Following his Mr. Olympia debacle last year Bill Grant vindicated himself with a strong finish recently at the Night of the Champions, defeating many of the men who had bested him at Columbus. Clearly 1977 was not a particularly good year for Bill Grant. And yet is started so well. In fact, things had gone so nicely through September Grant was certain nothing could possibly go wrong with him dream wagon. His training had been most productive, he was bigger than ever, more cut-up than before … and hell, his self confidence had never known higher levels. But then came October  1 … and tragedy. He entered that year's Mr. Olympia in Columbus, Ohio, convinced he was about to make headlines in the manner of... well, 

let us just say he felt ripe and ready to nail a few hides to his wall. But no way, that's not the way things turned out finally. Hear him tell it: “First there was Oscar State calling me out right there in front of the judges … You know what he said to me? He said, ‘Hey Grant, hope you've got calves this year!' In front of the judges too, even before I had stripped down for action …” Bill placed so low in the Olympia he felt “buried”. Then there was the fiasco that he carelessly allowed himself to be talked into. The Mr. World event that Serge Nubret staged in Paris on the same day that the IFBB held its World Championship in Nimes.

“I really would not have participated in the Paris show if I'd been treated fairly in Columbus,” Bill says. “Look, I'm not a complete idiot. I know I was in the best shape of my bodybuilding career. Sure, my calves are not my best bodypart, but then you show me the star who does not have his share of faults. But to place me so far down the line … eighth … well that was just so absurd.”

So he entered Nubret's show on the promise a thousand or so dollars would be his at the end of the day. What he got amounted to little more than half the promised amount. Nubret told him there must have been a misunderstanding … on Bill's part! Something to do with the transatlantic telephone lines, maybe. To make matters worse, Grant found himself up against Sergio Oliva, who he had been led to believe would only be making a guest appearance.

“Guest appearance my ass!” Grant says. “The guy's picture was on the box office tickets, on tee shirts that were on sale at the show … everywhere. He should have been a guest poser but for some crazy reason there he was competing. And in really horrible shape. But when you compete against Oliva you compete against a formidable reputation. He shouldn't have won, but there you are, he damn well did.” And Grant placed third!

He returned to the United States only to discover he was not in trouble with the IFBB for participating in a non-sanctioned bodybuilding event. He would compound the situation by appearing in another such show, this time in Germany where he is particularly popular.

But now it is mid-May and it seems the fog is lifting for Bill Grant. He's just placed high at the Night of the Champions, it looks like his problems with the IFBB are being sorted out, and there is nothing more on his mind that the 1978 Mr. Olympia … that and the World Cup event that Ken Sprague is staging with the cooperation of the IFBB. And this means training like Bill has never trained before. His workouts are like nuclear holocausts for tissue building muscle burn.

Recently I dropped in at Gold's and there he was looking much bigger than I remembered, his deltoids large and striated atop those famous Grant arms.

“Hi,” he said, “I'm just getting started. Today I'll hit my shoulders first.”

It turns out that Grant trains his deltoids and arms on the same day, the shoulder work comes first.

The first deltoid exercise in his program is the lateral raise with dumbbells. With Grant this has to be a very strict movement … at least, the first six repetitions are. He begins with a pair of 40-pound dumbbells held in front of the thighs. From there the weights are raised with deep concentration to a height just slightly above shoulder level, held for a count of one or two before lowering. He does twelve reps each set.

For his second set Bill chooses a pair of 45s. I noticed a more relaxed training style from the eighth rep of this set. Later he would tell me he eased up on the style because by then it was impossible to get the weights up in strict form.

“Cheating is a fantastic Weider principle,” he said, “but you must know when to indulge. In other words, don't cheat for cheating sake.”

In all Grant did five sets of laterals, working up to a pair of fifty-five pound dumbbells, always grinding away till the twelfth rep, cheating only when necessary. His deltoids seemed to acquire impossible proportions right there before my eyes, even after the first exercise.

Next on Grant's should program is the front press. He worked on the Universal machine but pointed out after his training session that is was strictly a personal preference, that the ordinary barbell press is just as effective.

“I like to do the exercise from a seated position at the Universal machine because then I don't have to worry about balance or cleaning the weight. It's strictly press, press, press and concentrating on burning the hell out of my deltoids,” he said.

He takes a shoulder width grip on the bar and presses to a point just over his head. The arms are not allowed to lockout. He does a continuous movement that he says places great stress on the deltoids.

Bill did five sets of the front press, 8 to 10 reps per set. He increased the weight each set and again he relaxed the training style as performance became difficult.

Grant does not rest for long. In fact, the rest he took between sets lasted only as long as it took him to add plates to his barbell or pick up a heavier pair of dumbbells.

His third exercise is the upright row with a barbell. Sometimes he does this exercise on the cable machine, “for the sake of variety.”