Page 185 - Muscle & Fitness (December 2019)

in my career, everything was
because he was so short,” Haney
says) to Rich Gaspari (“Rich the
Itch—he would never go away”),
Shawn Ray, Mike Christian, and
Albert Beckles—because the
5'11", Georgia-born Haney could
not be toppled from bodybuild-
ing’s mountaintop from 1984 to
his retirement in 1991.
“I made it that far, and I wasn’t
falling apart, that’s what I was
thinking,” Haney admits. “That’s
what made it easier to walk
away.”
However, Haney says, making a
final title defense almost didn’t
happen following his seventh
win a year earlier.
Haney says he was ready to re-
tire following his 1990 victory—
or at least his body was ready.
According to Haney, every joint—
from his knees to his shoulders
to his back—was aching like
C H R I S L U N D ( 2 ) the time, unbearable, he recalls.
never before, unusual and, at
“I woke up the day after the
Olympia, and for the first time
hurting,” Haney says. “All that
pain happened overnight. At that
moment, I was like, ‘Could I actu-
ally go through this again?’ ”
He added: “My mindset was,
‘Yes, let’s go for it,’ but my body
was like, ‘Hey, man, I don’t know if
we can go through this again.’ ”
History thanks his patience for
allowing the healing process to
run its course before ending his
bodybuilding career. It was nor-
mal for Haney to take time off
from any weight training. “After
the Olympia stress, your body
needs to readapt itself,” he says.
Haney also began creating
what is now known as his
seven-day cleansing system—
nothing but fruits, vegetables,
and water for a week—that he
experimented with at the time
to clean and repair any liver
damage, to obvious success.
Since incorporating the
cleansing in his regimen, he’s
prescribed his system for sev-
eral athlete clients through the
years, including heavyweight
champions Evander Holyfield
and Riddick Bowe and baseball
star Gary Sheffield.
“It’s like changing the oil and
filth in your car every 3,500 to
mortality allowed him to rethink
5,000 miles,” Haney says.
His brush with bodybuilding
and revamp his workout regimen.