A Natural Bodybuilding Hero
Patience, Hard Work and a Positive Attitude for a Healthy Mind Body Connection with 2x World Title Holder, Pete Hartwig
Kenny: What do you think about the physiques going back as far as the 50s? For example, do you think the muscular development that Steve Reeves possessed can be attained naturally? Whether Steve himself was or wasn't natural is besides the point. This is a highly debated subject, and I have my own opinion, but I think this can be a valuable topic to discuss, especially for those who have been training for less than ten years.
Pete: Steve was the Pinnacle of the silver era and looking at his physique he doesn't look ballooned out like many of todays modern era mass monsters. Steve was very well developed and so it's impossible to tell if he did or didn’t use PED’s. He's not excessively over developed to the point where it’s clear that he conclusively did take PED’s, but I think his physique is something that could be very attainable to achieve naturally. If you have the genetics, the work ethic and the knowledge of how to do it, I think it’s absolutely possible. I do think it would take quite a long time to build a physique like Steve, but I think the other thing to consider is, when people have a very aesthetic physique it can be related to the shape of their muscles as well, so sometimes you can have these really round looking muscle bellies that have very long insertion points and short tendons, so it can give you this “cartoonish” sort of look, genetically that’s their gift. When you fill out a frame like this it just looks amazing, and I think people assume that someone who solely has good looking muscle bellies must be on PED’s.
