Shaquille O’Neal says his biceps are the best bit.

“My arms are looking really good and really young,” the former Lakers center told Men’s Health in a feature on his new training regime, built around the one thing he still chases every session, the pump.

At 54, the four-time NBA champion has rebuilt his week around a bodybuilder’s template: four lifting days, each session around an hour, with 20 minutes of low-intensity cardio bolted on at the start.

The workouts lean on classics he can perform without putting his joints through what basketball once did. High-rep cable chest flyes. An incline bench lat pulldown variation. Sets built for feel, not for one-rep records. And at the end of a session, he hits actual bodybuilding poses, a back double biceps, a rear lat spread, the same shapes Arnold Schwarzenegger made famous on the Mr. Olympia stage.

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No more running, by force

The reason for the pivot is medical, not vanity. O’Neal had a hip replaced in 2023, and the stress of carrying a 7ft 1in frame through 19 NBA seasons has closed the door on his old cardio.

“I can’t run anymore and it’s sad,” he told the magazine. “I used to be the greatest athlete ever.”

What is still open to him is the weights room, and he has leaned into it. Shaq has shed around 55 pounds since the weight he put on during the pandemic, when he climbed past 400lb. The goal now, he has said, is longevity and muscle tone, not a competition card.

‘Here I come, Arnold Shaqanager’

The social-media version of the project landed on 9 October, when Shaq posted a shirtless clip of himself grinding out standing cable work on TikTok, in gray shorts and black sneakers, soundtracked by Mike Jones’ “Back Then.”

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The caption did the rest of the work.

“Here I come Arnold Shaqanager.”

It was a nod to Schwarzenegger that his audience ran with instantly, and one that landed inside the bodybuilding world too, Arnold’s son Joseph Baena has previously floated the idea of Shaq joining him for a guest posing routine.

For a 7ft 1in frame built in the paint, the physique on display is a long way from the center who dunked on four Finals opponents in the 2000s. The posing, the actual bodybuilder’s finish to a session, is new.

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Shaq’s own verdict, delivered to Men’s Health, is unfussy.

“My favorite part of working out is that I know when I get a good pump in.”

The chest video is still live on his TikTok account @shaq.

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