by Christian Duque
Age does not always bring wisdom. Getting to be older doesn’t really mean that you have lived any kind of a life. You could be 60 years old and never have done anything interesting in your life. Meanwhile, you could be 20 years old and be on top of the world. When it comes to giving advice, you have to have a relationship first. You wouldn’t stop a random person on the sidewalk and tell them how they should live their life, would you? You wouldn’t start randomly talking to somebody on an elevator ride telling them about why they should watch what they eat. That’s a great way to get jammed up.
For starters, it is socially awkward. Secondly, who are you to this person? Third of all, just because you’re older doesn’t mean you’re any wiser. Older people make mistakes all the time. And by that logic, senior citizens would be the sharpest tools in the pack. But how sad it is that so many senior citizens get scammed out of their financial information on a daily basis by scammers on the phone. The bottom line is that age is no more a marker for wisdom than height, weight, hair color, etc. There is no real connection between being older and being wiser. Maybe in the parlance of our times, trends like to hang their hat on this theme but that is not always the case. And one place where we have seen this quite evidently not be the case is in the subject of today’s article.
Tim Wilkins thought it was his place to give Sam Sulek advice on how to be a bodybuilder. And he didn’t do it on a phone call or an email, but he did it in a bodybuilding program format. And let me tell you, I think that he really regretted that move almost instantly. But let’s talk about it.
Before diving into this, if you don’t know who Sam Sulek is, then I invite you to do a deep dive into his YouTube catalog and the various things that he has put out on Instagram and Facebook. That said, he’s primarily a YouTuber that has really made his mark on the industry. He did it without all the bells and whistles that are customary with old school programs. For instance, Tim Wilkins, who attacked Sam, is part of one of these big-box programs. I’m not really familiar with Tim and we’ll talk about him in a moment, But for now let’s get back to Sam. He didn’t have the bells and whistles, he didn’t have a team of people following him around, he didn’t have a studio. I mean let’s be real here, for the longest time Sam didn’t even have a sponsor. He was literally just being a bro. He would go to the gym, he would lift, he would eat and he would reflect. That was a video. Then he would do it all over again. He did this for days, and those days became weeks and those weeks became months. Before he knew it, he had a robust catalog of content. And after that, then the sponsors came, then the podcast opportunities came, and finally he decided to compete. In a relatively short amount of time he won his first bodybuilding show, then he earned his pro card, and now he’s looking to the future to see what his pro debut will be. Interestingly, the more successful you get in the fitness industry, the more haters line up to take digs at you. Isn’t that sad? It’s sad, but true.
And again it comes down to how you address people and situations. Tim Wilkins is not someone that I’m familiar with. I have never really heard of him and I honestly don’t watch the type of program that he is a part of. I look at a show like Prime Time Muscle or Olympia TV as a bodybuilding program wanting to be a mainstream show. If I want to watch The View, I will wake up in the morning and watch it. I’m not going to watch a collection of has-been’s and loudmouths talking about bodybuilding and trying to give guidance to youngsters that never asked for it.
I can guarantee you that before all of this happened, Sam Sulek didn’t know Tim Wilkins any more than I know Tim Wilkins. He’s a non-factor. So what if he did a physique show or has a pro card? I don’t care. I don’t watch that type of program and I certainly would never read an article or anything by Tim. That’s nothing against him, it’s just not what I’m into. But because he decided to preach and because he decided to try to try to tear up Sam, that’s how I became aware of him. Because the backlash was so prominent that it even caught my attention. I know some people say “there’s no such thing as bad publicity,” but you know what? In this case, I think there is. 95% of the people who know the name Tim Wilkins, right now, probably don’t have anything good to say about him.
And what did Tim say? Nothing novel or groundbreaking. Just the same Grumpy Old Men knocks on an up and coming youngster. They don’t like Sam’s diet, so they attack him. They don’t like Sam’s training methodologies, so they attack him. They don’t like what they think Sam is running, so they attack him. The common denominator here is that they attack him.
Now they’re not attacking any number of other bodybuilders or physique-based influencers promoting flexible dieting or training like barbarians, because what’s the point of that? They’re attacking Sam because he’s the biggest YouTuber. They’re attacking Sam because he doesn’t have the production team that they have, or the sound system they have, or the studio set or the paid social media people they have. And you know what kills them? What kills them is that Sam buries all of them in terms of hits and relevancy and all he’s doing is talking into his phone. It hurts them. It makes their blood boil. So don’t feed me any of this looking after him bullshit. Tim Wilkins doesn’t care about Sam Sulek nor does he care about the youth. He’s a clown who wants hits. Simple and plain.
I mean I don’t know Tim personally but this was a dick move. He decided to pick on a 23-year-old kid who is living his dreams and loving bodybuilding. Sam never said a word to him or about him that I’m aware of. Tim probably figured he could attack Sam, get some buzz off of it, and then move on. And buzz, that he got.
Now everybody knows who Tim Wilkins is, but they don’t know Tim for being an athlete, a commentator, or a writer. They know him for being a bully. If that is what he wanted, that is what he got. Everybody now knows the name Tim Wilkins. I will never forget the name Tim Wilkins. Anytime I think of Tim Wilkins, I’ll think of some old clown trying to push a college-aged influencer around. And again, that might be success to some, but it seems like a black eye or a dark cloud to me.
I think the real issue, here, is not that Tim Wilkins is a bully or that Sam is larger than life, it’s the fact that when you’re on top you’re going to have people taking shots at you. and they’re not going to do that with any kind of good-hearted, good-natured, or even decent agenda. Simply put, when you’re at the top, people will take shots at you just so they can get some kind of notoriety off of it. And everybody saw through Tim and through Tim’s advice to Sam almost instantaneously. That is why the backlash was so prominent. That is why so many people piled on top of this idiot because they saw what he was trying to do. And it will never cease to amaze me how foolishly Jake Wood invests in these types of programs. I mean to put that kind of money behind a panel of bozos talking bullshit about the sport is simply a waste of time and resources. They’re not contributing to anything. Tim Wilkins should be fired and anybody that feels the need to bully anyone – especially young up and coming bodybuilders, should get kicked to the curb. That’s not entertainment. It’s lame AF.
Moreover, this little attack on Tim’s part was done on Jake Woods’ dime. That’s done during air time for a show that has sponsors and that would like to grow in viewership. If Tim were attacking Sam on his own Facebook page that would be one thing but he did it on the company’s dime. I think that when you’re working for a company you should leave any personal bullshit at the door. This was not part of the program and it didn’t do anything to benefit the show. If you’re going to work for somebody else, then you do the best you can for that person. You don’t bring drama into the mix. The same thing goes for Tamer and all the other bozos that do the shows that Jake financially bankrolls. I don’t understand the purpose of having a show like THE VIEW in the sport of bodybuilding. If you want to have a bunch of sour pusses talking about the sport, why even bother having a show?
Because that’s the vibe I got from Tim attacking Sam. Just a bitter nobody bitter at a youngster for actually having an impact on the sport.
At the end of the day, Sam is living out his dreams. He isn’t hurting anyone and he’s very entertaining. If he wants to eat Krispy Kreme donuts and drink gallons of milk then let him do it. He is able to put out a great physique on stage, but more importantly he is happy. He is happy, his fans are happy, and the sport is growing. The last thing we need is some dipshit with an internet connection on a show with a whole team working for him, thinking that because he’s older than Sam, his opinion somehow weighs more.
It doesn’t.
As always I hope you enjoyed reading my article, here, at IronMag. I look forward to reading your feedback in the comments. Please be sure to copy and paste a link to this article on all your social media feeds. And to Tim Wilkins, I’m sorry I called you a bully and a nobody, but when you make yourself famous in the way that you have, it comes with the dinner.