The movie “Rocky III” was a blockbuster. With Sylvester Stallone in the title role, it was far more than just two hours of entertainment for many people: In the early eighties, the ball was set rolling for many people in terms of training – including me.
Sometimes it takes a little longer
Normally, I don’t like to keep people waiting. I really don’t. At least not for long. But what I have afforded myself with Rocky Balboa is probably already a pretty strong piece. And my conscience is as bad as it can get.
But what happened? Actually: Nothing at all. Well – Sylvester Stallone probably didn’t notice any of this. Because: The story took place primarily in my head.
But one after the other …
The duties as a citizen
It was the early eighties. The scene: Me in a bus, in the last row, of course. With me: some of my friends and schoolmates. The mission: To go to Vienna to have ourselves examined. The reason: The Austrian Armed Forces cordially invited us to the military physicals, which was officially called “Stellung”.
Me: Sweet little sixteen or so. Maybe already seventeen. Anyway: absolutely no clue about bodybuilding or weight training. After all, the pictures of Ralf Moeller had not yet crossed my paths.
The evening off
So the two days of various examinations and interviews took their course. And in the evening of the first day we decided to watch this movie called “Rocky III – The Eye of the Tiger”. A cinema in Vienna’s Prater was quickly found, and after a well-cared-for meal (it was probably pizza and beer) we moved towards the cinema in good spirits.
We had no idea at the time that this evening would change lives. At least mine.
Hard blows – right in the face
And suddenly I was in the middle of the action: I had to suffer the pain of those blows that Rocky had to take. I felt the irrepressible motivation to emerge victorious from the next fight. And: ME was Rocky Balboa.
What fascinated me about the film was this emotionally charged absorption in the hard physical activity. Not only in the fight itself, but especially in the training and preparation scenes. Whereas as a goalkeeper on a youth soccer team I used to be mostly concerned with improving the technique of “throwing myself at the ball,” I was suddenly attracted to something else: the determined attempt to push the body to the limits of its capabilities.
Start strong – over and over again.
Back home, the motivation was great: heaps of sit-ups were trained. And push-ups. Due to a lack of training equipment, I was limited to exercises with my own body weight. And Rocky’s voice sounded in my ear and cheered me on.
Months, years, decades passed. In the course of time, my small but fine home gym became more and more equipped, and the training became much more varied. However: Rocky did not necessarily have the most consistent student in me. Again and again there were shorter or longer breaks in training, which lasted up to several months. Family and job were often reason enough to use my time elsewhere.
And so it came to pass that my training was never as consistent as I felt it should have been.
Happy ending after many years
It took me almost 40 years to find my own personal path to consistent training: Almost four decades after seeing Rocky in the movies, I found in my self-programmed online tool myTRS the tool that could make even me stick to training for a long time. Since fall 2018, there are no more unnecessary interruptions.
Today, at 55, even Mr. Balboa would probably be happy with me.
