Those of us who lived through the 1980s remember the inescapable awkwardness that often materialized during our misguided attempts to combine all of the pop-cultural components that captured the zeitgeist back then. However, if you can endure some of that discomfort and sift through the wreckage, you can also appreciate the truths that were buried beneath that decade’s popular misconceptions.
Case in point: As a kid, I always thought that wrestlers who weren’t as big as Hulk Hogan and the Ultimate Warrior were all somehow tiny. Well, now that I’ve had several years of my own bench-pressing failures to reflect upon, I can look at this insane training video of Rick Martel — the goodie-two-shoes-French-Canadian-babyface-turned-effete-model — and recognize that he was stronger and more jacked than 99 percent of us could ever hope to become. I mean, just look at him sling hundreds of pounds of incline dumbbell presses like all of that iron is made of Styrofoam.
You’ll never listen to George Michael’s “Careless Whisper” so dismissively again. In fact, it might even motivate you to add it to your workout playlist. Though, admittedly, it won’t come with the French announcer doing play-by-play, which just makes this all the more magnifique.
Ian Douglass
Ian Douglass is a volunteer firefighter, lackadaisical Concept2 rower and SkiErger and is the worst masters swimming All-American in recorded history. He also helps professional wrestlers publish their autobiographies, assists businesspeople with the writing of coherent thoughts and has overhyped degrees from Michigan and Northwestern.
