minutes and so like six and a half seven minutes amazing cardio workout that's all you need to do a couple of times a week trust me you'll hear it from the scientists in a few years time yeah yeah sure you apply I know they talk about hit now I was doing hit weight training yeah but now you got hit interval cardio and I think that's more efficient than the long cardio as well unless you've practiced in a scale of like swimming kickboxing or something where you need to do repetitive movements and get that pathway in your brain then that's more skill that's more practice but I'm talking about just the efficiency I think you can get it in very short bursts yeah and who wants to be all day on in a gym you know yeah just get in let's get it done and get out well I think someone to be to your level saying that you know if you want to get in shape three to four times a week is you know apart from the intense so the main thing that I hear from people is I don't have time and I say to them if I had you for 45 minutes twice a week I will transform you that's all I need as long as you do the homework eating properly and resting and all this stuff I would get you I do probably ten minutes interval cardio like that and thirty minutes fast paced to failure weight training and that would probably work much better than going in four or five times a week and piddling about yeah and and being in the gym for Oh a gym trainer for two hours you know you wasn't training for two hours because if you're train with me training you will be begging to get out of there after 30 minutes and I won't allow you to have your [ __ ] phone with you either no no that's very interesting and there's some yeah I guess there's a lot of sort of you know fitness trends that come out all the time but I think that that you know I've trained for years thirty years and you know I probably do too much to be honest if you get one of those kettlebells didn't do I in the past I was doing kettlebell swings for ten minutes as many reps as you could do for ten minutes so I would do maybe 15 switch to this one 15 maybe another 15 another 15 and put it down and breathe and my goal was to do three hundred three hundred reps over time so never taught me more than like ten minutes ten and a half minutes and that was an amazing workout and I've had bodybuilders tried to do that with me and I just they couldn't complete it they couldn't finish ten minutes after five minutes they were on the floor they couldn't breathe Wow so you don't need a lot of time if you did that cut if you did that cuttlebone workout twice a week yeah if that's all you had time for twenty minutes a week you'd have amazing fitness and also some muscular development on the quads and the glutes and lower back and everything because if thrown away top so when you're now like you know late forties fifth year olds the same principles apply again you know just someone like yourself outside of your yoga what it if you're asking me of body building muscle building of specific training then yes yeah but you may have to adapt it because you may have some physical injuries or limitations as you're getting older so you have to adapt certain exercise you may not be able to do and but the same the principles still apply yeah yeah okay so a couple of questions and I'm and I'm done but just before that I know you a couple of different businesses I wonder whether you just be able to share a little bit about what what they are okay so my main business is their DUI nutrition which I've just relaunched with a shadow line that's the bodybuilding line super high quality bodybuilding or sports line if you like and we're also working now in the background on a health and wellness line because kind of that's what I'm interested in now and that's what I've studied more rather than the bodybuilding are that's my past and I already know that quite well so there's almost two Dorian's as the bodybuilder and there's the Dorian now that's into health and wellness and it's very knowledgeable on that and as I'm doing it I'm doing it right so and I've got my old regime with herbs and antioxidants and vitamins and things like that that I do so I decided that it would be good to kind of develop that and offer that to people that need that they're into that maybe guys that are over 40 and guys or or women it doesn't matter so we've got the shadow line which is the bodybuilding line if you like and we're developing something at the moment we call it balance line you know I'm all about balance now really with my life so we're gonna call that the balance line so that's the you are nutrition and keeping pretty busy at the moment cuz I'm traveling a lot for promotions and just on that product like there's a lot there's a ton of different supplements and markets and you read a lot about the quality of them and in some of them you know they're not great what what's different about yours in terms of the quality of the ingredients and what your involvement in well first of all I got my name on it yeah right so I can't hide and I got pride in my name so I wouldn't want to accept anything less than the highest quality ingredients in there where there's other companies out there let's call it ABC brand they're there just to make a quick buck they're there to make as much profit as possible I'm in business so I have to make profit of course but I want to offer the best quality product to the customers and I'm accountable I'm Dorian Yates I can't disappear whereas other people that run supplement company they can you know they can shortchange their customers and make a quick buck and disappear no they're not accountable so that happens quite a lot in in this industry right and you make where do you make it It's Made in Europe various locations in Europe at the moment and we're looking possibly to manufacture in the States because we've got such a huge demand yeah coming from there now so we'll probably go there eventually maybe later of 2019 or next year to manufacture there for that market and where if people are interested in that where do they go to to get in touch about DeWine attrition calm you can find that so that's my main business and of course I do limited amount of personal training clients right I do that and I've got a certification course as well dya chai tea which is for personal trainers so the idea is that you come you spend a week with me and you learn hands-on in person all my principles practical in the gym you also have a study guide which is all the theory and we have an exam at the end so a personal trainer can be certified in my training methods and it's interesting because we did quite we did some in the States we did some here and a lot of the guys that went there good you know a good personal trainers and I've been training my clients on your method and I've read all your books I've seen the videotape I read everything and I thought I knew what I didn't quite know everything until I did it with you so the idea is that they can first hand learn off me and then they can go and train other personal trainers pass it down to personal trainers and obviously to the clients as well and make sure that it's being taught correctly because there's a lot of misconceptions and mistakes that people make the the training form is very precise although people under you know may have seen me listing lifting some heavy weights like yeah I was very strong I did lift some heavy weights but I could have lifted heavier weights if that was my goal yeah I heard about that you didn't although you're known for being crazy on weights you didn't lift super heavy weights is that is that true Oh what's a super heavy weight its relative what you're a butt I mean compared to your potential you you you lifted a lot but it was more about how you did it exactly it's more about using that weight as at all right in order to put maximum stress on the muscles that I'm trying to stimulate whereas for instance a power lifter his job is different his job is to get this way from A to B by any means possible that's his job but was the body bill that would be a mistake because you're not you you're trying to bring momentum into the movement you're trying to bring as many muscle groups as you can into the movement you're trying to shorten the movement right so body broadening is was almost opposite to the way a weight lifter or power lifter would would lift the weight I have my clients really slowing down the negative portion of the rep being conscious and slowing down the negative portion of the rep most people tip through that for instance they do a bench press right I've got one down got two and the negative phase of the rep is at least as important as a positive and I argue possibly more as I think more muscle damage occurs on the negative and it's a damage to repair that causes a growth so we couldn't debate that but anyway it's at least as important as the positive and so most people they missing half the rep right all the time because they're kind of not concentrate on the negative as as much as I should do would you say they're putting on a probably more weight on them what they need which potentially could create injury as well most people that come to train with me their weights go down well yeah because I have them doing things correctly so they'll be using less weight but the muscles will be receiving more stimulus and they'd the calm in the next day and they're like my back mate I can't move it yet you were using 30 or 40 percent less weights than they normally do because normally you have to run it around you using momentum you're pulling you you know everything you move your heart you missing half the movement is zipping through the negative you're not holding the contraction you're not squeezing so it's all in the details right and that's why I don't need to do a lot of volume and a lot of sets because each one is milked to the maximum every aspect of it and that's what you'll get on the on your hit certification yeah we're currently in the process of planning some dates for later in the it's been as I say very busy with the nutrition company but I think we'll try and get a couple of camps in later in the year in Spain so people come to Spain I stay here and the beautiful weather yeah we're trained together learn from me we get to hang out a little bit have lunch and dinner and so on so it's a it's a nice experience and use it as like six people in the group so they get to bond and suggested schools yeah because I train I do everything personally myself right so I train a maximum of three people in one session there in the day and then three people later in the day so six people in a week so you've got really you've got my personal attention all the time how do they get if they're interested in sort of applying for that how would they deal wih 30.com where you can go online and have a look there and we'll announce some dates soon right so those you know those are the main things that I'm doing that business was right I'll put those in the will put those in the show notes so great and can get in touch we on that one and so yeah just two two questions and one I'm just gonna sort of go back because I know it's a big part of what you do but they're the the the subject of concentrating and focusing on what you want in life what if you know if you if someone's probably not done a good job and they're you know they're maybe they want to start competing in Fitness or doing something for the business what have you learned over the years about the power of the mind and how almost like if you looked at your week any goal what was some of the simple things you should do how much time in a day should you be focusing on your goals and you know any lessons that we could sort of share with people that you I think it's important to maybe like focus once a day on your goals and it doesn't need to be like over through there all day about it but you're just reminding yourself every day what's important to where you want to be and honest with yourself and what that requires you know you couldn't shamelessly dream but I want this big boat or I want this I want there I'm just talking about material things could be anything well I'll go back to great but how are you gonna achieve it so you need a plan and you need to I think daily reinforce how important that is to and you know what you've got to do and are you willing to do that yeah that's being honest with yourself there's not the easiest thing to do but you've got to try and do that and yeah just reinforcing it daily it is a good practice yeah probably in the morning when you get up it's good before all the day hits you it's a good time to focus on things if you're going to meditate as well it's a good time because it's kind of setting yourself up for the day your energy level so if you go out the door in a more positive mood the world will treat you back in a more positive mood yeah you'll find people reacted differently if you're you know if you're feeling good your energy up you're feeling happy people are pick up on that and the opposites true people might avoid that guy yeah so it's a lot to do with your energy which if you're conscious you can be in control of that someone and do you when you did it and when you is in that position did you ever because I guess one of the things that when you think in and imagine it there's there's believing that you'll get it and almost like just being relaxed in some way that I'm I've meditated I've thought about it I'm gonna get it done here for that like someone's gonna take it away and still being in that anger of you do you kind of do get that feeling in your body where like yeah relaxed yeah relaxed confident that you're going to do it if you're gonna go out with fear of something you're almost like attracting that something toward you because it's what you're focusing on if you're focusing I'm gonna be broke I'm um when we're broke are you if you're gonna stay broke alright okay I'm having a hard time now but this this this and I will get out of this and let's focus on that let's feel confident and it's gonna have a much like better likelihood of happening so you just got you almost got to put out that any doubt haven't you I suppose in like picturing it and then the being aware that you do have that doubt because often we're not really aware of our thoughts really and I think that's where meditations has helped me it kind of slows down your thought process so you can almost like see these negative thoughts coming in you're like oh no you don't yeah stopping you there whereas before they might have got in there a little bit more so I think with the meditation it almost kind of slows down the way you're thinking and calms down your thoughts so that you can recognize them a little bit more push them out yeah and stop them stopping them at the door yeah yeah we used to do on the door stop mean before they get in trouble good point I'll use that on so so find a question in Dori and escape your limits is about escaping what you or other people have believed is impossible and made it possible we've obviously talked about a load of those things but what what st. recently where you've escaped your own personal limits reduce I'd like to say it's almost like I had a whole lifestyle change that that happened that could have been difficult it wasn't really but it could have been difficult in that I stepped away from what was familiar the body building training that was and Dyer and everything a lifestyle that was trying to continue because that's what I was familiar with and I like to Train and that's what the training started like my injuries are slowly getting a little bit worse and I thought how is this gonna go if I keep doing this you know maybe when I'm like 60 I'm not gonna lift on my arm or something so what was that I feel a little tight around the hips and everything so that's when the whole yoga idea came to me and following on from that I think of the yoga and meditation then I started reassessing my diet like why am i following a high protein bodybuilding diet now and like all the research and reading I'm doing his points and that's probably not the best thing to do really especially is it getting older I mean it's a stress to take it a ton of protein through your system so I changed the diet as well and this consequently I lost muscle mass because now I'm not it's not required I'm doing yoga I'm riding my bike but it doesn't need this muscle mass so I'm coming down in muscle mass which I think a lot of body builders are uncomfortable with especially if you're mr. Olympia right you know you your epitomizing bodybuilding your the you know is six times mr. Olympia surely you're supposed to look like this big all your life but I thought other people would expect that a lot of people would expect that and I could easily feel very pressured in to keep doing that because will people still like me yeah all the people still accept me well people still want to buy my products and we're still you know there's all that I think goes through people's mind but I did it I stepped out of my comfort zone and I've talked to people about it and I've shared it and actually it was my wife I did I was doing yoga and my instructor took a picture I'm they doing the splits I was able to do the splits right so a lot pretty impressive well I thought now nobody's gonna be interested in that no it's keep to myself people just want to see me old videos of me lifting weights and everything and then I got a message from a friend of mine Larry old me I didn't know you could do the splits I was like I can but how the [ __ ] do you know it's like oh it's on the Instagram so I had a bit of a word of my wife I was like why did you put that on Instagram I don't on that on there it's just slow relax look at you okay the comments and other looks and people were loving it and so I think not that it should be super important to me but people did accept it they were interested and a lot of people got in touch with me guys in their forties and fifties that we knew weights for years and they got pains and they got these and they've started doing the ogor and they've started meditating and they you know they're grateful that I put it out there that was doing it so I mean made it seem as though it was kind of masculine you know mink and dude that sort yeah we got body builders going to yeah when I went I go to a class on the weekends and when I went it was just me and a lot of girls now there's a few guys coming from the gym because they see that I'm doing it and so they get curious and yeah somehow it maybe it's more acceptable now because I did it already and I think it's very beneficial for people especially as you getting older yeah I'm sure the young Darian wouldn't have listened because it's like how's that gonna give me a bigger legs or something I don't I don't need it but for general health all these practices are great and nothing that's what you need to be more concerned with when you get an older rather than projecting some image to the outside world that it's not beneficial to yourself yeah I think it's a lot of ego kind of gets caught up in you know there's look there's being fair and healthy but then there's also what it looks like and I think there on carries some of that with you and do things you probably shouldn't do like you know like kids and steroids you know you know young kids taking those thinking they're gonna get a body when as you know even as you said if genetically you not got some of those things you're never going to look like you know how much you need to do some period even if you're going to compete you need to do some period of training with that steroids first just to get to know your body and get to know how to do things properly yeah yeah we're doing this it's been wonderful great conversation let's Janice thanks I could have talked for hours but I know you've got other things to do so thank you very much thanks [Music]

Channel: Escape Fitness

Views: 1,433,839

Rating: 4.7628598 out of 5

Keywords: Escape, Fitness, dorian yates, bodybuilding, bodybuilder, mr olympia, muscle, arnold schwarzenegger, lee haney, frank zane, confidence, determination, belief, escape your limits, podcast

Id: li7iY6g2Qdc

Length: 92min 38sec (5558 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 31 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/Poptartx]

he didnt train for 3 weeks prior to the 97 olympia because of tricep tear and still won lol

[u/malibuflex]

Does he say he was on only 500mg test again? Rather not listen to a bunch of bulkshit again

[u/Best_Natty_Calves]

Hell yes! Thank you for posting this!

[u/[deleted]]

in just 6 months of planning we get the podcast

[u/dopamine_dependent]

Dorian is the man. Love hearing his perspective on life, training, etc. Great post.

[u/IPAisGod]

Godfather of the Bubbleguts