Page "Mike Mentzer" Paragraph 31

Following the loss at the 1980 Mr. Olympia, Mentzer reportedly ran into numerous problems.

In the late 1970s, he was reported to have begun using amphetamines, claiming he took them only as an ergogenic aid to help facilitate a hectic lifestyle.

Mentzer left his position at Weider Publications shortly after his loss at the 1980 Mr. Olympia contest and suffered financially as a result.

He did land a job in 1985 as publisher and editor-in-chief of the newly launched WorkOut magazine, a venture of Stewart Communications Inc. in Tarzana, California.

However, when WorkOut failed during the same year that his father died, Mentzer reportedly suffered a mental breakdown.

According to Peter McGough, editor-in-chief of FLEX magazine, stories began to surface of Mentzer exhibiting very erratic behavior.

Stories of him running naked through the streets, directing traffic, telling prophecies about the end of the world, being arrested by the police numerous times and even waiting for aliens to land were all published in magazines at one point or another.

Popular bodybuilding writer Dan Duchaine even suggested that Mentzer was drinking his own urine at the time.

Mentzer denied this in a 2001 interview with Ironman magazine, stating: A lot of people like to see celebrated figures come down a notch or two because their own self-esteem is not very high.

They gain a sense of self-esteem when they can say, Look, I'm not like that ; that person has shortcomings.

And that's not the proper way to gain self-esteem.

That's irrational.

No, I never drank my own urine.

Where that notion arose, I have no idea.

I did take doctor-prescribed amphetamines for a while, because as a competing bodybuilder and writer I found it difficult during periods of severe dieting to sustain the energy required to train and then go home and write for hours.

But it was always doctor prescribed.