Muscle Bound

They are either the ultimate bodies beautiful or grossly overdeveloped symbols of narcissism. Briony Kidd talks to bodybuilders about what drives their quest for physical perfection.

Herman, 43, is 168 cm tall and weighs 89 kg, making him obese according to the body mass index.  But Herman is far from overweight – he’s just got more muscle mass than ordinary people.  He’s a bodybuilder, and building muscle is how he spends his free time.

“Bodybuilding is all I know and what I'm good at. I have never wished I could give it up and just lounge around,” says Herman, who is originally from Bandung.  He admits that he struggles with food: “I always cave.  I'll just eat today and diet tomorrow." 

But he feels better when he eats healthily.  His typical diet includes 2 kg of egg whites a day, a lot of fish and a lot of cassava.

He started by working out casually at a neighbor’s gym and dabbling with jamu (traditional tonics) to build up strength, before taking up the sport seriously in 1994.  He began to see how a muscular physique could enhance his job prospects but it was more than that: “There was also a feeling, like being 'someone else', that kept me coming back to the gym.” 

He is relaxed about the idea that other bodybuilders might be bigger or better than him. “It's never been about winning,” he says.  For Herman, bodybuilding is a way of defining himself, of having confidence as an individual.

“I know sometimes I'm competing against [steroid users], because I've seen them around and I know they can't get that big that fast.  But I don't care.  Really.  I never care about winning, that's not my target."

For Didit Supriyanto, 35, a former bodybuilder who also works as a personal trainer, competing was a sort of addiction.  There was always another prize to try for, one more chance to prove himself:  “My motivation was always, ‘I have to be a winner, I have to be a winner.’” 

Didit usually placed in the top three in competitions, making it hard to walk away from his career even after 12 gruelling years.  Finally, one day in 2004, he was due to take part in a major competition in Malaysia and realized that he didn’t really want to go.  He didn’t drop out – after all, the trip was already paid for – but he knew that he had lost his hunger to compete.

These days Didit is relieved to be earning a steady income.  Bodybuilding was always an expensive hobby, he admits.  Whatever prize money came his way (gold at a National Games-level competition, for instance, can be worth more than Rp 20 million in bonuses) could never compensate for the dedication and ongoing expenses, such as a protein-rich diet.

Sometimes bodybuilding can be a stepping-stone to a myriad of opportunities. Ade Rai, the sport’s most famous name in Indonesia, is a spokesman for companies from Reebok to Panther energy drinks. He has his own magazine, his own line of supplements and a chain of gyms across the country. 

While Ade’s ability to turn his success as a bodybuilder into a business empire is impressive, for him bodybuilding is not so much a career as a mission. Ade has become an eloquent advocate of physical fitness and sees this as the most important contribution he can make.

“The problem is awareness is very low. Our education system – the level of health education is very low," he says.

Ade, 37, retired from competition a year ago, but hasn’t lost his passion. "This is the only sport where my heart is 100 percent. I love the gym so much.” 

He first became interested in building up his muscles through arm wrestling, then popular at universities. The young Ade, 183 cm tall but weighing only 55 kg, had a hero:  Sylvester Stallone.  Ade’s success in American bodybuilding competitions in the 1990s brought him to prominence. 

Ade seems embarrassed when asked about his fame, and why so many people love him. “You’ll have to ask them,” he laughs. 

Herman deals with a different kind of celebrity.  "Sometimes I'm walking around at a mall or something and people will be staring at me because I'm a big person. Maybe they think I'm a big man with a small brain. You feel hurt if someone thinks like that. It takes brains to be a bodybuilder, a good bodybuilder."

Bodybuilding is becoming increasingly popular in Indonesia and across Asia. On Jakarta street corners and in kampongs, young men work out with blocks of concrete, metal bars, whatever they can find. The sport is ideally accessible. And achievement is visible.

Another segment contributing to bodybuilding’s impact is gay men. 

“They've always been there in the audience but now they don't try to hide,” says Herman. “It's obvious they are gay men, they're not slinking back in their chairs, scared to show who they are, worried.” 

Ade Rai explains, “They want to look better and are more physically aware of themselves than straight guys. We have to look at it as an appreciation, like I like to look at beautiful women.  It is quite positive actually.  Bodybuilding, in that respect, is like the fashion industry.”

Bodybuilding is a strange concept – intensely physical in preparation but essentially a competition of esthetics.  A bodybuilder must reach a peak of physical fitness, and yet the competition itself requires the participants to do nothing more strenuous than hold a few poses, smile a great deal and, should they be so inclined, perform a little cheeky dance for the audience. 

The bodybuilder’s weekly, daily and hourly effort is never even glimpsed by the audience, who sees only the gleaming oiled flesh, the boyish camaraderie on stage.  Could this be the appeal to Indonesians?  A sport that is extreme, hard work, requiring great willpower to transform a small, average man into a formidable example of power, but you don’t witness any of this.  So are bodybuilders the public’s superheroes, in some sense?

To many Indonesians, Ade Rai represents more than a mere sportsman.  Ade and his fellow bodybuilders are tangible proof of the power we each possess to reshape our bodies and minds.  To reinvent ourselves, if we want it enough.

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