Subculture: Bodybuilders

For my subculture group, I chose bodybuilders. I frequent the gym about three to four days a week and am around people belonging to this group often. People of this subculture are very proud to be a part of the “bodybuilders” and have certain ways of showing one another and the outside world what they are doing to maintain membership to this group. People in this group take great pride on their appearance and how they look to the outside world. Many guys and girls in the gym work their butts off to achieve their desired physic. Bodybuilders also get tattoos to accentuate their bodies and stand out more then the next. Members of this group also like to wear very tight fitting clothing to once again show off their hard work. One of the people I interviewed happened to be my roommate. He has pronounced himself a body builder for the last 4 years. He is very much a type A personality. He is a stickler when it comes to watching what he eats. If he misses going to the gym more then two days a week, he gets all out of sorts and acts weird for a few days until he feels like he is back on track. To quote him, “The ritualistic aspect of a daily gym routine creates soundness of mind, body, and soul.” He says he does the average bodybuilders routine. Legs on Monday, back on Tuesday, chest on Wednesday, day off on Thursday, shoulders on Friday, arms on Saturday, and he takes another off day on Sunday. During the interview, he reminded me that 80% of bodybuilding is a healthy, high protein diet. He tries to eat six meals a day to keep his metabolism up. He says he enjoys sculpting his body very much. Not only does working out create endorphins and make him feel better about himself, but also his appearance to other bodybuilders and folks that do not want to “put in the work” as he says, is noticed quite often. Chris loves the compliments he gets from other people, as he was not used to them growing up. Chris has been sober for 4 years now and has used his past to help him succeed in his future career. In going to the gym, and being in recovery myself, I happen to notice that there are many people in recovery who also get involved in the body builder culture when they get clean.

I also interviewed my friend Tanner, who has been bodybuilding for 5 years now. He originally got into working out in high school while playing baseball. It was necessary for him to stay in top physical condition. He started training with a trainer to help increase his size and gain some knowledge about the human body. Tanner is a big fan of switching his workouts up to confuse his body, giving better results. Tanner has become enthralled with body builder competitions. He says the routine that he gets into becomes very addicting. He gains as much weight as he can for the two months prior to the competitions, lifting weights five times a week and doing cardiovascular exercises 6 days a week. Two weeks prior to the competition, he cuts out all complex carbohydrates and depletes his body of almost all of his fat cells. Along with getting his body cut and lean, Tanner also would go to tanning salons to get a bronze color to his skin to further accentuate his muscles.

This lifestyle takes almost all of his time and energy, not to mention money. Tanner and Chris, along with most other bodybuilders, buy and use a plethora of supplements to enhance their growth and gains. Before Chris works out, he uses a pre-workout supplement to enhance the blood flow to his muscles, giving him a better pump and making it easier to get in the mindset of lifting heavy weight. From talking to Chris and Tanner, this is one of the most common supplements used by bodybuilders. After the work, many bodybuilders use protein shakes to flush nutrients (mainly protein) back into the broken down muscle, usually within a half an hour after the workout. This causes very large gains because it feeds the muscles and causes them to heal themselves bigger then they were before, therefore creating stronger muscles.

Along with supplements, bodybuilders have to buy a lot of food to keep their bodies well nourished. It is common for my roommate Chris to spend upwards of $400 dollars at the grocery store every month just on himself. He tries to stick with high protein foods, but also is conscious of buying live foods, or foods that were once living. He says that these foods with little or no preservatives in them can be used by the body much more effectively, in turn, letting the body absorb what the food has to offer easier and leaving less left over garbage in the body.

One thing Chris admitted to me was the fact that he used to do anabolic steroids to gain mass, which is not uncommon even though it is illegal without having them prescribed by a doctor. He does not use them anymore, being in recovery, but he knows many people that are still on steroids. These people appear to be huge, but in Chris’s and many others eyes', they are very noticeable and are considered to be cheating to get the results that others are getting without the use of illegal substances.

So from what I have learned from studying the subculture of bodybuilding is that it is much more than just going to the gym. This subculture puts a lot of work into what they do and how they look. They put in a lot of time money and effort into how they look so they can keep their status in the subculture.