De La Rosa, who took over the Mr. Olympia’s Instagram page for a day as part of its Home Gym series, said he frequently trains with bodybuilders he later competes against at shows.
“It’s something I’m really excited to do,” De La Rosa said during an Instagram Live Q&A, which you can watch below. “It’s something that brings out the best in us.”
Right now, he’s training with Flex as the latter prepares to compete in the Open division during the Olympia weekend, being held this year Dec. 17 to 20. De La Rosa has yet to qualify for the competition, but hopes to secure his spot at the New York Pro on Sept. 5.
And once they’re done being opponents, they’ll go right back to being training partners. “We’re going to get in the gym probably the next day and push each other to be our best yet again,” De La Rosa says.
De La Rosa has been in the bodybuilding game for most of his life — his father, William De La Rosa, is still competing at 58 and looks damn good (luckily for Jon, the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.)
Jon De La Rosa hit on a number of topics during two Q&A sessions, with a lot of the inquiries centering around eating for mass, whether we’d see Kai Greene and Phil Heath onstage this year, and what his favorite chest exercises are.
He was also asked how he keeps himself motivated to keep dieting and training every day.
“Motivation can carry but so far,” De La Rosa responded. “You have to have the willpower to tell yourself no matter what’s going on you got to put in the work. It’s easy for me to do that but that takes time and repetition.”
