Mr Olympia Phil Heath has arms borrowed from the Incredible Hulk

Heath

Mr Olympia Phil Heath gives Adelaide Doherty, 4, a lift. Picture: Craig Borrow HWT Image Library
Sign up for your free 2 month trial

It is, he matter-of-factly admits, an “Adonis physique”, envied by men and desired by women.

And if it means exercising like mad and eating a small restaurant worth of food each day? Well, Phil has the hunger, and he has bodybuilding’s ultimate accolade, the Mr Olympia title Arnold Schwarzenegger won seven times.

“I’m not trying to be average,” Phil says, and the tale of the tape backs him.

Arms 56cm.

Calves 50cm.

Thighs 79cm.

This weekend, at the FitX Sport and Fitness Expo, Phil will sign autographs and shake hands, but will need some arm-twisting to take off his shirt.

Out of competition, he is not quite perfect. It is scary to think how he must look when he is fit because he looks scary now.

The 32-year-old one-time University of Denver basketballer has put almost 10 years, and an unspeakable amount of food, into his shape, and the game’s all about looks.

“I eat seven, if not eight, times a day. Every two hours, I’m usually eating,” Phil says.

That includes about 3kg of protein – meat, fish, chicken, whatever, and a lot else besides. That, and a 76cm waist.

“It is just something that people have never seen, never understand,” he says.

“If they see a guy like me walking down the street, they might be scared.” Or not.

“Some ladies like muscle,” says Phil.

“It is always the mystique behind the muscle.”

At Doherty’s Gym, a morass of muscle, Phil stands out but also fits in perfectly.

Around him, more meat than a Four’N Twenty pie factory, most of it imported for the expo.

At 180kg, walking tall on size 17 feet, is Pennsylvania’s Mike Jenkins, 29, now ranked the world’s strongest man and described as “a human forklift”.

Even at 10 he was a fair piece of work, 100kg and banned from contact sport with kids his age.

“I played college football and after that I needed something to do,” he says.

“It started as weekends for fun and it’s turned into this.”

At the Arnolds two weeks ago – a competition named after the Terminator cum governor – he broke world records in three of the five disciplines.

He hauled a 400kg frame up an 11m incline in a touch over seven seconds because he could and because, he says, it’s fun!

“If it wasn’t fun, I wouldn’t do it,” he points out.

FitX Sport and Fitness Expo will be held today and tomorrow, 10am-5pm, at the Melbourne Exhibition Centre.