Calum Von Moger says he and Chris Bumstead “would have been the rivals,” standing side by side on the Olympia stage, if not for “these injuries or setbacks.”
“I would have thrashed him,” said the 36-year-old Australian, who played a young Arnold Schwarzenegger in the 2018 film Bigger. He spoke in a clip the More Life Podcast posted to Instagram on October 24.
Bumstead won six straight Classic Physique Olympia titles from 2019 to 2024. Von Moger never faced him on a pro stage, and the first of his major injuries happened while the two were filming a workout together.
What Calum Von Moger Said About Chris Bumstead
Von Moger said he only ever wanted one Olympia win. His plan was to reach the Olympia, win once and walk away: “get one trophy, get the win and then just boost it.”
“That would’ve been the best experience of my life, but I won’t have that,” he said. “That’s okay. I’ve got a lot of other different life experiences instead.”
In June 2024 he still talked about a comeback. He told Larry Wheels on a podcast that he might compete in 2025. Two years later, in a YouTube video recorded after his move to Thailand, he said: “I had accepted that I wasn’t getting into the Classic Physique Olympia.”
How Von Moger Tore His Biceps Training With Bumstead
Classic Physique made its Olympia debut in 2016, when Danny Hester won the first title. Von Moger had competed in the WFF and NABBA, federations outside the IFBB Pro League, and he said in 2024 that the new division looked “perfect” for him: “My goal was to be on the Olympia stage for Classic Physique.”
In November 2016 he won the Classic Physique overall at the NPC Iron Games in Culver City, California. It was his first show with the NPC, the amateur league whose national shows award IFBB pro cards.
Late in 2017, about two months after Bumstead placed second at that year’s Classic Physique Olympia, Von Moger ran into him at Gold’s Gym Venice, and the two filmed a two-man barbell curl for a video. Von Moger tore his biceps on the lift. His MRI showed “a complete tear in the distal biceps tendon,” he wrote at the time, and he needed surgery to reattach it.
In April 2018, still recovering, he fell while rappelling down a cliff with his brothers. “I tore my bicep again when I tried to pull myself up the cliff,” he wrote. The fall also left him with “a complete rupture of my quadriceps tendon, dislocated kneecap,” he said in a post the same week. He had knee surgery in Los Angeles that month and a second biceps operation in October.
What Happened After Von Moger Earned His Pro Card
On November 12, 2020, Von Moger won his height class, Class D, in Classic Physique at the NPC Universe, one of 13 men in the division to earn an IFBB pro card there. The overall went to Tomas Adame-Hernandez.
That made him a pro in Bumstead’s division a month before the 2020 Olympia in Orlando, where Bumstead won the second of his six titles. Von Moger has not entered an IFBB Pro League show since, so he never earned the pro win or the qualification points it takes to get an Olympia invitation.
In May 2022 he jumped from a second-story window, and doctors placed him in a medically induced coma. He left hospital two weeks later. In 2023 he said he was no longer trying to become a champion bodybuilder.
Bumstead retired from Classic Physique after his sixth title in 2024. He then entered one Men’s Open show, the 2024 EVLS Prague Pro, and placed second to Martin Fitzwater. That was his last show.
Calum Von Moger and Chris Bumstead, Year by Year
Both men aimed at Classic Physique when it arrived at the Olympia in 2016. After the 2017 curl video, Von Moger competed once more.
| Year | Chris Bumstead | Calum Von Moger |
|---|---|---|
| 2016 | Earned his IFBB pro card | Won the Classic Physique overall at the NPC Iron Games |
| 2017 | 2nd, Classic Physique Olympia | Tore his biceps in the curl video with Bumstead |
| 2018 | 2nd, Classic Physique Olympia | Ruptured his quadriceps tendon and tore the same biceps again |
| 2019 | Won the Classic Physique Olympia | Did not compete |
| 2020 | Won the Classic Physique Olympia | Won Class D at the NPC Universe and earned his IFBB pro card |
| 2021 to 2024 | Won the Classic Physique Olympia each year; 2nd at the 2024 Prague Pro in the Men’s Open | Did not compete; hospitalized in 2022 |
| 2025 to 2026 | Retired | Did not compete |
Neither man was on stage when Ramon Dino won the 2025 Classic Physique Olympia, or when Niall Darwen won it in September 2026.
