Bob Gajda – Bodybuilding Legends Podcast With John Hansen [S7E1]

1966 AAU Mr. America Bob Gajda and his friends Al Jakich, and Terry Strand get together to talk about the Golden Age of Bodybuilding in Chicago. Bob, Al, and Terry talk about Rock Stonewall and his time in Chicago managing Irvin Johnson’s gym while simultaneously running a prostitution ring in the city.

The guys also reminisce about the great Sergio Oliva and his legendary workouts at the Duncan YMCa, including the time he trained with Arnold Schwarzenegger in 1969. Bob, Al and Terry also talk about Sergio’s amazing eating habits and his time on the Chicago Police Department.

John Hansen:

All right. Welcome to the Bodybuilding Legends podcast brought to you by our sponsor, Old School Labs. And today we have a kind of special episode. We’re going to talk to three friends of mine from Chicago. One of them is Bob Gajda, who was the 1966 AAU Mr. America winner, and also his friends, Al Yakich and Terry strand. And these guys are old times Chicago bodybuilders, and they grew up around the bodybuilding scene and particularly, they saw the rise of Sergio Oliva. Sergio moved to Chicago in the early sixties and all of them, Al, Bob and Terry got to know Sergio really well, and they got to see him work out, and they got to see him in his prime.

John Hansen:

So, they’re going to talk about some really good stories from the old days of Chicago bodybuilding. Bob, actually worked out with Sergio at the Duncan YMCA, when Sergio first moved to Chicago and Sergio helped Bob with the Olympic lifts, because Sergio was an Olympic lifter for the Cuban team that was trained for the Olympics. And Bob helped Sergio with his bodybuilding, especially with his diet. So, we got some great stories coming from Bob and Al and Terry, and they’re also going to talk about Rock Stonewall. Of course, we talked about Rock with the 1965 and 1966 Mr. Olympia events, that Larry Scott won, and Rock was a part of those IFBB competitions. I believe he was in the Mr. America contest in both of those years. So, Rock’s got an interesting story too, so we’re going to hear from Al and Terry and of course Bob Gajda as well.

John Hansen:

And we’re going to talk about the old days of bodybuilding in Chicago, in the 1960s, particularly the rise of Sergio Oliva. So, enjoy it.

The Interview: Starting Out

John Hansen:

All right, welcome back to the Bodybuilding Legends podcast and I got three of my old friends from Chicago on the show with me today. First of all, we got 1966 AAU, Mr. America Bob Gajda here with us. We also have his friends, and my friends Al Yakich and Terry Strand, two old times Chicago guys, who grew up in the 1960s watching Sergio and Bob train, as well as Rock Stonewall and great stories to share. So, welcome to the show guys.

Bob Gajda:

Thank you. Our pleasure.

John Hansen:

All right.

Bob Gajda:

As the eldest John, I got to say, I had to be blindfolded, Al brought this up, and he said he wanted to do the comedy moment as it comes in, but we have to be respectful because a lot of these guys had very tragic ending, so to speak.

I like to start out with a bit of comedy. I first met Jesse the Rock Stonewall at whatever was left of the Urban Johnson studio, that was located by the railroad tracks, 22 East Van Buren, it became the Triumph Health Club. But I first went there, when I was 15 years old. I was at a weightlifting competition and they had some ticket reward thing, if you had the right ticket stamp, you won three months free.

Bob Gajda:

So, I went there as a member and the thing was, I would go there on the L and workout, and I noticed that after I worked out, all these guys would come in and take showers and I would take showers and then I would dry off and they would dry off and they go back and workout.

So, after about three workouts, I went to Perry Laken who was the manager at the time, and I said, “Hey, is this some secret that these guys know about that I should know about, that if you take a shower after you work out, then you work out again that, that’s a better way to make gains.”

And he says, You are the most naive guy, I have ever met in my life.” And I said, “What do you mean, naive?” He said, “They’re gay.” I said, “What does gay mean?” So, I think that’s funny.

Bob Gajda:

But that 22 East Van Buren, became a legendary place, later Duncan YMCA, because they came. But in those days, that was like a mixed atmosphere, you had to understand things that you didn’t have to see on TV. Right? But now you got guys kissing on TV, I have no reason to judge anybody for those things. But in that time, I was just learning how to get along with others.

John Hansen:

Great, great.

Bob Gajda:

But in that same place when I came, I was in the Air Force and I was scheduled to go to Thule, Greenland, and I stopped off, to visit the guys that I knew there at the time. And it was at that time they said, “Hey, guess what? Jesse Stonewall is a member here and he’s in the air force and he’s going to Thule Greenland.

So, that’s how I met him at the gym. When he came in, they introduced me to him and then we became training partners in Greenland. I got to remember in Greenland, it’s a period of time during the year where it’s 24 hours of sunshine. And then there’s a time in a year when there’s 24 hours of dark, and you have to adjust to that kind of mission.

Bob Gajda:

But the fun part of the whole thing is, besides being 60 below zero, you have to wear these porkers, when you get to the gym, to workout. And at that time, Thule Greenland had the best gym in the Air Force, it was known for that. It was the muscle beach gyms in the Air Force. Stonewall at the time had problems and he had to get circumcised.

John Hansen:

Oh, really?

Bob Gajda:

His name was Flash, because he would walk so slow, because he had to walk in with his porkers on, and he couldn’t have any friction on his member, and so, he was Flash. So, later it became Rock. So, I thought, as a comedic and yet respectful means every man can understand this. So, with that, I’ll turn it over to Al. But-

Terry Strand:

…where Rock Stonewall actually was, predates a lot of-

Al Yakich:

Rock, competed primarily in the Weider’s competitions, Mr. America, Mr. university, won Mr. Central USA, Mr. Northern American, every contest that Weider had, he is at it. Stonewall was a piece of work, because what Bob didn’t tell you, it was Bob, used to have to work with, ultimately called Blair’s protein.

We were getting it from the old Chi company, which was manufacturing it, and he was having it sent to Greenland, and Stonewall was Steve pumping. And then, when he got out of the Air Force, …He got a job of eating health was started at 22 East Van Buren.

Al Yakich:

And Stonewall was known for being an absolute thief, because we go down there, was 13 or 14 years old, and he’s your champion. You want to get big like him, watch his arms. You’d be looking at his arms, 13 years old, “Oh my God, look at that.”

We wind up buying all sorts of crap, take it home, and every one of us had the same response, we get diarrhea, we go back. “Fuck, this is not working man. I got sick, I took this stuff that you sold me.” “Well, champ, here’s the problem, you weren’t taking this.” And then we’d leave the store with another back load of crap.

Al Yakich:

And one time a guy, a father noticed that Rock was charging extra on the bill. And so, he took his kid downtown, confronted Rock and said, “Hey, what the hell is going on here?” “This is my nutritional consultation fee.” The owner who hired him and put him on a salary, it was to avoid that crap. Commission from the…a supplement company and a couple of other stuff from the company. So, he was hustling all the young guys, selling them this crap and getting a commission from the supplement company and his nutritional consultation fee.

Bob Gajda:

Sold the Weider stuff.

Al Yakich:

Yeah, and he sold the Weider stuff.

Bob Gajda:

He said it was full sugar. He told me and Stonewall himself would take Blair’s protein and then he reached behind him, pull some stuff off the shelf behind the register. “Here’s what you need,” he didn’t know, he had it in his hands.

John Hansen:

And another thing you guys said, Rock Stonewall, he called everybody babe and champ, right? Because he couldn’t remember their names.

Al Yakich:

Everybody was babe and champ when I was working for him, when he owned the Triumph Health Club. I found out that he could never remember everybody’s name, so it was babe or champ and that was it.

Bob Gajda:

Realage Blair was a name for Urban Johnson. And because of astrology, his astrologer told him that the name based on the numerical factors wasn’t right, so he had it changed to Realage Blair. So, when you talk about Blair protein, which was apt to pro, which was made by OG Oval team. Yeah.

Terry Strand:

…Or what fifty, just for a very raw deal on all these other health proponents.

Al Yakich:

Yeah. Well, Stonewall was fired from his job at Eton’s, because the owner found out he was charging the nutritional consultation fee, and in addition to that, he was banging the owner’s daughter.

Bob Gajda:

Hey, hey.

Al Yakich:

I was managing the gym club, and Rock was running his own prostitution ring. And these two guys came to the gym before we open, and these were the two biggest Italians I’ve ever seen in my life. And they wanted to know, “Where’s Rock?” I said, “Well, he’s not here right now.” “So, when will he be here?” “I don’t know. He makes his own hours. He’s the owner.” and he said, “We know that. Do you mind if we wait?” “I don’t mind at all. I’m 18 years old.” So, we marched them over to the lounge, which is a ripped up couch, and an old Silvertone black and white TV, was a codename of our antenna.

Al Yakich:

They sat there three straight days waiting for Rock to show up. Rock calls me up, he says, “Babe,” I said, “Rock, don’t babe me, don’t champ me. I’ve got two shady goons waiting in the gym for you for three days. What is going on?” I already knew what was going on, I grew up in the West. And he says, “Well, champ, I’ve got to go underground for a while. You take care of the gym, Gody will be in charge.” Which was his ex wife. That was a smart move, give your ex wife power attorney over the gym. She sold the gym for meat balls, for $500.

John Hansen:

No way.

Al Yakich:

Yeah. That was the best gym I ever worked out in, by the way. It was designed by Ernie Johnson. So, Rock then makes his run for New York, planning, then he starts to work with Leroy Colbert, he was married to Leroy’s sister. So, they catch up with him in New York and then they chase him all the way to California. He gets a job with Jack Lalanne, Jack Lalanne lets him live in this compound, so he’s safe. He starts training at Bill Pearl’s gym.

Al Yakich:

Then Rock, who had the gift of gab like nobody you’ve ever met, talks Jack Lalanne into getting a loan, on a 1971 Eldorado convertible. So, rock was going back into business, Jack Olane co-signs on the loan. And the outfit, let’s Rock know, that they caught up with him by forging the Eldorado.

John Hansen:

Wow. In California?

Al Yakich:

…for the balance of the loan, then we found out Jack Lalanne Was in Chicago, pushing his My Fair Lady songs. We went to see him and asked, “Jack, how you doing? I understand Rock’s working for you now.” He leaps from the chair, he says, “Where is that son of a bitch?” What happened, I say, “I have no idea where he’s at.” So, then Rock winds up going from California to Madison Wisconsin, sets up a ring with the college girls in Madison. They catch up with him there, they chase him back to Chicago.

Al Yakich:

And he starts dealing dope, in Rogers park in Chicago. And he’s standing on the corner, with Sergio Oliva, Sergio was a police officer on the 24th District in Chicago. 10 police cars come flying up on the corner, guns drawn, order Stonewall to the ground. Sergio standing there not knowing what the hell is going on. Sergio told me the story himself, and I had no idea Rock was wanted. Now, Sergio was a foot guy, so he never went to roll call. And they had Rock’s picture on the wall, saying, “See this guy, arrest his ass.” Sergio in a squad car, takes him to the police station. And in the meantime, the Lieutenant is screaming at Sergio, “What the hell is wrong with you? We’ve been looking for this guy for months and your ass is on the corner talking to him.” Sergio was dumbfounded. So, he had to write a report saying, what his relationship was with Stonewall. Then Stonewall went to prison after that, and I understand after he got out, he went back to Pennsylvania where he died of a stroke. So, that was the saga of Rock Stonewall.

Terry Strand:

He was in the wheelchair.

Al Yakich:

Yeah he was in the wheelchair for quite a while.

Bob Gajda:

But you had to love the guy, no matter how big a thief he was, I personally saw him do 40 chins.

Al Yakich:

In a row?

Bob Gajda:

In a row.

John Hansen:

Well, mm-hmm (affirmative).

Bob Gajda:

Yeah. Five grip chins, unbelievable. Back then, one of the best back I’ve ever seen. This is before drugs. This is Thule Greenland, nobody knew nothing about drugs at that time. That’s the difference nowadays. You get into the era of Sergio, and just follow the lead of Al, who’s memory is tremendous. In fact for the past three days, I had to arrange, bit of recalling all of these things. There was this feature article about the Duncan YMCA, and you got to remember where it was located. Okay. Was it Monroe and Ashland was where it was located, but when Madison and Ashland was considered Skid Row, that was the next block. Okay. So, that was skid row. So, we were like half a block North of Skid Row literally.

Bob Gajda:

And unbeknownst to me at the time, but only to be deliberated in the Chicago Tribunal, they had a picture of me and some of the guys that were in the athletic portion and we were winning competitions and stuff and pictures of Sergio in that. And in that they also mentioned that it was a hangout for the mafia. And so, Tony Barbarossa and Sol Maglio and all those guys. All had lockers there, and they were members of the Duncan YMCA since they were kids. And that was their private executive club. And I used to go in there every day and I knew them all by their names, but not the last names. Nor did I know them as, again, I was naive in terms of the fact that, here we have a mafia that’s in that. So, it was an interesting atmosphere at that time.

Bob Gajda:

….Of course the YMCA had problems with this. And so, after a couple of years we had nothing but success at the Duncan Y. I mean, people were coming from the suburbs, just filling the place. And the guy that was running the YMCA, came in one day and said to me personally, he says, “Bob, we got to let you go.” He said, “And we can’t tolerate the hernia factory anymore.” So, in terms of respect for bodybuilding and weightlifting and we had power lifting, we had weightlifting, we had the shows going on, the place was a Mecca. But the YMCA closed it down, not because of the mafia, but because of the hernia factory…

Al Yakich:

The Duncan Y was a very interesting place, because Bob had created two gyms. One was in the first floor, he took a basketball court and turned it into a bodybuilding Mecca. And the basement was for power lifting and Olympic routines. And he had a gym down there that would rival any Russian, Bulgarian or Romanian gym. It was phenomenal, which he didn’t mention, is that the best equipment in the world for weightlifting came from Russia. The Russian weightlifting equipment was considered the Rolls Royce of lifting equipment. And we had York Barbells and Ivanko, the Swedish one, Eleiko, we had Eleiko bars.

Al Yakich:

But the Russian stuff was not allowed in the country, because it was actually in the Soviet union. And you got to remember back in the 60s, when the cold war was raging, so if you were caught with any product made in the Soviet union, you get arrested. Some guy that figured out a scheme, of fashion Olympic sets snuck in through Mexico and then wired it’s way up to Chicago, which is where we wound up with the Russian Olympics set for the guys. And we gotta remember the guys that were training there, Soga Paulis, Rasnips, Mike. We had some of the best solicitors in the world.

Terry Strand:

And Duncan Y, if i can throw this in, was one of the few gyms, where not only was smoking allowed, one was required to smoke.

Bob Gajda:

Terry always points out, it was the golden age for all of this stuff before they got rid of the press and they started dropping the weights and started rubber bumper plates and all that crap.

John Hansen:

What year was this guys?

Terry Strand:

When they dropped the press, it was in 1972, but previous to this we considered the golden age, because of Chicago iron or Chicago bodybuilding, because 48 was it? Steve Reeves won Mr. America. And then resurging in 64, I was at the contest where Bill Seno won most muscular, competing all kinds of guys, like Sergio. And then what happened? Then 69 was the final..Chicago Golden Age, at DePaul university. You might remember it John. I don’t know. It was probably just when you were just getting started, 1969 at DePaul.

John Hansen:

Okay.

Terry Strand:

In any case, I came and I got the best advice from Bob. He was always happy to help guys for free. And I went in when I was a teenager and I had contracted the dreaded iron fever, of course, there was no known cure. And I said, “Bob, which shall I do for my triceps?” And Bob hopefully replied, “The tricep exercises.” And it changed my life. I turned everything around, and became the sitting in my basement as am today through this wings world, Bob did.

Sergio, Arnold and Competitions

Al Yakich:

Well, the cool story about the 69′ Mr. America, this is when Arnold Schwarzenegger was sent by Weider, to find out what exactly did Sergio do? How did he train? What did you see?  I had dinner with Weider, in 2004 and he openly admitted, he said, “I wasn’t making any money with this guy. He was driving me nuts.” So, he figured, Schwarzenegger was going to be his boy, send him to Chicago to find out. So, Arnold says to Sergio at the 69 Mr. America says, “I want to train with you.” Sergio said, “Fine. I train at Duncan Y, it’s at 1515 West Monroe, show up we’ll train.” Then he showed up and then Sergio promptly mopped the floor with him. No way in the world that Arnold could keep up with Sergio, in anything, benches, squats, chins, dips. And I mean I’m openly admitting, I was in the middle of the workout, and he said, “I’m done.”

John Hansen:

What kind of workouts, and what kind of weights was Sergio using back then?

Al Yakich:

Well, back then he was doing repetition with 500 in the bench.

John Hansen:

Wow. Unbelievable.

Al Yakich:

Five and a half in the squat. He was doing, three 15 was spent over rowing, and every time he did a set, after a set he would do either set of chins or a set of depths. He was just nonstop,

Bob Gajda:

Let me interrupt, go back to some comedy. All right. Somebody I enjoy telling this story. But Arnold Schwarzenegger was the smartest guy in the world to me. I competed against him when I won Mr. Universe. Okay. He is German, so I know he couldn’t speak a word of English, but then the next time Leopold Merck was his translator. And the next time I met him, he was speaking rough English, and that was at the time when he came to America. But as he progressed after Sergio…Oliva came as an Olympic lifter from Cuba. He had a wonderful snatch, but he had hypermobile elbows, so he was always suffered from elbow problems and couldn’t work his triceps, because they were tough. So, he had to do real short movements and same thing with the curl. His arms, although they got bigger and bigger and bigger as he got bigger, and there’s plenty to be said about that. It was an interesting one. They started to compete against each other. Okay?

John Hansen:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Bob Gajda:

Sergio was at 235 and I visited him at the Duncan Y at the time, and I told him, I said, “You look great.” And I gave him some advice in terms of nutrients and stuff, to watch his diet and all that. Okay. After I had talked to him, Arnold called him up and said, “Sergio, I got to tell you, I’m going to wipe you away. I’m weighing 255, I’m bigger than you, and big is better.” Sergio went on a whipped cream diet, and started eating donuts and chips, excuse me audience, but he started eating crap. Went up to 255, this large nigger came in at 215, I was there, he was cut, he was ripped. It’s when cuts and rips came back and said, “Guys, guys.” Draper and those guys never showed that bigness again, they started getting muscular again for a while.

John Hansen:

Great, great.

Bob Gajda:

But that was brilliant, in terms of psyching another guy out, to get them to bulk up, when all bodybuilders knew at the time, common knowledge, after you bulk up, you trim down. And the problem with that, was your skin would sometimes hang, because you’ve got too big. But the Randall concept started with the, eat as much as you can. Bruce Randall told us, the bodybuilding history is really interesting.

John Hansen:

What year was that probably, when Arnold weighed 215 and he’d beat Sergio. Was that 69′ or 70′, I mean?

Bob Gajda:

I’m looking at 1970.

John Hansen:

70′. Okay. Yeah.

Bob Gajda:

Well, Sergio’s dietary for proteins was legendary. When he first came to this country, a little guy named Jimmy Alexander gave him a job at a meat packing plant.

John Hansen:

Okay.

Bob Gajda:

He was astounded at Sergio’s development, and he was watching Sergio, take a side of beef on each shoulder and marching up a ramp and put it in a truck. So, he says, “Oh, this is nuts, I got to find out what this guy eats to get this big.” So, he sees him, Well, he’s at lunchroom and he sees Sergio dining and two bottles of Mountain Dew and two packets of Hostess Twinkies. Now, if you remember, you had Sergio at one of your contests.

John Hansen:

Yeah.

Bob Gajda:

I picked him up at his house and we’re driving to up to Romeoville and Sergio says, “I got to get a snack.” That’s not where he wanted to go, and says, “Let me go to Walgreen’s.” So, we take him to the Walgreens. He comes out. What does he out with? Hostess Twinkies and mountain Dew. People laughing at him, he asks, “What’s so funny?” And I said, “You and your Hostess Twinkies.” Then I told him the story about Jimmy Alexander, sneaking into the lunch room, and he just swung and started munching away. But that was it, I mean, his dietary.

Terry Strand:

I was working as a paramedic in Chicago about two blocks from his station, I would walk into McDonald’s and get some coffee or something, he would be in there. There’s was this one time I could talk to him specifically, and he was sitting there in his uniform. He looked like King Kong and he’s churned out two big trays of McDonald’s, big breakfast with all the greasy everything. And I say, “Morning Sergio?” And he says, “Damn, I got to eat, I got to get big.” And he churns out. Meanwhile, the other body weighing out dietary supplements, with its oatmeal with a jewler scale, and I am looking for calories. So, that’s Sergio story.

Al Yakich:

We had a lot of fun back then with them.

John Hansen:

Well, let’s go back to Rock Stonewall, because you mentioned that he was running. So, he’s basically running a prostitution ring.

Bob Gajda:

Yeah. He ran them out of the gym. In order to be part of watch stable, you had to work out and be in shape.

John Hansen:

You mean, to be one of his girls?

Bob Gajda:

Yeah, one of his girls.

John Hansen:

Okay.

Bob Gajda:

And we had to cordon off the locker room, because when the girls came to work out and they wanted to take a shower and dress, the other guys couldn’t do it. Kind of made us think, because it was an all man’s gym and they would basically go for that.

John Hansen:

Yes.

Bob Gajda:

That was the beginning of… Oh, God, no, that was with Rock.

Terry Strand:

He used to have stag movie nights, on Friday, he would get the projector. And back then, you had these eight millimeter porno movies and he would try to… get this, this 1969, he charged five bucks, that’s to come in and bring their friends and he’d throw a sheet over the Chimney bar and that was the screen.

John Hansen:

Stag movie night. Al explain about the mob, because those of us who are living in this present day, we don’t really understand that. But back then the mob ran everything. And if you did any crime in Chicago, you had to pay a tribute to the mob, right?

Al Yakich:

Well, the problem Rock had, he was doing it downtown. Now, I think if he did it in the South side or the West side, they would leave him alone. But no, he had to do it in the loop. You know his prostitution ring. The problem is that, the girls were taking back their street tax to Gus Alex who ran the loop, Tony Accardo, which was the mafia in Chicago. He wanted to know where is Rock’s share, the girls said, “That’s your responsibility not ours.” And that’s when they started chasing him. And the street tax back then was 50%, so he always spent his money and he didn’t have the money, Gus Alex’s. And that was a big mistake, back then, they usually beat you half to death.

Al Yakich:

I wound up, after I graduated college, I had my own construction company, did some work with Gus Alex. And I was sitting on the front porch of the building that I worked at, and I said, “Look, I’m not wearing a  wire, you’re not wearing a wire obviously.” I said, “Why didn’t you just get Stonewall, to beat the piss out of them and get it over with.” He says, “Kid, you got to understand.” He says, “We couldn’t let them get away with that.” He said “The fear of the beating is much worse than the beating itself.” I mean, why did you take all the time going from New York to California, back to Wisconsin, to Chicago. He says, “We wanted to make sure he never had a moment of peace, and he was always looking over his shoulder.”

John Hansen:

What did Rock die of?

Al Yakich:

He had a stroke. He had a number of strokes and the last one killed them.

John Hansen:

When he was young? Right? He was pretty young when he died. Right?

Bob Gajda:

No, in his 50s.

John Hansen:

50s. Wow.

Al Yakich:

Yeah. I mean he spent, Oh God, I think he spent six to eight years in prison. They really hammered him. The slick act got old real quick with the Chicago Police.

John Hansen:

Right. And he was married to Leroy Colbert’s sister. Right?

Al Yakich:

Right. They got a divorce and he also had a side job, state street in Chicago, where right now that’s the Harold Washington library. Rock used to do duty work or bouncer work for the strip shows that were on state streets. And I think that’s where he met his second and third wife.

John Hansen:

Yeah.

Al Yakich:

He was always into some kind of scamp activity.

John Hansen:

Tell me a little bit about some of Sergio’s workouts and stuff. Because I’ve always heard stories about how unbelievably strong he was, of course he was probably the most genetically gifted bodybuilder ever. So, you guys were there when he was in his prime and you saw him in his prime. Tell me a little bit of some of the stories that you saw.

Bob Gajda:

I always say that Sergio taught me Olympic weightlifting and I taught him bodybuilding. Okay. That’s all I wanted. The drugs and all the bigness and all the diet came off. I tried my best for years to influence his dietary procedures and I was a nut from Urban Johnson or Real Blair, always on nutrition. I could talk that stuff night and day. Okay.

John Hansen:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Bob Gajda:

Weight lifting became my favorite thing to do. I mean, I won a region championship. Terry’s got photos of me pressing 325 pounds. I like to know, how many guys could do that. Okay?

John Hansen:

Yeah.

Bob Gajda:

That was 280. My clean and jerk was 375. I cleaned 400, but I couldn’t jerk it. I mean, that was like somebody that ran six floors and then tried to run another six, when I was on my shoulders and I came up, I was just matching Clyde Emrich. That’s all I can remember at the time. But I loved that. But there was a time when I was able to beat Ralph Kleiner for Mr. Chicago, because I out pressed him, and he was a strong guy. So, strength and health or health and strength, which was the name of the British version, what both of those looked at that. But the idea of health being a factor, is an important thing for bodybuilders that seems to be returning.

Bob Gajda:

Now, people accept bodybuilding, in my time, the Catholic church was ready to rug me out for vanity and all the other simple biases that you can be accused of, because you looked in a mirror. But you want to do good bodybuilding, you need to look in the mirror, not because you’re admiring yourself, it’s because you can see what your form is. And so, you have to be able to regulate form. So, it has changed dramatically. I’m sad about the fact that now, that there’s no rich sources except for guys like you who can bring the health factor back and emphasize that, and we could start getting strength back, in terms of where it belongs. Now, you can do that, when physical fitness took over.

Bob Gajda:

Nowadays, every plasma that you could see, you can go do some yoga sites. There’s all these yoga gurus out there, all of whom have achieved samadhi and Nirvana and they can take your money. So, you can talk about Stonewall taking your money, but these guys are taking your money. And so, I went to University of Chicago to study religion, and they had some people there who would talk about Zen Buddhism and yoga and all this stuff, but in a much different manner. And their books are available, they say, if the man has not achieved Nirvana and Samadhi and they followed a vegetarian diet. I never saw a vegetarian with Mr. America, that’s a protein diet, different thing.

John Hansen:

Bob, you mentioned you beat Ralph in the one of the local challenges in Chicago, because you lifted more. I know back then, the Mr. America contest, AAU Mr. America, they gave you points for your lifting scores. Right? But they did that in all the shows. They even did that in the local shows?

Bob Gajda:

Yes. They’re athletic points, if you’re going to compete in the physique, you were given point, if you were an Olympic lifter or a powerlifter, it would also help break the ties. So, the question about how did Sergio train, that’s how he trained then. Okay. I became separated from that environment and all of that, because I was asked to leave the live scene, not by choice, but because of the… Al can talk about the mafia. But we also had the Chicago Police Department Captains, and they were all part of the play in handball. I used to play handball. Racquetball was just starting at the time, so that was a part of the environment. But that was the same time when you could put 20 bucks on the back of your driver’s license if the cop pulled you over and that was the way Chicago was working. It’s different now.

John Hansen:

Yeah.

Bob Gajda:

But the environment then like that… My point is, that now it’s not a sin to develop your body or overdevelop. I don’t know how to say it.

Terry Strand:

There’s a paradigm and Steve please, you are going through physical culture, health size. Now we’re up to the day of Richard Rich Piana, who I enjoyed watching by the way. He just goes so far over the top. And, of course…, I’m not a Saint, but there were no drugs in the fifties or sixties per se, there was some natural testosterone around. But the champs were not proud to that. In any event then It got crazy with the… Oh, well another factor is that you had the strong guys like Grimek and the whole York model and Chuck Sipes and so forth.

Terry Strand:

Then you had branching off Larry Scott and the pumpers and those guys didn’t care what they curled or what they benched. They didn’t even know what they did because they were pumpers. And I’m not castigating it, but it was a different emphasis branching off and John Grimek and any of the real strong Mave Peter, Bruce Randall and so forth. So, but getting back, I know John you asked about Sergio and we wandered off, but I’ll pass this to Bob. Sergio was famous for doing incomplete reps, non lockouts and so forth. And which York power belts that’s terribly going to do each one, full movement. So, Bob what do you get to say about seeing Sergio giving partial movements, would you say?

Bob Gajda:

Yeah, that’s what I said before. I’ve got to repeat it. He got bigger, he got bigger by it, but he stopped doing the… I didn’t see him doing the weight lifting anymore. And then all those positive changes, I don’t think he became a pumper and a user of Diana Ball. He went to Weider because AAU had rules. We had a heavy brandish and we had drug testing and stuff like that, so you have to watch it.

John Hansen:

Yeah, I know. Well-

Bob Gajda:

When he trained with me, he shared my PHA system with me, because we were training partners and I also did Olympic lifting as a part of that too. So, we interchanged-

Terry Strand:

Well, Sergio did get out of the shower and shower clogs.

Bob Gajda:

Oh, yeah. He was able to snatch a 240 with shower clogs on.

John Hansen:

Wow.

Bob Gajda:

Yeah. Tremendous snatch. Wonderful. We all set the whole point of it, in terms of his training and his diet. And he lived right across the street from the Duncan Y.

John Hansen:

Oh, really? Okay.

Bob Gajda:

Well, he took my job, because the Spanish population demanded that. But after they threw me out, he took over my job.

John Hansen:

Oh, really?

Bob Gajda:

And we remained friends all those years, but he was no longer under my influence. So, I have to say, I knew him in the early periods. I knew Stonewall in the early periods. What they became later is a different story. Okay. So, Al, I don’t know how verifiable 500 pound budget is-

Al Yakich:

No…that’s what he was doing.

Bob Gajda:

Well, all of us tend to exaggerate. That’s why I say, you’ve got to look at the back of the magazine for the totals. When I give you my total, I could show you in the back of Strength and Health magazine, it’s listed there.

Terry Strand:

John, maybe you remember the interview with Arnold, where they ask him, “Who’s the strongest bodybuilder in the loop?” And that was, probably from a magazine in the early seventies or late, probably early seventies. And he said, without a doubt, “Franco Columbo is very strong but Sergio is the strongest bodybuilder I’ve ever met.” In an interview. And it’s obscure, that’s a lost interview now. But he did say that and it’s quite high praise.

John Hansen:

Well, I remember when Sergio passed away and I went to Donald classic the next year and they had that seminar with Arnold and Sunday and Arnold talked for probably 40 minutes about Sergio. And he was talking about that workout he did in 1969 with him, and he said he would warm up with 10 sets of behind the neck chins like 20 reps each or something. And that was his warm up, 10 seconds of that before we actually started his workout. He said the guy was unbelievable, as far as the weights he would use and this work ethic, and how hard he would train. So, he had nothing but praise to say about Sergio back then.

Bob Gajda:

Yeah, this was after completing the full day’s work. Nobody had a sponsor in Chicago. It wasn’t like Weider was paying you to work out and eat. Sergio had a manual labor job.

John Hansen:

Yeah.

Bob Gajda:

I still wasn’t able to get a workout like that. It’s just a genetic anomaly. It was phenomenal.

John Hansen:

Most of it is in the year of no air conditioning. Right? No air conditioning in the gym.

Bob Gajda:

Yeah. That’s where the Health Triumph helped them in 1968. When we had the riots for the Democratic Convention, we were at nine o’clock on a Friday night and the guys were ready to shut the gym down and all of a sudden there was something that came into the gym we had never heard of it before. It was tear gas.

Al Yakich:

Really? Wow.

Bob Gajda:

Yeah.

Terry Strand:

Then we liked it, hell we loved it!

Bob Gajda:

So, we had to shut all the windows and jump into the shower to get the teargas off our skin. That was Chicago in 68, three interesting periods we got to live too. But there’s one guy who touched down that we haven’t hit yet as well, Plaintiff. Ralph Plaintiff was our version of Steve Reeves in Chicago.

John Hansen:

Okay.

Bob Gajda:

The only word we used for Ralph is gorgeous. I mean-

Al Yakich:

He’s the most handsome man I’ve met.

Terry Strand:

Movie star.

Bob Gajda:

Movie star, gorgeous. Yeah. I told you the other day when we watch Ralph to incline crows, at 75 pound dumbbells. So, he had the most incredible arm strength and physique, it was just amazing. And so, the stories that we told you, the one time when the gym was on the fourth floor, we had a music studio on the fifth floor, and these nuns get off the elevator and come storming into the gym, our door was open. And then about five or six nuns in their habits and they’re looking around, “Oh no, we are on the wrong floor.” Ralph was standing, doing a set of chins, and huffing and puffing…and this one young nun just could not keep her eyes off Ralph. She just kept looking at him, and by this time all the nuns had already gone into the elevator. Mother superior comes rushing, and she grabs her in the arm and yanks her out. Even while she’s being yanked out, she’s still looking at Ralph. She never left Ralph of yet.

Terry Strand:

That was the end of her.

John Hansen:

Yeah. She resigned as a nun the next day.

Bob Gajda:

We are standing on Van Buren, on a summer’s afternoon, and here comes Ralph with his gorgeous self, walking towards the gym, and here’s a girl walking west on Van Buren, in the opposite direction, off she walks right into a lamppost, couldn’t take her eyes off Ralph. There are other stories that we have, but I don’t think in the company, that’s a good idea.

John Hansen:

Now, what was the gym that faced the L train? So, the people in the L train could see inside the gym room when the train go by.

Sergio Oliva’s Memories and His Death

Bob Gajda:

Sergio started out in Triumph and he would take a set of squat racks and he would set him in the window and he’d take a bench, and then take one of the big bar and he will do press behind neck right at the window. So, when the people who go by the L, I mean, the L would turn at Wabash and go North. So, it almost come to a stop as it was turning, and here’s Sergio doing press behind neck, so everyone can see him.

John Hansen:

Wow. That had to be a freaky site.

Bob Gajda:

Yeah. That was about 63′ or 64′. And they lived there around their place, do you remember the Blues Brothers apartment?

John Hansen:

Yeah.

Bob Gajda:

That was Sergio. That was inspired by this place.

John Hansen:

What year did Sergio come to Chicago?

Al Yakich:

61′ or 62′.

John Hansen:

Oh wow. That early, huh? Okay. I didn’t know that.

Al Yakich:

Yeah, he is just an amazing athlete… Well, we used to see him at the meets. Bob used to run the Olympic weight lifting competitions and the physique contest and Sergio would compete in the Olympic lifting. And then, after the Olympic lifting he would compete in the physique contest.

John Hansen:

The first time I saw Sergio was in 1976, I think at the AAU, Mr. tri-state contest. And he was the guest poser. And after he got done guest posing, he came out in a row and he sat on a stool and somebody gave him a microphone. He was answering questions from the audience and some guy goes, “Hi, Sergio, do you use free weights or machines?” And he goes, “No machines, just free weights, no machines.”

Bob Gajda:

It’s true. I asked who’s Diana ball and Sergio says, “Diana ball is shit.” “Okay, Sergio.”

Al Yakich:

Oliva was upset, because is the one time he came for Ralph’s funeral, you would think there’ll be a lot more, but he was let down by the Latin community and the bodybuilding community, which very few people at his funeral.

John Hansen:

Yeah, I talked to Blair Cole recently and he said the same thing, he really admired Sergio, from when they competed in the Junior, Mr. America together and stuff. And he said he didn’t even know about Sergio’s funeral until after it was over and he was trying to get ahold of a Sergio’s manager to pay for the headstone.

Bob Gajda:

Wow. A couple of months before Sergio died, Bill Pearl was in town and he wanted to see Sergio. He asked me, “So, Bob, can you get a hold of Sergio, so we can get together?” I called him and called him and he wouldn’t return my phone call. Finally, I went over to his house and I see him. By now, he’s like a little old man walking with a cane.

John Hansen:

Yeah. Yeah.

Bob Gajda:

And he couldn’t even get the key into the lock. I got out of the car and I walked over and I took the key and I opened the door and I said, “Now, you want to tell me why you didn’t return my phone call.” He says, “I know what you want,” he says, “But you got to tell the guy, I don’t want anybody to see me look like this.” And what he said, is that some folks in the neighborhood jumped him about a month or two before, beat him off and they took all the gold that he used to have hanging off. If you remember he used-

John Hansen:

Oh, yeah. That big gold medallion. Yeah.

Bob Gajda:

They pounded him pretty good and in reality, he never really recovered from that beating. And after that, we found out that he had died.

John Hansen:

Can you imagine, if those punks would have tried that when Sergio was in his prime?

Bob Gajda:

Wouldn’t have worked out very well.

John Hansen:

All right.

Bob Gajda:

Sergio, and I mean from that, 1967 in Humboldt park, every June they have a Puerto Rican festival and Chicago police shot a Puerto Rican at the festival. And there was a riot and Sergio and his homies took a Chicago police squad car and flipped it into the Humboldt park lagoon.

John Hansen:

Flipped it into the lagoon?

Al Yakich:

Right. Mario Devese, Sergio and a bunch of other guys took the squad car, threw it into the lagoon..most people don’t know about Sergio.

John Hansen:

Right.

Bob Gajda:

It was fun times.

John Hansen:

Yeah.

Bob Gajda:

Riots and all.

John Hansen:

And you were saying that Ralph Plaintiff was a cop also, right Al?

Al Yakich:

Sergio was a cop. He got his job the old fashioned way in Chicago. He had juice, and Commander Reardon wanted Sergio on the police force, because of the burgeoning and Latin community in Chicago. In Chicago, Sergio was a god in the latin community. I mean, he used to ride around in this Excalibur, like he was a King.

John Hansen:

Yeah, I remember that.

Al Yakich:

And usually a blonde next to him. And, he was needed by the police department. He couldn’t write a report, Sergio was essentially a functional illiterate.

John Hansen:

Right.

Al Yakich:

Somebody else wrote the reports for him.

John Hansen:

Wow. Do you think you guys all think Sergio was the greatest physique of all time?

Al Yakich:

Oh, without a doubt. There’s nobody that could come, I mean, if you look at him at his peak and you look at Schwarzenegger at his peak, there is no comparison. I mean, the guy had a 29 inch waist and 29 inch thighs and a 55 inch chest. Who has dimensions like that?

John Hansen:

Right.

Terry Strand:

I’ll chime in on this too, somebody in a magazine or form said that, “I don’t have the greatest competition to seek, but Sergio had the best gym physique.” I don’t be prepared for the last, maybe diuretics and dieting and everything, but Sergio didn’t diet, he didn’t do anything. And Sergio was always a monster. He wasn’t a product of, well, months of dieting and three months of bulking, he was just always a monster. And the most came to mind about Sergio, oh, well, this is something probably nobody knows, but there’s a good bodybuilder, a buddy of mine from the old days, and he managed Sergio’s GMOs. It was not Sergio’s and shook all book. Some couple of guys wanted to open a gym, they still want to call, Sergio’s gym on Ridgeway Avenue, any how. This was during the combat mosaic 83′ or 84′ January-

John Hansen:

84′, yeah.

Terry Strand:

Yeah. So, he went to the, it was Lipton, he was in tremendous shape, Oliva. And the people in the gym said, “You’re going to have a going away party with us.” Big table, and my buddy, in fact he was one of Sergio’s main men and then George Mendez.

John Hansen:

George Mendez. Yeah.

Terry Strand:

Well he said, “Please don’t do this big table, because he’s going to eat one over the other.” And he did, the night before he go out, he said, he was waiting before he got into the table and he held the…, like a jelly donut.

John Hansen:

Oh, yeah.

Terry Strand:

Well, now see that’s the thing he would do. He wouldn’t be the same where everything is just to the end degree. And that was what made him great. And the fact that he was always fully employed, not laying on the beach and some people say, “Well, that’s the way body building competition is. The best guy wins.” And actually while that is true, there’s rules and there’s an expected conditioning appearance and so forth. But if you’re just talking about an unbelievable man, human being, wait room monster.

John Hansen:

Yeah, he’s one of a kind, that’s for sure. I mean even today, I mean, how many years has spent since the sixties and seventies and I’ll post a picture of him, even from his later years like 1980, 81′ and I’ll post it on Facebook, and just the comments you get is unbelievable. There’s just never been a physique like Sergio before.

Bob Gajda:

No, he was one of a kind.

John Hansen:

Yeah.

Terry Strand:

Ironically, he did not want Sergio Junior to go into body building, because he knew it was as a swamp of drugs and politics and really no financial gain. Probably, made more money as an IFPD. Bob, you and I have talked about this many times, your net winnings after a year minus something usually.

John Hansen:

Yeah. Correct.

Terry Strand:

Unless you’re Jay Cutler one in a trillion people. So, I hope that Sergio Junior really gets his priorities right. Because Sergio died, we were all at his funeral and at the cemetery. And I remember standing there, we were here for quite a long time talking to his ex wife Irene was there, and so forth. Who is the fellow from? The editor.

Al Yakich:

The Muslim sitting in the chair.

Terry Strand:

Yeah.

John Hansen:

Shawn Kareem

Terry Strand:

And what a good guy that was, but I remember we were last people there and they just filled in the fall. I can send you some pictures. I took pictures and I posted them where they’re just at Sergio’s grave site. Everybody has pretty much gone and there’s a mountain of just dirt, throwing by hand. It was sobering, you go, “Oh my God” and the other hand you got Arnold who’s still vital.

John Hansen:

Yeah.

Terry Strand:

He’s the same age or a few years younger.

John Hansen:

Right.

Terry Strand:

I just wanted to say that about that, John.

John Hansen:

Yeah.

Al Yakich:

Here’s what we learned at the funeral mass, Sergio attended Catholic mass every single Sunday.

John Hansen:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Al Yakich:

Every single Sunday. And story that Joe Weider told me when Sergio first won the Mr. Olympia contest, they wanted Oliva to advertise Weider products. So, they had a pack of proteins that they handed Sergio at Jimmy Caruso, picture taking session after the contest. And Sergio says, “What’s this?” And Joe Weider says, “Well, Sergio you won Mr. Olympia. You’re going to be advertising Weider products all over the world. We’re going to send you all over the world and you’re going to be well known, and sell the Weider products.” Sergio looks at him and he says, “I don’t take this shit.” Weider says, “Well, that’s fine, but we need this for advertising, so you can promote Weider products.” Sergio gives him the container back and says, “That’s … I’m not going to do that.” And that’s when Weider decided, he had to get rid of Oliva.

John Hansen:

Yeah.

Al Yakich:

“I wasn’t making any money off of the Cuban rebel, so he had to go.”

John Hansen:

Yeah. Yeah.

Al Yakich:

That was it.

John Hansen:

All right guys. I want to thank you all for joining me for these recollections from the past, especially with Chicago and hopefully, we can have you guys on again and talk about some of the older stories again. So, thank you Al Yakich, and Terry Strand and 1966 Mr. America, Bob Gajda. I appreciate you guys all coming on, to talk about the old days.

Terry Strand:

That’s fabulous.

Bob Gajda:

Keep doing your work to bring health back into bodybuilding.

John Hansen:

Got it Bob. Okay. I will.

Bob Gajda:

Bye, bye.

Terry Strand:

Thank you, John.

John Hansen:

All right, guys. Take care.

Al Yakich:

All right. You too.

John Hansen:

All right, thank you for listening to another episode of the Bodybuilding Legends podcast, brought to you by our sponsor, Old School Labs. I want to thank Bob Gajda and his friends Al Yakich and Terry Strand, for joining us for that interview. I’ve been looking forward to talking to those guys for a long time, so it was great to finally get to join us. Join us next week, when we’ll be joined by Mr. Olympia himself Chris Dickerson, who is going to talk about his years competing in the NABBA Mr. Universe, over in London. So, that’ll be a great interview as well. Thanks again for joining us and we’ll see you guys next week. Take care.