Arnold Schwarzenegger - Gym Motivation - Motivational Speech

Who Is Arnold Schwarzenegger?

Arnold Schwarzenegger was born on July 30, 1947, near Graz, Austria. He rose to fame as the world's top bodybuilder, launching a career that would make him a giant Hollywood star via films like Conan the Barbarian, The Terminator and Total Recall. After years of blockbuster movie roles, Schwarzenegger went into politics, becoming governor of California in 2003. He returned to the big screen after leaving office in 2011, finding success with The Expendables franchise and a return to the Terminator series.

Early Years

Arnold Schwarzenegger was born on July 30, 1947, near Graz, Austria. Schwarzenegger's childhood was far from ideal. His father, Gustav, was an alcoholic police chief and one-time member of the Nazi Party, who clearly favored Arnold's brother over his gangly, seemingly less athletic younger son.

Gustav is reported to have beaten and intimidated Arnold and, when he could, pitted his two boys against one another. He also ridiculed Schwarzenegger's early dreams of becoming a bodybuilder. "It was a very uptight feeling at home," Schwarzenegger later recalled. So uptight and uncomfortable, in fact, that Schwarzenegger would later refuse to attend the funeral of his father, who died in 1972, or his brother, who was killed in a car crash in 1971.

Bodybuilding Champion

As an escape, Arnold turned to the movies, in particular those of Reg Park, a bodybuilder and star in B-level Hercules movies. The films also helped propel Schwarzenegger's own obsession with America, and the future he felt awaited him there. Getting to his new country was the issue. Schwarzenegger found his answer in Joe Weider, the man behind the International Federation of Body Building, an organization that sponsored contests such Mr. Universe and Mr. Olympia.

Weider loved Schwarzenegger's bravado, sense of humor, and the potential he saw in the young bodybuilder. Weider's instincts couldn't have been more dead-on. In all, Schwarzenegger would win an unprecedented five Mr. Universe titles and six Mr. Olympia crowns during his bodybuilding career.

Equally significant, Schwarzenegger, who had immigrated to the United States in 1968, helped propel the sport into the mainstream, culminating in the 1977 documentary, Pumping Iron, which tells the tale of Schwarzenegger's defense of his Mr. Olympia crown.

Arnold Schwarzenegger in 1976

Photo: Jack Mitchell/Getty Images