Michelle Marchante/Staff Writer
“Only his sight beat me,” Arnold Schwarzenegger said in the Mr. Olympia bodybuilding competition of 1969 when Sergio Oliva first stepped onto the stage. With a 27” waist, 58” chest and 22” arms, Oliva was a force to be reckoned with, being the only man in the world to ever defeat Schwarzenegger. It’s been three years after his death on November 12, 2012 and not only has the bodybuilding world failed to find another man that could even come close to Oliva’s legendary status but he continues to appear and be discussed in bodybuilding magazines, newspapers and websites all around the world. The reason for this isn’t because he’s a bodybuilding legend but because he continues to be an inspiration for people everywhere. He’s a prime example of what it means to follow the American dream.
Born in Cuba in July 1941, Oliva was born into a tough life, working by the age of 13 but it wasn’t until after the Cuban Revolution that he was introduced to the world of bodybuilding. Call it luck or call it destiny but after months of training, Oliva was chosen to represent Cuba in the 1962 Pan American games that were being hosted in Kingston, Jamaica. The night before the competition, he escaped his quarters, out ran Castro’s secret police and the Jamaican police and made it to the American embassy where he was granted political asylum and came to live right here in Miami.
A year later, Oliva moved to Chicago, Illinois, after the FBI recommended he should get farther away from Cuba because Castro was sending continuous threats to him. He eventually became a police officer and used any free time he had to workout at the gym and it wasn’t long until rumors began to circulate in the bodybuilding world about a Cuban Powerhouse who could lift more than any of the champions. Even with all the discrimination Oliva faced at the time, as civil right issues were very intense in the United States, he proved the rumors were true as he went on to win first place in over 20 bodybuilding championships, even entering the Book of World Records twice, once for winning Mr. Olympia uncontested, and for being the first ever bodybuilder to win and hold the top standings titles in four competitive bodybuilding federations- IFBB, AAU, NABBA, WBBG- a record that he still holds today. It was through all these accomplishments and the size of his physique, with his arms being bigger than his head and his thighs bigger than his waist, that he gained the nickname, “The Myth.”
While the nickname is fitting, he wasn’t just a myth that people talked about. He was real. He was the first black man to have won the top titles in bodybuilding and still today is the only Hispanic to have won Mr. Olympia. Experts in the bodybuilding world have agreed that his body is not only one in a million but he’s the most genetic champion in the entire history of bodybuilding. He’s still an international sensation and was inducted into fourteen different Halls of Fame during his life.
Yes, he was a legend and yes, he was no regular man, like Denie, another legend in the bodybuilding industry, has said, “Greeks had Hercules, bodybuilding has Sergio,” but he’s proof. He’s proof that the American Dream can be accomplished. If he was able to escape communism, find success during a time when discrimination was at its peak, and still ignite passion in the hearts of many today, then it means you can as well, no matter where you come from.
We’re lucky to be here in America, in a country where countless opportunities to make yourself what you want to be exists, and we’re lucky to be in a university that is continuously growing and offering us different opportunities to better ourselves. Struggle, fall down, but always get back up, as long as you love your passion, whether its a sport or something else, as long as you try, you won’t have regrets. If Sergio Oliva hadn’t tried to get to the American embassy he never would have been the legend people still know today, so take the risk and don’t look back.
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