When we reach for a barbell and plates, ready our lifting straps while swigging a luminescent pre-workout, we pay little attention to the fact the original lifters of the 19th and 20th centuries were pushing themselves close to failure, and using progressive overload, long before those methods had any fitness vocabulary attached to them.

Before Arnie, there was Bob Peoples, who, in the 1930s, fashioned a barbell out of metal with baskets either side filled with rocks. Before Milo Steinborn invented the Steinborn squat, lifters would squat on their toes with lighter weights, but he made the squat loadable, and what it is today. And long before that, late-19th-century strongmen, such as Louis Cyr, became famous for extraordinary feats, amassing fandoms decades before the concept of fitness influencers.

Looking back isn’t just for nostalgia’s sake, but for inspiration and information. Many of the principles lifters use today were created under far worse conditions, and without the constant stream of information from social media.

Speaking to Men’s Health, sport lecturer of social sciences at Ulster University Conor Heffernan explains that we could all learn something from the lifters of the 18th and 19th centuries. ‘A lot of what we’re rediscovering now always existed – we just stopped paying attention,’ he says. The lifters of the time didn’t have the same luxuries as us, but we can still take a leaf out of their training notebooks to sharpen our approach.

Known as the ’Father of Modern Bodybuilding’, Eugen Sandow popularized lifting for health and functionality of the body, not just aesthetics

ERA 1:

Physical Culture (1880-1914)

The physical culture era marked the birth of gym training before formal programmes or specialisation. Dr Heffernan describes it as the prehistoric period of fitness. ‘They had some equipment, supplements and magazines, but they were still figuring things out,’ he says. Training revolved around simple lifts, such as the ‘pullover and press’, a bench press variation performed from the floor due to the lack of benches.

Described as the father of modern bodybuilding, Eugen Sandow popularised the idea that lifting weights was not just for aesthetics, but for health and vitality. While his methods leaned towards light weights, Sandow’s contribution was reframing resistance training as something that could improve both how the body looked and how it functioned.

Alan Calvert found little progress with Sandow’s approach of lifting lighter and turned instead to heavier barbells. By repeating staple lifts instead of changing exercises, Calvert promoted consistency, laying early foundations for progressive overload and long-term strength development. Think of him as the equivalent of the reliable PT down the gym reminding you to stop programme hopping.

This lifting era was also influenced by the sheer will of Alexander Zass. Known as ‘Iron Samson’, he was imprisoned during the First World War, forcing him to train against immovable objects, contracting his muscles against chains and cell bars – a practice that would later be recognised as isometric training. Zass reportedly used this strength to break free from captivity, becoming a leading example of resourcefulness in extreme conditions. Suddenly, that kettlebell gathering dust in the cupboard feels a little more appealing.

Breakthrough: The foundations of progressive overload and isometric training
Signature move: The pullover and press
Key proponents: Eugen Sandow, Alan Calvert, Alexander Zass

John Grimek was 1940’s Mr America, and he retired undefeated

ERA 2:

Weightlifting During War (1918-1945)

Wartime had a dramatic effect on how we trained. With much of Europe’s metal diverted to the war effort, access to barbells was limited – lifters improvised with sandbags, homemade implements and whatever was available – reinforcing the idea that you don’t need the best kit to get results.

Reflecting on the era, Dr Heffernan notes, ‘Few people know their names now, but when you walk into a gym, the influence is directly there in how you train.’ Experimentation was at its peak, with lifters adjusting their approach based on what produced results, an early example of autoregulation long before the term existed.

When it came to experimentation with different lifts, Arthur Saxon, known as ‘The Iron Master’, stood apart from the rest. Saxon was most renowned for his mastery of the bent press, setting an unofficial world record of 175.1kg and developing what came to be known as the ‘Arthur Lift’.

John Grimek, a two-time Mr America winner who regularly squatted over 400lb and clean and pressed 300lb, had a symmetrical and coveted physique when contests still rewarded athleticism. Bob Peoples pulled a 700lb deadlift using homemade barbells and Hermann Görner pulled a 727lb one-hand deadlift without standard equipment. Their achievements emphasise how a lot can be done with very little.

Breakthrough: Lifting is adapted under wartime constraints, with feedback and experimentation leading progress
Signature move: Bent press
Key proponents: Arthur Saxon, John Grimek, Bob Peoples, Hermann Görner

Hercules star Steve Reeves became Mr Universe in 1950

ERA 3:

The Post-War Era (1945-1965)

‘In the 1930s and 1940s you didn’t just pose, you demonstrated athleticism as well,’ says Dr Heffernan. Competitive bodybuilding at the time reflected this, with early contests rewarding not just muscular development, but demonstrations of strength and physical ability alongside posing. It marked the peak of the pre-steroid physique, when symmetry, proportion and performance still mattered. Bodybuilding had become more refined, but had not yet fully separated aesthetics from athletic function.

A key figurehead we can take inspiration from in this period was Steve Reeves, whose balanced frame came to define the post-war ideal. Reeves built his physique drug-free and believed bodybuilding should enhance function, not just appearance, once describing a bodybuilder as someone with ‘functional, real-world muscle’. Training three full-body sessions a week, he avoided lifting to failure, prioritised recovery and relied on progressive overload rather than excessive volume. Modern research supports this approach, showing that training close to failure, rather than to it, is sufficient for muscle growth. It’s a lesson we can still apply today.

As Dr Heffernan notes, ‘Across the long history of bodybuilding, the through-line isn’t collapse or redlining. It’s pushing yourself to the point of effectiveness, but no further.’ It was an era largely protected from performance-enhancing drugs and, as he adds, ‘when drugs weren’t part of the equation, consistency over time mattered far more.’

Breakthrough: The rise of functional bodybuilding, prioritising athleticism and performance as much as aesthetics
Signature move: Pinch-grip deadlift
Key proponents: Steve Reeves, Reg Park, Bill Pearl

Founder of the Heavy Duty system, Mike Mentzer

ERA 4:

New Age Systems (1960-1980)

As bodybuilding became a formalised sport, training volume exploded and mammoth sessions became the norm. Through magazines, competitions and the rise of split routines, Joe Weider helped standardise bodybuilding into a repeatable system, popularising principles such as progressive overload, pyramid sets, supersets and high-volume training. The ‘bro split’ was born. His influence shaped a generation of physiques, most famously that of Arnold Schwarzenegger, Weider’s protégé, whose marathon sessions and relentless volume became synonymous with the era’s gym culture.

But as volume climbed, so too did resistance to those methods. Arthur Jones emerged as one of bodybuilding’s fiercest contrarians, arguing that intensity mattered more than time spent in the gym. Jones advocated single-set, all-out training performed sparingly. His most famous protégé, Mike Mentzer, took this philosophy further with his Heavy Duty system: just two to three brief sessions per week, each set taken to muscular failure.

The clash between Weider’s high-volume model and Jones’ minimalist approach defined the era. With hindsight, it’s clear that both roads still led to Rome. Progress came from training close to failure and increasing demands as the body adapted, whether delivered through higher volume or higher intensity.

Breakthrough: High-volume vs high-intensity training
Signature move: Barbell bench press
Key proponents: Joe Weider, Arthur Jones, Mike Mentzer, Arnold Schwarzenegger

Dorian Yates was Mr Olympia champion six times

ERA 5:

Steroid Shift (1965-1990)

As anabolic steroids became more widely used, the bar was raised not just for performance, but for the sheer size of bodybuilders. Arnold Schwarzenegger sat at the transition point, sustaining training volumes that would previously have been difficult to recover from, while still adhering to classic ideals of symmetry.

By the 1990s, however, Dorian Yates had redefined the standard entirely, introducing a look characterised by density and mass over proportion. As Dr Heffernan notes, ‘steroids didn’t just change how big bodies could get, they changed expectations of how quickly progress should happen,’ a shift that altered bodybuilding’s aesthetic.

‘Recovery becomes a different thing once drugs enter the equation,’ says Dr Heffernan. With recovery capacity altered, higher volumes and greater training frequency became possible, reshaping progress and laying the groundwork for the larger physiques that followed. This era reminds us that training doesn’t exist in a vacuum. What we see influences what we expect, and altered recovery changes results and ideas of what’s ‘normal’.

Breakthrough: Altered recovery through steroid use reshaped expectations of size, training volume and speed of progress
Signature move: Cheat curls
Key proponents: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Dorian Yates

According to Dr Heffernan, if modern lifters were to borrow anything from bodybuilding’s past, it would be these principles.

Train with Specificity

Early lifters trained directly for what they wanted to improve and repeated it.

Train with Intensity

Across eras, effective training meant pushing hard enough to stimulate change by working close to failure.

Progressive Overload Still Matters

Early lifters understood that improvement came from gradually doing more of the same work.

Be Patient

For most of bodybuilding’s history, progress was built over decades, not through hopping from one programme to another.

Be Realistic

Focus on what’s achievable for you with the resources you have, rather than comparing yourself to other people’s physiques.

Raise the Bar by Lowering the Barrier to Entry

Make progress by using the equipment available to you and being resourceful, rather than waiting for perfect conditions.

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