Plague of Strength

Bear in mind when you run down the list of historical “it” lifters and fighters, you are reading a list curated by people you probably would beat the shit out of if you ever had the misfortune to end up at some weird “all time celebrity potluck dinner” or whatever that silly mental exercise is we like to play is called. Like Harold Poole, Vic Downs is a guy who got fucked by the AAU’s beauty pageant standards, the Weiders, and random happenstance, but whose name is definitely worth knowing in spite of his near-total obscurity and having never won anything of note because he was the first modern heavyweight bodybuilder of whom I know.

The peeled dude on the left is a bodybuilder of whom you’ve never heard but should have- Vic Downs. That hottie with the body that just won’t quit [**and if you pop those pants off, I’m sure you’ll find a bird that just won’t quit either**] is staring at the floor having just been informed that Joe Wieder fucked him in the ear by handing the trophy to Oliva. Downs had been a bit too publicly honest about the effects of Joe Wieder’s protein on his physique, and Wieder was so pissed about it that he instructed the judges to give the 1967 Mr Universe to Sergio.

Though his fucking by Weider is an interesting anecdote, it’s hardly a reason to learn the man’s name, right? Wrong, because

Vic Downs’ routine was the earliest published bodypart split I’ve ever seen prior to running across the name of Eric Pederson.

Though it’s almost certainly not the OG bodypart split, it has to be one of the forerunners, and using it Downs looked fucking phenomenal and trained at Gold’s in Venice for this contest, tanning and hanging out with Zabo when they weren’t heaving the iron around. He’d tan and train twice a day precontest, and was the first bro to really get tan for a contest (although I’d imagine Zabo would have made the same claim). He had the key to Gold’s and would train earlier than anyone… at six or seven in the morning. Literally everyone else was a corpse at that time in the morning, be it Joe Gold, the notoriously hard-training and hard-partying Zabo, Arnold, Franco, or anyone else. At six or seven in the morning.

So shut the fuck up about your goddamned grind already- literally no one useful is fucking impressed you awoke early to enjoy your fucking hobby.

My hatred of people’s need for validation for having participated in a hobby that in no way affects the lives of others notwithstanding, Vic Downs wasn’t just a crazy jacked, hyper-good-looking bro with a sick tan- in the above pic he was a 38-year-old man with an 18-year-old kid and a wife of 20 years who’d only been lifting for six years. At a time when it was just becoming common in America to purchase your produce and fresh meat in the same store (supermarkets only became predominant in 1960- prior to that, you had to shop at separate green grocers, dry goods shops, and butchers) and when steroids consisted of 5mg dianabol tabs, Vic Downs showed up to the Mr America peeled to the fucking bone and big enough to turn heads even in modern “hardcore” gyms.

As I mentioned, the reason you don’t know this man’s name is that Vic never won a contest in the IFBB after 1966 due to his brutal honesty. A shop owner overheard Vic honestly tell a couple of kids that Weider’s protein had only put fat on his waist and no muscle on his frame and immediately called Weider to rat him out. Thereafter, Weider instructed the judges to push Downs further down the rankings as punishment for his failure to toe the company line.

Though Weider never realized it, Downs could have been a hell of a cash cow, as he was basically the OG Clarence Bass (who I just realized also didn’t started competing until his late 30s), showing people you could get big and ripped when you were on the backside of life at a time when people hardly exercised, nevermind people over 35. And Downs’ method was pretty fucking simple- he trained the exact same way and dieted the same way, without stopping, for ten straight years. At the ten year mark his son died in some sort of tragedy and his life went off the rails, causing his training and diet to falter and his career to finally derail, though Weider’s chokehold on the industry had already seen to that.

Vic Downs Vital Facts

Born: 1929 (I think- if I have that wrong, let me know)

Height: 5’11”

Weight: 226 lbs.

Chest: 49″

Waist: 32″

Upper arm: 19 1/2″

Thigh: 26″

Calves: 16 1/2″

Forearms: 12 1/2″

Vic Downs’ “Always the Bridesmaid and Never the Bride” Contest History

1964

Mr Canada – IFBB, 2nd

1965

Mr Canada – IFBB, Most Muscular, 1st
Mr Canada – IFBB, 2nd

1966

Mr Canada – IFBB,Mr Universe – NABBA, Tall, 3rd (won by Chet Yorton, with Arnold in second, and Vic took the Most Muscular)
Mr World – IFBB, Tall, 3rd

1967

Universe – IFBB, Most Muscular, 1st
Universe – IFBB, Tall, 2nd (the title was handed to Sergio by Ben Wieder on some bullshit)
Mr World – IFBB, Tall, 1st

1968

Universe – IFBB, 7th
Mr Universe – NABBA, Tall, 4th

1969

Pro Mr America – WBBG, 2nd
Universe – IFBB, Tall, 3rd

1970

Pro Mr America – WBBG, 3rd
Universe – IFBB, Tall, 3rd
Mr World – IFBB, Tall, 2nd

1971

Universe – IFBB, Tall, 5th
Mr World – IFBB, Tall, 2nd

What made Downs most impressive wasn’t his age or his royal Weider fucking, but rather his ultra-modern diet and training techniques. At a time when all of the other big deal bodybuilders were at best working with an upper/lower split routine, Downs gave us a glimpse at the watershed moment in which the bodybuilders of Southern California began focusing on bodyparts rather than just planes of movement. Rather than a single exercise per bodypart, like rope climbing for biceps or bench press for chest, Downs explained to Iron Man magazine in 1968 that he’d begun splitting his routine up into a single bodypart per day, training three exercises per muscle group for five sets of 8-12 reps. with between 120 and 210 reps per bodypart, Downs felt like he could get much better growth, as he was stressing his muscles far harder. Additionally, Downs adopted the ultra-fast training style of West Coast bodybuilders, electing to use incredibly short rests and Vince Grionda/Rheo Blair’s low carb diet rather than the five minutes or more rest periods and see-food diets used by odd lifters and Oly lifters at the time- doing so meant that they didn’t have to do cardio.

Which is, of course, not to say that Downs did no cardio. Unlike modern lifters, Downs and his compatriots didn’t fear a good jog- he just preferred to rely on his diet and lifting pace rather than his jogging to dictate his bodyfat levels. Downs ran two miles a day, every day, at a pretty fucking blazing pace of 12 minutes before tucking into his typical breakfast of two dozen eggs (or more, if he was eating breakfast with a fellow bodybuilder who was competing against Downs in an upcoming show- then it would turn into an unofficial egg-eating competition).

Vic Downs 1968 Training Routine

According to a recent interview with Vic, he dieted strict as shit for ten straight years, and never missed a workout. He trained six days a week during that decade, training abs and running every one of those six days- two miles at a six-minute-mile pace and 15 straight minutes of hanging leg raises and hanging crunches

Day One

Weighted Chins- 5×5 x 80lbs

Bent Rows- 5×5

Bent Arm Pullovers- 5×5

Day Two

Lateral Raises- 5×5

Military Press- 5×5

Bent Laterals- 5×5

Day Three

Tricep Press- 5×5

Tricep Pulldown- 5×5

Tricep Extension- 5×5

Day Four

Barbell Curls- 5×5

Dumbbell Curls- 5×5

Concentration Curls- 5×5

Day Five

Bench Press- 5×5

Incline Press- 5×5

Incline Flyes- 5×5

Day Six

Hack Machine- 5×10

Thigh Extension- 5×10

Leg Press- 5×10

Calf Raise- 3×20

Once Vic mentally hung up his trunks (the death of his son really fucked up his head, though he kept competing for another few years), he turned to religion to try to make some sense of his personal tragedy. It was quite a face turn for the man, as he’d hated religion up to that point, but after entering the seminary in 1965 he’s remained in the service of the church on a super low-key Anglican tip. As such, the man is the type of religious individual with whom I could get along- like the badass Bud Jeffries, the dude just tries to be the good guy he believes he’s supposed to be (and I believe one has to be as a transhumanist) and rarely, if ever, brings up his god unnecessarily in the course of conversation (Bud’s never tried to convert me, and Vic Downs didn’t say the word “god” once in a forty-five minute interview)- as they are with lifting, they’re about that life and not about just paying lip service to it, which is super rad.

Vic still trained an hour or hour and a half in morning, six days a week as of 2018. Though he doesn’t go heavy, obviously, he still lifts on machines and dumbbells daily (and laughed about tearing his bicep warming up with a five pound dumbbell recently, because he’s old as fuck).

Don’t let yourself focus too much on just the winners- there is a hell of a lot to be learned by studying the dudes who might not have quite had the genetics to win, because they’re the ones who really had to figure shit out in order to find themselves on top of the podium.

Sources:

Speyrer, Steve.  Forum Post: Vic Downs.  Reprinted from Nov 1968 Iron Man Magazine. Raw-Iron.  29 Nov 2009.  Web.  26 Aug 2020.  http://raw-iron.com/forums/index.php?topic=1048.0

Vic Downs.  Bodybuilding Legends Show.  25 May 2018.  Web.  4 Sep 2020.  https://bodybuilding.libsyn.com/vic-downs-season-6-episode-7

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