Brother Iron, Sister Steel

A strained intercostal muscle has me laid up from training, and I wanted motivation. Eric Helms recommended this on his podcast, Iron Culture.

Draper proves a charming writer. His conversational style evokes Roger Ebert and Stephen King. Recalling his journey to the 1965 Mr. America stage:

I took the long, serious road to get to New York, leaving New Jersey in the spring of ‘63, stopping off in Los Angeles for a few years and arriving at LaGuardia International in mid-September of 1965. Gave me a chance to think and see the sights. They’ve got sunshine out West; The Beach Boys were right.

After a short autobiography, Draper delves into his training philosophy and routines. His philosophy emphasises consistency, hard work, and supersets. He loves supersets, but refrains from painting them as a panacea. A refreshing approach in a field littered with folks purporting to hold the “secret” to muscle building. That said, this section has little to recommend it over the multitude of similar works, such as Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Encyclopedia of Modern Bodybuilding.

Given Draper’s talent as a writer, I wish he’d focused more on his life story. The book’s best parts come at the end, where he offers disjointed snapshot memories, including a memorable story of himself and Frank Zane pulling the emergency cord on a European train when they realized they were travelling in the wrong direction.