Arnold Schwarzenegger gave his all as a bodybuilder and amassed a then-unprecedented seven Mr. Olympia titles. The bodybuilding icon’s immense presence attracted attention and earned him a movie role in 1969, helping him draw more eyeballs to himself and the sport. The hard work he put in to sculpt his body is well documented, but it took more than just sweating it out in the gym to propel ‘Austrian Oak’ to bodybuilding glory. 

To win a bodybuilding competition, Arnold Schwarzenegger had to showcase his muscular figure to the audience and, more importantly, the judges. Posing, and gracefully switching from one pose to the next, was crucial to ensuring that his muscles really stood out. Hence, a combination of an immaculately sculpted physique and an aesthetically pleasing and graceful exhibition of the same was key.  

Arnold Schwarzenegger used ballet to fine-tune his posing routines in bodybuilding competitions

Arnold Schwarzenegger spoke about this unusual combination in a 2016 chat with Graham Bensinger. The Terminator star likened the posing routine in bodybuilding to how artists look to display their paintings and sculptures in the best possible way. 

On In Depth with Graham Bensinger, he said, “When they bring out a Picasso there’s a special spotlight on it. There’s a special frame and everything is very, very special. The same is with bodybuilding. If you don’t present your body in this muscular development that you have developed in the right way.”

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“If you don’t study the way to pose that all those muscles really come out and how you move gracefully from one pose to the next and how you keep the waist in and do all those kind of things, you don’t have anything.”

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“After working out, we trained the posing from half an hour to an hour…We even hired ballet teachers to teach us about the hand movement and the way how to look, how to move slowly and how the eyes have to move… how they’ll show confidence.”

‘Austrian Oak’ Schwarzenegger looked at his body as a work of art

Arnold Schwarzenegger, who was always in good shape, served as his own biggest critic. This helped him zero in on areas to enhance his body. Besides working on moving with grace, he identified weak points by looking at photographs or in the mirror. ‘Austrian Oak’ then designed specific exercises to focus on those specific areas.

Earlier, in the 2016 chat, Arnold Schwarzenegger said, “I have always had an eye for aesthetics. Some people say because I’m a Leo, with a rising cancer, so the artist is in me. That’s why I like to draw and paint and stuff like that. I think that had an effect also and on my body, because I looked at the body as a complete work of art.” 

“I always looked at it kind of like that you have to sculpt it with your hundreds of different machines and exercises that we have instead of a chisel and a hammer.” 

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Arnold Schwarzenegger’s dedication to his chosen field saw him accomplish more than one dream. He clinched six consecutive Mr. Olympia titles, returned five years later, won a seventh, and embarked on a remarkable Hollywood career. Hence, one can safely say that incorporating an art form helped ‘Terminator’ enhance his “work of art” and worked wonders for him.

What did you make of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s inclination to focus on the aesthetics in bodybuilding?