Flex Ability: A Story of Strength and Survival [Hardcover]

Flex Wheeler (Author), Cindy Pearlman (Author)

Book Description

Series: Fitness Books from the Experts | Publication Date: May 1, 2003

One look at him and it seems like a sculptor created this sort of perfection. Champion bodybuilder Flex Wheeler has biceps of molded steel and a back that is so cut and sculpted that it looks like a mountain range. Fellow athlete and movie star Arnold Schwarzenegger has called him "one of the best bodybuilders of all time" and also insists that "Flex Wheeler is a fantastic champion. He has won the Arnold Classic many times and I've found him to be an extraordinary athlete. He is a winner."

"It's not just about building your body," Flex says. "It's about building the love in your heart for God and your family."

Flex Ability is a story of overcoming odds so awesome that most people would have just given up and called it a day. Flex Wheeler is a champion when it comes to bodybuilding. . . . Kenny Wheeler has proven that he’s a champion when it comes to life. In this, his first book, Kenny takes you around the globe and into the winner’s circle as he describes his two-decade journey through the tough sport of bodybuilding. He also brings you backstage at competitions, where personalities of 300-pound men clash, and into the private gyms of Los Angeles, where the puddles of sweat tell the story of what it takes to push your body to the max.

While telling the extremely personal story of his private struggles, Kenny shares how the abuse he suffered as a boy taught him how life isn’t fair, but sometimes you just have to cope and rise above the ultimate challenges by finding your own inner strength. He shares never-before-told secrets about his current struggles, and how with the right mind-set, anyone can face trouble head-on and come out on the other side as a winner.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Flex is one of the best bodybuilders of all time...I've found him to be an extraordinary athlete. He is a winner." --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

About the Author

Ken "Flex" Wheeler is one of the top bodybuilding champions in the history of the sport, and a man who has spent over two decades developing his body into a work of art. Born a premature baby to a single mother in Fresno, California, he faced many early struggles, including extreme poverty and dyslexia, plus the horrors of physical and sexual abuse. While his mind coped with some of life's tragic turns, he found an outlet for expression at his local recreation center, where he was allowed to train for free as a child and teenager. Almost from the start, Flex shot to the top of the bodybuilding world and began winning local competitions, which led to a first-place trophy at the 1989 California Championships. He's in the Guinness Book of World Records for his multiple wins of the Arnold Classic, sponsored by bodybuilder and actor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has dubbed Flex "one of the greatest bodybuilders I've ever seen." Flex is also a personal trainer to some of Hollywood's elite, and he maintains his own rigorous training regimen of eight hours-plus a day in the gym for a good reason. Although Flex retired from bodybuilding in 2000, he recently shook the industry to its core by announcing his return to the sport.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 199 pages
• Publisher: Hay House (May 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1401901735
• ISBN-13: 978-1401901738
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #826,916 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Would the real Wheeler please stand up?, May 9, 2006

By 

Brian Malley (Ann Arbor, Michigan) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Flex Ability: A Story of Strength and Survival (Hardcover)

I enjoyed reading this book, but as time has passed and I have reflected upon it further, I have become more and more disappointed with it. Flex now writes for Muscular Development, and his pieces in there vary a great deal in the persona he projects. In FlexAbility he portrays himself as the quasi-innocent, long-suffering victim. The suspicious "ninja attack" which supposedly occurred right before an Olympia, thus forcing him to withdraw, is not even mentioned here, though surely it ought to be discussed--if it were real, because that would be a major event in his career; if it were invented, because only by 'fessing up would he really be honest. I think that in this book Wheeler is working really hard to convince the reader that he, Flex, is a good guy. He might be, but methinks this book doth protest too much.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Honest and Thought Provoking, March 22, 2005

By 

J. Teske (Minneapolis, MN) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Flex Ability: A Story of Strength and Survival (Paperback)

Once I started reading this book I could not put it down. Flex is very honest with painful stories from his childhood all the way to the present. When you read this book you understand exactly the pressures he was under during his bodybuilding career and in his personal life. In fact he was so honest, that at times I hated him, and at times I loved him, and you can tell that he's learned lessons from his life and is now a completely changed person.

I don't understand why some of the readers gave him such negative reviews. First, this is not a "training manual," it is a biography. Second, how can a reader really question Flex's extremes that he wrote about? Do you think he was lying about the size of his house or the number of cars he had? He states that now he realizes how foolish he was to blow all his money and not save anything. And how can a reader question the amount of work he put in when training for a show? I must say that 3 hours of cardio in a 24 hour period is extreme but it is certainly not uncommon for the few weeks leading up to a big show; how do you think the guys get to the level that he was on -- everything they do is extreme, from the amount of drugs they use to the amount of exercise they do to prepare for a show.

All in all a great in-depth story about an interesting guy living in the interesting world of pro bodybuilding.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Flex Ability, June 26, 2003

By 

DENITA (Fontana, Ca. United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Flex Ability: A Story of Strength and Survival (Hardcover)

This book really lets you see the real Flex Wheeler from the inside out. He gets down to the dirt of what is printed about him and clarifies the untruths. You'll love this book. I could't put it down.