A true legend of bodybuilding, Dorian Yates won six consecutive Mr. Olympia titles between 1992 and 1997. With a professional record consisting of 15 major contest wins and two second-place finishes he has the fifth-highest number of Mr. Olympia wins since the competition began. Between 1992 and 1997 when he retired, he won every contest he took part in, and is widely considered one of the top bodybuilders of all time.
Born in Hurley, Warwickshire in England, Yates began training in 1983. As he rose through the ranks he picked up the nickname “The Shadow” after turning up by surprise at many bodybuilding competitions and going on to steal a win. A proponent of the high-intensity training (HIT) style of bodybuilding pioneered by Mike Mentzer and Arthur Jones, he was considered one of the first “mass monsters” in bodybuilding combining incredible conditioning with huge muscle mass. Yates gave full commitment to his training and preferred to maintain his privacy, avoiding interviews and publicity.
Yates has been involved with several fitness-based business ventures, including Temple Gyms which he purchased in Birmingham in 1987 and Heavy Duty Inc. in California with Ray Mentzer and Mike Mentzer. He has founded three bodybuilding nutrition and supplement companies including DY Nutrition in 2011 which specialises in pre-workout formulas, and has released several popular training DVDs. In 1993 he published is autobiography Blood and Guts, and he starred in the London Real feature film Dorian Yates: Inside The Shadow in 2017.