Tales of an Ectomorph

Peering up the side of my arm toward the dumbbell held atop it, I can’t help but think of my old dorm-mate Kevin. Kev was the kind of guy who looked like he’d been produced at a meat-packing plant. I’ve always imagined that, at his birth, the nurses exclaimed things like, “Is that a six-pack?”

Prior to undergrad, I’d thought little about my physique. Then, returning from class one afternoon, my girlfriend made a passing comment about how one of the guys she knew had recently bulked up. She didn’t say whether he looked attractive, but it didn’t matter. She might as well have thrown a grenade at my feet. My ego had issued the red alert. COMPETITOR MALE TAKING STEPS TO BECOME MORE APPEALING. IMMEDIATE ACTION REQUIRED.

I walked straight to Kevin’s room. Having begun working out early in high school and already possessing the genetic predisposition of a Sherman tank, Kev knew his way around barbells, free weights and Nautilus machines. I told him three things. One, I wanted to start working out. Two, I wanted to start right away. Three, I wanted a mind-blowing body within a few days, if possible.

He advised that, because my muscles were naturally long and lean, it would be more difficult for me, six feet and 165 pounds, to build and maintain muscle mass than, say, him, five-eight and hand-stuffed by God. I’d simply have to work hard, he said. Also, stay consistent. Oh, and get to know what level of attention my different body parts needed relative to one another. I told him thanks and short-sheeted his bed.

The next afternoon, and the one after, Kev and I hit the campus gym. I was astonished at just how difficult it was to extend the barbell just a few feet above my chest. It did seem like an awfully long way to the top of my arms, whereas I noticed, as he raised and lowered over 250 pounds with about as much effort as it takes a normal person to butter toast, that his barbell had much less distance to travel. I’d have felt even better had there actually been any weight on the barbell I’d been trying to lift.

After two weeks we’d hit each major muscle group twice, mixed with serious cardio sessions during which Kev would holler things like Suck it up! and Push yourself! and I’d want to holler lots of things back but couldn’t because I thought I might die. We also included intense abdominal work whereby Kev would insult my form for twenty minutes then slap me on the back and say, “Good job.”

One morning at the end of these two weeks, I stood in front of the mirror and was suddenly enthralled by what I saw. Pieces of my body — biceps, triceps, delts — seemed to have pushed themselves outward in response to some primitive call. I hurried to Kevin’s room and told him what I’d witnessed.

“Progress,” he smiled. I asked if we could work out again that evening. He told me my muscles needed time to recover. I told him I was pretty sure my muscles were unlike everyone else’s. He said we could blast my pecs and glutes the following day. I agreed and hid his breakfast.

Then an odd thing happened. Christmas vacation came, I returned home, and, after a few non-workout days, my body collapsed back to its original size. I asked my mother if she’d had slimming mirrors installed. She looked at me like I’d started doing drugs. I called Kevin and told him my muscles had decided to go on vacation somewhere different. I asked if this was normal behaviour and whether I could expect them back after the holidays. “Doesn’t happen overnight,” he said. “You have to build up some muscle memory.”

Muscle memory, I thought. Sure. Kev’s muscles probably sat around just waiting for his next trip to the gym so they could bulge out and say, Hey, look at us! Mine, I knew deep down, were of a different sort — the sort that say, Um, you go ahead. Call us if there’s an emergency.

From that day I knew I’d have to try to trick my body into thinking it was something it wasn’t. Over the years I’ve tried to fool it using numerous methods: low reps and high weight; high reps and low weight; interval training; circuit training; pyramids and inverted pyramids; light sets, heavy sets, supersets, iso-sets; and so on. But a body’s a funny thing; it seems to know its own limits. I’ve resigned myself to the knowledge that, at a certain point, my pecs say, Any further than this looks dangerous. My biceps, sensing my chest’s hesitation, become likewise uncertain: Pecs are holding back, boys. Must be a reason. Let’s keep it riiight here. Then my leg muscles join in: No sense in us pushing ahead. Don’t want to make him look like one of those freaks with tree trunks below and twigs above.

But I keep going. I keep trying to persuade my body beyond its natural limits. Though I’ve embraced my inner ectomorph, I haven’t told it so.

Why do I keep striving against a goal that is so elusive? Because the challenge is an end of itself. I work out not for the chance to outlift the Schwarzeneggers at the gym, but for those mornings when I wake still riding the endorphin high that can come only from pushing myself to new heights. It’s for the inadvertent moments when I catch myself in front of the mirror and perceive an extra bit of size on my chest otherwise undetectable to the human eye. It’s for those instants when my wife hugs me then asks if I’ve been doing pushups, and, even though 99 percent of me is sure she’s saying it because she knows I have, that other one percent feels she might be genuinely surprised.

Do I feel at these times that I could win a body-building competition? Hardly. Do I believe I could take on a group of thugs in a dark alley? I’d hand over my wallet faster than you can say Don’t shoot. Do I think women are murmuring to each other on the sidewalk as I pass? Regarding my hairline, maybe.

But do I feel alive? Do I feel that pulsing thrum that reminds me how lucky I am to have a body with all these fantastic moving parts working together? Do I buzz with the simple excitement of possibility and potential?

You bet I do. And that’s why the journey all the way to the top of my arms is worth it every time.

Beyond Fitness 

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I.J. Schecter
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© I.J. Schecter 2003