by Christian Duque
Some recent photos of Ramy suggest that he is not in fact doing the 2025 Mr Olympia. Earlier in the year he had said that WINTER IS COMING and that the fans should expect to see him back on the Olympia stage. He was talking like a man who was poised on winning back his title. He was very much speaking to his many fans all around the world that would love nothing more than to see The Egyptian Phenom return to the Olympia stage and win back the title that he lost back in 2021.
But the reality of the matter is a recent appearance by Ramy at a gym event does not show him with the death face that we are so accustomed to seeing him with so close to the Olympia. The most popular YouTuber, Nick Miller, also pointed out that he didn’t see very much vascularity. Now mind you, Ramy was wearing pants and a shirt but it would have been very obvious if he was 2 weeks out from Mr Olympia because his face would be sucked in by now and he’d be covered in veins.
Moreover, Ramy has not said what his plans really are. As Miller pointed out, and I concur with him on this one, nothing would be cooler than if Ramy showed up on stage and just shocked the world. But that being said, I think that what we saw earlier in the year is very similar to what Kai Greene did for many years after competing in his last Olympia. He got so good at it that almost every year he would mention a possible comeback. But Ramy really hasn’t done that before. In fact. Ramy went on to do different things after bodybuilding. That being said he will forever be a part of the Olympia club and not just a part of it, but a driving force. In all honesty, he should really compete again, but what’s in it for him? And was he ever going to compete? Could he still compete?
What’s in it for him is really debatable. Once you win one Olympia title you are part of the Olympia club for life. It doesn’t matter if you won one like Dexter Jackson or you won eight like Lee Haney. You are a Mr Olympia and as such doors will open you for the rest of your life. Is there a benefit to Ramy coming back and winning a third Olympia? Well of course there’s a prize money to consider and it’s a significant amount of money for what you’re actually doing. You’re preparing for a contest that spans 2 days. Essentially you are really working two days and you’re walking away with however much money they’re offering these days. Whether it’s half a million dollars or $600,000, bodybuilding continues to be the flagship division, and it always will be. So as a result of that it has the biggest purse. But what can $600,000 do for Ramy? I’m not suggesting the guy is so rich that he doesn’t need it, but what is it going to do for him in terms of changing his life or making it so worthwhile that he has to do the O again? See right there, I don’t know how to answer that because while it is a lot of money, I don’t think it’s enough money to get him to come out of retirement and to go through all the bullshit of contest prep and then having to be judged extensively by a panel of guys that haven’t seen him compete in years. What’s in it for him? Why does he need to pose in front of these judges if he’s already done that and has already won the biggest title in the world? And he’s won the biggest title in the world, twice. What does one more win do for him? I don’t think it really does anything.
But I do think that the situation with Ramy is different from the situation with Kai. Kai after 2016 made it almost a career to hint at comebacks. Whether he was doing it directly or indirectly. Whether he was doing it because he had a phone call with Dan Solomon or because there was a rainbow in the middle of the road that he used to go to the gym. I mean honestly the talk of a comeback got to the point where by the 7th or 8th year of doing it nobody believed him. Right now I don’t believe him. I really like Kai as a bodybuilder and think he’s a great person but he’s a bullshiter. And after so many times of hinting at a comeback and not coming back, people just stop believing you. This is not something that Ramy has done. So when he said earlier this year that he wanted to compete again and that WINTER WAS COMING, I took it seriously, as did many other members of the media. The fact of the matter is I don’t think that Ramy would say something like that just to say it. I don’t believe that he is currently sponsored and if he is, I can almost assure you that he was not talking about a comeback to sell some tubs of protein powder. There’s different ways he could do that and that’s not one of them. At least that’s not an honorable way to sell products because once you say you’re coming back and then you don’t come back, you start to look like a person that is not very credible. And people that are not credible do not generally bode well for selling supplements or training programs or anything where their character and integrity factor in.
I believe that Ramy wanted to continue competing after the Arnold Classic where he took 5th place, but I think he realized that the writing was on the wall. I think people who were very close to him told him that that was the right time to maybe take a break from the sport and unfortunately as is the case with taking time away from the stage, a temporary break can become a permanent one. For Ramy to compete, it would require him to go back to a way of life that I think is foreign to him at this point. Plus, if he was coming back, why would he have missed the opportunity of posting content this whole time? He could have been dropping videos showing his his progress, his training, his meals, etc. Why would he miss so many great opportunities simply to surprise everybody by getting on stage? That doesn’t make any sense. It doesn’t make sense from a business standpoint, it doesn’t make sense from a legacy standpoint, it just doesn’t make any sense at all.
I believe that Ramy probably had every intention of making a comeback. If you look at pictures from a recent gym appearance, he does not look bad. I agree with Miller in that he doesn’t have the death face that he would have during any other prep at this stage of the game. I also agree that his arms don’t look particularly vascular and we don’t see any crazy separation. Now granted, he is wearing a black shirt and black is the hardest color to distinguish that sort of thing, but we can still see the physique and the lining of it. And Ramy just doesn’t look like he is in any kind of prep. He looks very much like he’s in the off season but not a sloppy off season, either. As Miller points out in his video, and I agree, Ramy may in fact do the 2025 Olympia. It is possible – it’s not likely – but it is possible. He doesn’t look fat or out of shape, but he also doesn’t appear to be two weeks out from the Olympia, either. Now could this be one giant mind fuck? Absolutely, but highly unlikely.
I don’t see any reason why Ramy couldn’t compete in 2026 or the following year. He still has retained much of his size and I have no doubt that he could still get himself in contest shape. The problem is that only one man in 60 plus years of bodybuilding history has been able to win back the Olympia. That man was Jay Cutler in 2009. I don’t know how many times I have written that in articles but it’s very important because history is not on the side of anyone trying to win back the title. Brandon hasn’t able to do it, Derek has not been able to do it, Hadi has not been able to do it, either.Nobody has been able to do it. Jay Cutler did it. Ronne Coleman couldn’t do it, Phil Heath couldn’t do it, Frank Zane couldn’t do it. It is not something that is done. It is just not. So maybe Ramy has factored all of this into the equation over the course of a real prep and at some point it made no sense to him.
Why would somebody that has won two Olympias come back knowing they can’t win? There’s no honor in that. Sure you can compete because you love doing it but when you are Mr Olympia you have to protect your legacy and I don’t think Big Ramy would be doing that jumping into a show where he might not even be in the Top 6.
The sport has changed and Big Ramy has not changed along with it. I think that once you’ve been off the stage for more than a year you start to look like you’re retired. and I think that’s why Nick Walker also came out of the woodwork because after dropping out of two consecutive Olympias, I think people were writing him off. And unfortunately for Ramy, it’s been more than 2 years. It’s more than 3 years, actually. At that point people just start to assume that competing is in the past.
Plus competing after an absence of three or more years is almost like having to start from scratch. William took one year off and was able to come back firing on all cylinders but once you take two, three or more years I feel like it’s just very difficult to be able to get back into excellent contest shape. Plus Ramy is also no spring chicken. He isn’t old but he isn’t young. And honestly, I think that his desire to compete went out the window after the Olympia he lost and the Arnold Classic.
Only time will tell if he will take the stage in 2025. if he does I would absolutely love to be mistaken and I’ll write an article celebrating his comeback immediately for iron man. but the same way I didn’t think he was going to compete in 2025 I also don’t think he’s going to compete in the future either. Once you have won the highest title in the sport unless you can win it again, realistically, I see no reason to even bother trying. and right now I suspect Ramy would not even make the top six. Isn’t that sad? It’s sad, but it’s true.
What say you? Do you think Ramy will compete? Do you think that he will compete in the future, if not in 2025? As always, thank you for reading my article 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. It is bound to generate lively conversation.
