Mike Mentzer
Michael "Mike" John Mentzer (born November 15, 1951 in Germantown , Pennsylvania ; † June 10, 2001 in Los Angeles ) and his brother Raymond "Ray" Harry Mentzer (born August 2, 1953 in Germantown , Pennsylvania; † June 12 2001 in Los Angeles ) were American professional bodybuilders who died successively on June 10th and 12th, 2001, just a few days apart.
Athletic career
Mike Mentzer was the better known and more successful bodybuilder of the two. He won the IFBB Mr. Universum in 1978 and finished second in 1979 and fifth in 1980 in the Mr. Olympia , the most important competition in professional bodybuilding. Mike felt himself being disadvantaged by the jury in 1980 and therefore ended his career, deeply affected, immediately after this competition.
Together with his brother Ray, Mike taught and marketed the bodybuilding training concept High Intensity Training (HIT) based on the training concept of Arthur A. Jones , which is based on relatively few short training units that have to be carried out at maximum intensity. He has also published numerous publications on this subject, the best known being the book Heavy Duty . Mike Mentzer was one of the few and probably the most famous bodybuilders who (even if he didn't at the beginning of his career) preferred HIT to conventional volume training . For this he was repeatedly criticized by other well-known bodybuilders, such as Arnold Schwarzenegger . Other representatives of the fitness industry were not on good terms with him either, as he repeatedly stated that a healthy and balanced diet is preferable to the consumption of food concentrates (including protein concentrates).
death
On June 10, 2001, Mike Mentzer died in Los Angeles at the age of 49 from cardiac arrest as a result of calcification of the heart vessels ( arteriosclerosis ). Only 38 hours later, on June 12, 2001, Ray Mentzer died at the age of 47 in the same apartment as his brother before. The official cause of death was calcification of the heart vessels. In a statement by Mentzer management immediately after the news of death became known, Ray Mentzer named kidney failure as the cause of death.
The autopsy also revealed an overdose of morphine in the blood of both of them , which would probably have been fatal on its own. Both Mike and Ray had suffered from serious illnesses for years. Ray had kidney dysfunction ; Mike suffered from heart , lung and spine damage ; in addition, his right arm was numb as a result of an accident. The morphine had been administered by the doctor to relieve pain.
literature
- Philipp Oehmke : Death came twice , Süddeutsche Zeitung of August 2, 2002
- Jürgen Gießing : HIT - high-intensity training. The optimized system for rapid muscle building, Novagenics-Verlag 2008
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Mentzer, Mike |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Mentzer, Michael John Mike (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American bodybuilder |
| DATE OF BIRTH | November 15, 1951 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Germantown , Pennsylvania |
| DATE OF DEATH | June 10, 2001 |
| Place of death | Los Angeles , California |