Working-class workout: Randy Phillips Jr. filled out his blue collar by taking a working-class attitude to the gym

WHILE OLD-FASHIONED ETHICS AND HARD WORK may seem to exist only as plot devices in oatmeal commercials these days, it's nice to know there are folks like Randy Phillips Jr. out there, putting those values into practice. This homespun Midwesterner applied his work ethic to his health, overcoming both anorexia and obesity to build a body that's now Hollywood bound.

Though happy and healthy throughout his childhood in Mt. Vernon, Ill., Phillips found himself in turmoil during his college years. Still living at home, he began to feel the negative effects of his parents' unhappy marriage--so much so, in fact, that he eventually developed an eating disorder. "There was a lot of tension in the house," says Phillips, "and I guess I felt that if I couldn't control anything else, I could at least control what I ate. So I stopped eating." Subconsciously believing that if he changed his body, he could draw his parents' attention away from their own problems, Phillips--19 at the time--launched a fanatical running program to see how thin he could get, jogging 10 miles a day, six days a week.

By the time he'd earned his associate's degree the next year, Phillips had dropped some 25 pounds from his 5'7" frame, leaving him a gaunt 115 pounds. In the fall of 1996, when he enrolled in Eastern Illinois University to earn his bachelor's in psychology, Phillips pushed the weight loss even more. "I ended up literally becoming the 97-pound weakling," he says. Amazingly, he maintained that weight for more than a year, eating only sparse amounts of granola, fruit, salad, and tuna fish--at best, only 1,000 calories a day. "I was a full-blown anorexic."

Though Phillips' transformation did attract his parents' awareness, the attention wasn't positive. "They told me that if I dropped under 100 pounds they would send me to a clinic. I just lied and told them I weighed 102."

Things continued to worsen for Phillips. His energy plummeted and his hands got so dry that the skin cracked and bled. Though he never sought professional help, he came to his senses in the spring of 1998--his senior year. "I just woke up one day and said, 'I'm killing myself and I can't do it anymore.'"

To make up for years of deprivation, Phillips went hog wild, eating everything in sight. By graduation, he was up to 160 pounds and nearing obesity. The following summer he married, but he was divorced two years later. "My parents split up the same month," he says. "The problems they had in their marriage made me want to prove that I could make a marriage work--but I picked the wrong person."

An emotional wreck, Phillips was aimless. He worked construction off and on for his father, and he continued eating recklessly until finally reaching 180 pounds in August 2001. "That's when I finally said 'enough is enough' again. I wanted to get back into the shape I was in high school, when I was an athlete--before all my problems."

So that September, Phillips joined a gym. Balancing heavy construction work with heavy lifting, Phillips averaged two workouts a day, getting up at four in the morning to lift weights, then hitting the gym again after work to do cardio. He followed the routine religiously, week in and week out. "I grew up in a very blue-collar family where the work ethic was very important," says Phillips. "I can remember my father putting in 100-hour weeks and still making time to come to my basketball games--that mentality really applied to my getting in shape."

In two months, Phillips dropped 20 pounds. Eating healthy fare such as chicken, fish, and vegetables, he continued making progress until, in March 2002, he got a job working at his gym. Though he was a jack-of-all-trades at first, Phillips became a trainer a year later, helping clients and maintaining his own regimen despite his hectic schedule. Today, at 155 pounds and 5% body fat, he's eager to inspire people nationwide to reclaim their bodies and get in shape.

"My dream is to become a fitness model and trainer in Hollywood," says Phillips, now 29. "I'm planning to move there very soon." In the meantime, he's just glad to be healthy--both mentally and physically. "I feel like my life is just starting now. All I need is the opportunity to get to the next level--I'm not afraid of the work involved."

Wake Up!

How Randy Phillips Jr. stays motivated--and how you can, too

PROGRAM YOURSELF

"I've always been an internally motivated person," says Phillips. "And I was raised to believe that if you want something, you'll work hard enough to get it--making sacrifices where you have to."

BE POSITIVE

"I tell myself every day that I have been blessed with a wonderful opportunity, so I don't take anything for granted. Not too many people want to get up at four in the morning to work out--but I do. I think it's great."

VISUALIZE

"I can see myself reaching the goals I've set. I can see me on the cover of fitness magazines, doing what I love as a career. That keeps me going."

COPYRIGHT 2005 Weider Publications
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning