Chapter 5

 DIET

 Diet -- by far the most controversial subject in the field of physical training today; and for a very simple reason -- because the fairly recent attention given to this factor has resulted in a literal bonanza of profits for commercially involved interests.

 Twenty years ago, the subject of diet was seldom mentioned in weight-training publications -- and when it was, no great emphasis was placed upon it; but at approximately that point in time, the supposed benefit to be derived from massive amounts of protein was "discovered" -- and the floodgates were opened. Since then, the propaganda devoted to the factor of diet has reached such proportions that it now dominates the entire field of physical training.

 Years ago -- once having been persuaded to purchase a barbell -- most trainees were effectively removed from the category of potential customers; and thus the market was strictly limited -- and no great profits were to be made by anybody. But a box of protein food supplement doesn't last almost

literally forever -- as a barbell does; and secondly, it is far more difficult to judge the quality of a box of powdered food -- if a barbell fails to live up to advertised claims, the shortcoming is obvious, but who can really judge the value of a food supplement?

 Since many bodybuilders are perfectly willing to endure any sort of product -- for money -- it hasn't been difficult for most advertisers to produce all sorts of glowing reports of outstanding results produced by people supposedly using their products; but it might be of interest to note that most such advertisements use the same few people over and over again and it should be of interest to note that such "case histories" are always reported after the fact. That is to say, the people supposedly using these products are always outstanding examples of muscular size -- and the supposed fact that they are using a certain product is never mentioned until after the individuals involved become well-known figures on the body building scene.

 A few weeks prior to the recent Mr. America Contest, a California manufacturer (or "distributor," since I am sure he doesn't make his own products) of food supplements sent Casey Viator a contract offering him $1,000.00 (retail price) worth of these products -- in return for which (and this was clearly stated in the contract), he wanted the unrestricted right to use Casey's pictures and endorsements for publicizing his products. If this offer had been accepted -- which it WAS NOT -- then the bodybuilders of the world would soon have been subjected to a barrage of advertising giving the above mentioned products full credit for Casey's success; while, in fact, Casey has never used any of these products.

 While it is certainly not my intention to imply that diet is of no importance, I do want it clearly understood that the "amount" of food is of far more importance than the actual makeup of the diet -- so long as any reasonable attempt is made in the direction of providing a balanced diet: which points should be obvious to anybody merely from a careful reading of the advertisements for food supplements -- in an advertisement for protein supplements, great stress will be placed on avoiding carbohydrates, but in an advertisement for "fast weight-gaining" supplements, equal stress will be placed on consuming a heavy load of carbohydrates.

 The truth of the matter is, of course, that you require both -- but the barrage of conflicting advertising has now reached such a level that most bodybuilders are hopelessly confused, and many of them end up trying to restrict their diets to pure protein; under the totally mistaken impression that such a diet is a requirement for producing good results.

 The fact of the matter is that the subject of diet is probably the most completely understood factor involved in physical training -- but not by bodybuilders, who have been brainwashed into spending hundreds of millions of dollars on products of little or no value.

 Many people have strongly urged me to stay clear off of the subject of diet in my writings -- since they are fully aware that my simple statement of the facts will surely bring forth a barrage of slings and arrows from outraged commercial interests. In efforts to defend their own positions, it is almost certain that some people who have simply ignored my work up to this point will now feel it necessary to attack me in any way they can.

 But in that regard, at least, I am in a unique situation -- since I really have no positions to defend; I originally became involved in this field simply from personal interest, and my continuing interest hinges strictly on a desire to improve the methods available for producing certain results from exercise -- and I sincerely don't care what the final method turns out to be.

 If the methods that we are now advocating do prove to be the "final answer", well and good -- but if not, then I will be just as satisfied; and while I am fully aware that many people will not believe that statement, I am just as aware that many other people -- the people who really matter to me -- do realize that it is a simple statement of the truth.

 In my primary business -- motion picture production -- the amount of time I have devoted to research into physical training would have produced income far in excess of anything that I can even hope to equal in the field of weight-training; but until quite recently, my interest was strictly in the nature of a hobby -- if, as it happened to be, a very expensive hobby.

 During the last year alone -- while turning down several offers of film work -- I have devoted a total of at least two-thousand hours to directing the training of hundreds of people from all over the country; most of these trainees being young men who came to DeLand because of articles that I have written on the subject of our special weight-training classes -- and few if any of whom are potential customers for my machines. Nor is this merely an attempt to obtain additional research material -- at this stage, we already have far more such information than we actually need; we know what the machines will do, and I have not even bothered to record the training progress of any of our trainees during the last six months -- instead, most of my attention has been directed towards attempts to help sincerely interested trainees.

 But even that statement is subject to misunderstanding -- so I will clarify it; at the moment, research involving the use of Nautilus machines is being conducted in several universities and research foundations -- but this work is under neither my direction nor my control. And when the results of this research are available, all of it will be published in an unedited form -- in Iron Man Magazine and elsewhere.

 In short, my position is such that I literally cannot be hurt by attacks from the commercial interests who will undoubtedly be outraged by my clear statement of the facts -- but they will try, of that I am sure.

 And for the benefit of those people who may wonder why I thus expose myself to such attacks -- when I obviously have nothing to gain by speaking out, when perhaps it might appear that I would be well-advised to remain silent on the subject of diet -- I will add the following; my clear statements on this subject will also outrage some people who are NOT commercially involved, and will be taken by many bodybuilders as clear proof of my ignorance -- and, they will rather naturally assume, if I am so ignorant on the subject of diet then I probably don't know much about anything else either. So speaking out will actually prevent me from reaching the minds of many bodybuilders -- but I am aware of that unavoidable price in advance, and willing to pay it.

 Because -- totally apart from the bodybuilders who have been brainwashed into believing all of the garbage that has been published on the subject of diet -- there are at least a few bodybuilders left in this country that are aware of the truth, intelligent bodybuilders, actually-educated bodybuilders; and if I failed to speak out in defense of the truth, they would rightly regard such a failure as a shirking of duty.

 So -- at least and at last -- it has been said; the results should be amusing, if nothing else.




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