“Fitness is psychotherapy for me. It’s the one thing that has never disappointed me. In fact, it seems like the only truly fair thing in life. It gives back exactly what you put in.”
day of the contest. LT: Is it true that you entered your first contest only one year after joining the gym? DB: Yes, it was the Teenage Mr. Compton—at the age of 16. A couple of my buddies at the gym saw the poster promoting the show on the gym wall and pushed me to compete. I was about 5’8” and 135 pounds then. I asked Bill whether I should enter the contest, and he said, “Why not?” So I entered it and placed second—beating out several guys who were bigger than me. I had a little bit of muscle, but mostly I was very lean. There was a reporter at that contest from a magazine called New West [which later became California]. He was there to do a story on this new phenomenon called “teenage bodybuilding.” For whatever reason, he picked me. He came over to my house, interviewed my mom and my brother, and wrote this really long, seven-page article about me—at 16! That motivated me even more. LT: How did you put together your posing routine? DB: Well, in part from looking at magazines; the poses of Ed Corney and Frank Zane inspired me, in that they were dramatic and graceful. Plus, when I was 15, I went to the 1975 Mr. America contest, which was held in Santa Monica that year, and I saw Dale Adrian, Robby Robinson and a bunch of the other greats do their routines. So I learned from watching and also by just experimenting in front of the mirror. Posing was really fun for me. LT: You went on to win the tall class at both the Teen California and Teen America in 1979. Then, in 1982, you took the mediumheight division and the overall at the AAU Mr. California. DB: Yes, the Mr. Cal was held that year at the Long Beach High School auditorium, and Kal Skalak was the emcee. In winning the overall, I beat a much larger guy, Ray York, who had won the tall division. Frankly, he scared the crap out of me when I first saw him backstage because he was so big—he outweighed me by almost 30 pounds. I only weighed 184, but I was ripped. Before the contest, when I was backstage in
160 OCTOBER 2009 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com
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