Carl grinned. "Just a minute Mike, I'm still shaking from the experience!" Carl pretended his hands were shaking.

"Hey, I didn't do anything scary." I protested. I could see that Carl was kidding, and the excitement of driving around the first time still had me grinning nonstop.

"It's exciting the first time, huh Eric?" Mike smiled.

I tried to stay cool about it. "Yeah, it was OK."

"OK?" Carl laughed, "you couldn't have torn the grin off his face with a crowbar, he loved it - didn't ya lead foot? So who are you, Mike's brother?" Carl was looking at Justin and Justin was definitely looking at Carl. Justin nodded silently. He was wearing shorts and no shirt even though it was only in the low 70's. "Damn, you guys are quite the trio aren't you?"

"That's Justin, Carl." I figured I'd better introduce him since Justin was clearly speechless. "Guess how old he is."

Carl looked at Justin for a second. Justin loved this game, because he definitely had the face of 14 year old but he had the body of much older kid. "Hmmm, it looks like you've been working out for a while, Justin. Your arms and chest are pretty huge. I'm going to guess you are about seventeen, and you just have a baby face."

A huge grin crept across Justin's face. "I'll be fourteen next week!" he said proudly. "But I'm stronger than Mike and Eric" he said as he hit a double bi pose for Carl. Carl couldn't believe it, no one ever did. Mike and I both told him it was true - Justin was almost fourteen. and he was indeed stronger than either of us.

"That's incredible." Carl said. "So where do you guys train?" I told him about the gym in our garage, and he wanted to see it. He was impressed with the equipment we had and was even more impressed by the amount of weight we left on the bars and the size of the dumbbells that were still lying on the floor. "You guys should come down to the gym where I train. Everyone will be amazed at all of you. You all have done a remarkable job."

Mike almost jumped toward Carl. We all wanted to see where this monster of a guy trained, but Mike was totally excited. "Really!?! Can we? I'd love to see where you train. How soon can we go?"

Carl told us that he was going to meet some of his friends at Iron Mike's Gym later on around six. None of us had ever heard of the place, so he gave us directions. It wasn't too far away. We were pretty sure that Mike's parents would let him drive us over to the gym. "Great, then it's set, I'll see you all around six" Carl said, "oh, make sure you come ready to lift. If you come, you have to train with us. No pussing out on me, OK?"

We were all totally stoked. We'd talked about joining a gym, and we had even gone and looked at a Gold's to see what they had. We ended up decided that it was a lot easier to work out at home, and if we needed more or different equipment, I could always talk my parents into buying it. Besides most of the guys we saw at Gold's weren't very impressive.

The three of us hung around waiting for 6:00 to come. The time seemed to drag by as we speculated about what the gym would be like and what kind of guys Carl trained with. When finally it was time to go, we headed out and jumped in the car. I gave Mike directions as he drove; in about 15 minutes we were at the gym. We were in an industrial park. There was no big neon sign and no fancy entrance. The only thing that distinguished it from the other warehouses was 4 X 8 piece of plywood that said "Iron Mike's Gym" and listed the hours.

We walked in and immediately noticed about ten huge guys working out. Carl was one of the bigger guys, but he wasn't the biggest. The gym itself had great equipment, all of it capable of supporting some really big weights. It was definitely a notch up from Gold's. The place was clean, but not as flashy as most gyms. Nothing was chrome and all of the padding on the benches was basic black. Carl saw us come in and greeted us. Mike and I were wearing tanks and shorts; Justin was shirtless and had on his lycra shorts. Carl looked over at Justin and smiled. "Sorry kid, but you have to wear a shirt in here. Mike's rules." Justin pulled a shirt out of his gym bag and put it on. It was a skin-tight tank top, but it seemed to satisfy the rules.

"OK, so let me introduce you to a couple of my friends" Carl said as he walked over to where two other huge guys were waiting. "This is Mike. He owns this pit of a gym," Carl laughed. Mike was about an inch or so taller than Carl and easily as muscular. In fact, he was probably the most muscular guy in the place. He had dark hair and blue eyes and seemed to constantly be smiling. I figured he was a little older than Carl, probably in his thirties. He was genuinely nice and seemed happy to see us.

"And this is Jonathan," Carl continued. "He's my regular training partner and a total animal." He smacked Jonathan on the back of his head as he said this. Jonathan pretended to be hurt, but it was obviously more of a, well, a love tap. Jonathan was about 5'10" and not as built as Carl or Mike. Where Carl and Mike were huge like pro bodybuilders, Jonathan was what could only be described as incredibly good looking and well proportioned. He was still well over 200 pounds, but he looked more aesthetic than the others. He was younger too, probably only twenty or so. I don't know why, but I wondered right away if maybe Carl and Jonathan were more than training partners.

We talked for a while and managed to get past everyone's disbelief in Justin's build. Carl finally said, "OK, so you guys came to train, right?" We all nodded. "Good! I figured we'd pair up and show you guys how we train here. Eric, you work out with Mike here. Mike, let's have you go with Jonathan. Justin, I want you to come with me." We looked at each other just for a second and then went off with our appointed training partner. We weren't really expecting to work out this way, but we were all willing to give it a try.

The workout they put us through was incredible. I decided that Carl really knew his stuff because our assignments were no accident. Each of us ended up working our weakest parts and these guys showed us no mercy. Mike and Jonathan were working chest and shoulders. Justin and Carl were doing legs. Big Mike and I did back and arms. Watching his 20 inch arms pump up as we did curls was something I'll never forget. It was humbling and inspiring at the same time.

We trained for over two hours before they finally had us stretch out and cool down. The gym wasn't huge so we could see what everyone was doing. Carl in particular was taking it to Justin. We even heard him yell at Justin once. "Damn it, Kid. You know you can do more, don't stop until can't do another rep!" Justin was totally concentrating on everything Carl was telling him. It was probably good to have someone really push him, but I don't think I saw Justin smile once during the entire session.

Watching the weights that Carl, Mike and Jonathan used was nothing short of awesome. Mike did seated curls with 85 lbs dumbbells. Carl squatted with five plates on each side of the bar. Jonathan knocked out inclined presses with 100 lbs dumbbells. If we ever thought we were big shit, we didn't now. We'd had a demonstration of what big really was, and we all had a long way to go. Honestly, I don't think that Mike and I were interested in being as big as Carl and Mike - maybe Justin was. Jonathan was another matter. That man was HOT and Mike was having a great time training with him.

Jonathan was wearing a loose fitting tank top that barely covered abs and back. When he did seated military presses, his body looked as perfect as any I'd ever seen. I could tell by the look on his face, Mike was concentrating on spotting for Jonathan, but even more he was concentrating on not popping a hard-on.

As we were leaving, we thanked Mike, Carl and Jonathan for letting us train with them. It was definitely an experience we'd never forget, because both Carl and Mike were about to turn pro. They invited us to see their next show and Mike told us that we could come back to his gym whenever we wanted if we needed advice or anything.

We talked nonstop as we drove home. Mike told us that Jonathan was an aspiring actor. He'd been in a couple TV commercials and had done some photo shoots. While Mike and I were mentally drooling over Jonathan, Justin thought Carl was incredible. Carl had really kicked his butt around the gym, and I think Justin was missing having a coach to push him. We made Mike stop at a Jamba Juice because we were all starving. By the time we got home, we were all exhausted. We went to sleep immediately.

The next morning we all met back at the garage. We had planned to work out, but there was no way. We all had learned a new meaning for the word sore. We spent the day lazily watching TV instead. •