PHIL HEATH WILL SURPASS RONNIE COLEMAN’S OLYMPIA RECORD

Generation Iron Phil Heath Will Beat Coleman

Does Heath have what it takes to be the greatest of all time?

Phil Heath is in a very intriguing position these days. Maybe it has to do with the four Sandows sitting in his home or maybe it has to do with his budding supplement and sponsorship companies. There’s no doubting that the Olympia champion is a true talent both in bodybuilding as well as in his entrepreneurial endeavors. But there’s also another big fact that makes him unique among the great Olympia champions who came before him. His age.

Phil will soon be turning 35 years old, an age that many other professional sports would look on as advanced. In the sport of bodybuilding however, the greater your age the more muscle maturity you possess. When compared to his contemporaries, Kai Greene and Shawn Rhoden are both 39 while Dennis Wolf is 36.  Heath is still considered to be relatively young for the sport. When you consider the fact that Olympia great Ronnie Coleman won his first Sandow trophy at the age of 34 and went on to win eight titles, Heath has already won four trophies by the same age.


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So the real question now becomes just how far can Phil go? Does he have the ability to surpass Coleman and become the greatest bodybuilder of all time. There are some things standing in his way, mainly the ever present form of Kai Greene who seems to be advancing just as much, arguably more so than Heath at this point. Many people felt that Kai was robbed of a victory at this past years event. Heath is certainly up to the challenge, but it’s a hurdle he’ll have to overcome. Besides that, everything else seems to be in Phil’s favor. He has youth on his side, he still hasn’t reached his peak performance age as a bodybuilder, and he’s still hungry. It’s that last fact that the other competitors have to worry about.

Phil Heath claims that he wants to take home 10 Sandows before he ends his reign as Olympia champion. The way it looks right now, he seems to be right on track. Every year he comes back to the Olympia stage he is in top form. Sure there’s always Kai, Dennis, and Rhoden nipping at his heels, but we are willing to go out on a limb and say this: Phil Heath can and probably will become the first person to break Lee Haney and Ronnie Coleman’s eight Sandow record.

There can always be a wild card that changes the game – but with the time it takes for someone like Big Ramy to earn some muscle maturity and conditioning, and the rest of the top competitors only getting older, we wouldn’t be surprised if we saw a lot more of Phil “Olympia Champion” Heath in the next six years to come.

So what do you think? Are we being too brash? Will Phil become the greatest of all time? Let us know in the comments below and be sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

Jonathan Salmon
Managing editor of Generation Iron, Jonathan Salmon is a writer, martial arts instructor, and geek culture enthusiast. He has been writing about bodybuilding, combat sports, and strength sports for over 8 years. Check out his YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and Sound Cloud for in-depth MMA analysis.