Follow Craig on Twitter https://twitter.com/bigcraigmonson?la...

While researching our first book, Jailhouse Strong, we wanted to leave no stone unturned. We talked with the former Mr. Olympia Dorian Yates (who started lifting while incarcerated), an outlaw motorcycle club president, gang leaders, old time prize fighters, and a legendary British hard man. During this exhaustive process of discovery, one name came up again and again…Craig Monson.
His name was echoed with a hushed reverence. A member of an LA street gang during the 1960s called the Avenues, which would influence the founding of the infamous Crips, Big Monson spent time in the California state prison in Tracy and at San Quentin. He was said to dwarf his lifting partner, the notorious Stanley “Tookie” Williams. It was rumored that he was doing back arms (triceps extensions) with 315 and that he could easily rep out well over 500 pounds on the bench press.
During a number of our visits with a cofounder of the Crips, Angelo “Barefoot Pookie” White, we tried to locate Monson. Alongside “Barefoot Pookie,” we drove across South Central Los Angeles. But, it was to no avail. Word on the street was conflicted. We heard that he was hiding out, still locked up, or maybe no longer alive.
Not of the temperament to be easily dissuaded or discouraged, we finally found Craig Monson. And we found that the truth was greater than the legend.
At an unassuming gym in sunny Southern California, we interviewed Craig. He shared the grand saga of his life. A cultured man who enjoys European travel and was an accomplished artist, Craig speaks with passion and intelligence about his incredible journey from early backyard lifting alongside fellow gang members to becoming an international bodybuilding sensation who brought audiences to a point of collective fervor and trained alongside Danny Trejo and Arnold Schwarzenegger during the heyday of Muscle Beach in Venice, California.
Join us as Craig Monson shares his transformation from inner city obscurity to the status of living legend. Along the way, he provides a candid description of the workouts, substances, people, and lessons that impacted this incredible life story.