Gym king Tony Doherty in trouble as Arnie Classic in liquidation

Through grit and determination, gym impresario Tony Doherty became king of the Australian fitness scene, with his own TV program and a business partnership with Arnold Schwarzeneggerthat resulted in the country’s biggest sports expo.

But now the self-made entrepreneur, who built his empire after arriving in Melbourne from Bendigo in the 1990s with $250,000 of debt and a truckload of broken gym equipment, is in financial strife.

Arnold Schwarzenegger with event promoter Tony Doherty during the Arnold Classic at The Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre in 2017.Credit: Getty

Doherty has been battling financial difficulties after a cooling of relations with the Hollywood star and former governor, and the collapse of his promotions company which ran the Arnold Sports Festival, a victim of COVID-19 lockdowns.

The festival was last held at Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre in 2019. It attracted thousands of participants in sports from bodybuilding to boxing, but also more niche pastimes including cup stacking and historical medieval combat.

The liquidator to Doherty’s company, Arnold Classic Australia, estimates that while the majority of stockholders received refunds, about 700 ticket holders will be left out of pocket by a total of more than $100,000 as a result of the event’s collapse.

Companies who signed up as exhibitors – including US drinks giant Bang Energy – have launched legal proceedings in Victoria against Doherty’s group in an attempt to claw back money they allege they are owed due to the event folding.

Boxer Michael Zerafa and promoter Tony Doherty cheer on the competitors during the IFBB Pro Qualifier and Pro Show at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre in April.Credit: Getty

Schwarzenegger, who has caused uproar in the bodybuilding community with his strong pro-vaccination stance, appears to have lost interest in attending international versions of the event named in his honour and was a controversial late cancellation from the Arnold event in the UK last month.

Doherty, whose Max’s Muscle TV program ran for six seasons on Foxtel, was vocal in attacking the Andrews government after COVID-19 lockdowns crippled the gym industry.

Asked about his financial difficulties, Doherty told The Sunday Age that postponing the event four times, after restrictions forced him to shut the 2020 event one week after the Melbourne grand prix was cancelled, had cost him $1.6 million.

“It’s pretty hard to recover from,” he said.

“It is correct that the pandemic devastated our expo business, causing significant financial loss. However, at all times we have remained positive and are working hard re-establishing our businesses, which is progressing well, and we are looking forward to the future.”

Doherty – who witnessed the near-fatal shooting of Bandidos boss Toby Mitchell outside his flagship gym in Brunswick in 2011 – warned in a 2020 interview that the COVID-19 impact on his expo business could bankrupt him.

Speaking at the time about the closure of the Arnold Sports Festival with bodybuilding vlogger Dave Palumbo of RXMuscle, Doherty said: “[We] just took the hit, just moved some stuff around and if it had have been more, honestly, it would have wiped me out, like it was this close.

“I guess I was lucky that three or four of our probably four or five of our big sponsors and exhibitors who’d put their money in agreed to leave it in for next year just to help me through it,” he said.

“Without that, we wouldn’t have been able to get through. I would have been bankrupt.”

Doherty declined to answer questions from The Sunday Age about whether he was facing personal bankruptcy as a result of the festival now being disbanded, as he had predicted in his 2020 interview.

The businessman, who has given his name to a chain of gyms in Victoria and Western Australia, is still hosting and promoting the International Federation of Bodybuilding and Fitness’ IFBB PRO national finals in Brisbane on October 28.

Tony Doherty speaks during the 2017 Arnold Classic at The Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre.Credit: Robert Cianflone/Getty Images

The IFBB PRO competition, which is separate to the Arnold Classic, has drawn large crowds to its state competitions. The NSW finals were declared the biggest bodybuilding show in Australian history, with about 150 competitors, more than the Arnold Classic, he said.

Doherty’s gymnasium business, which operates venues in central Melbourne, Dandenong and Brunswick, as well as Perth, continues despite suffering a fall in patronage in 2020 and 2021 because of the pandemic restrictions.

A report prepared by the liquidator to Arnold Classic Australia, Hamish MacKinnon of Dye & Co, confirms that Doherty’s business was a victim of lockdowns.

“I have been advised in March of 2020, that the restrictions imposed by the Victorian government in response to the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre closing and forcing cancellation of that year’s event just one week before it was due to run,” MacKinnon writes in his report.

“At this time, the company had received monies from exhibitors and ticket sales to the public; with considerable amounts expensed on the event for printing, merchandise and on a range of marketing, PR and advertising.”

The report explains that the Arnold Classic offered ticket holders and exhibitors options for refunds or rollover packages to use at the next year’s event.

A little over a quarter of all ticket holders – or 723 ticket holders representing $111,602 in ticket sales – decided not to seek a refund and chose the rollover option and are still owed refunds on their tickets, according to the report.

However, the liquidator expects that ticket holders and other creditors to the group, including its ticket seller Ticketebo, will receive a refund equivalent to 5.6¢ in the dollar.

The Sunday Age approached Schwarzenegger’s representatives and United States Arnold Classic event organisers for comment.

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