"Hard work, works" - Samson Dauda gives inspiring insight on how he won the 2023 Arnold Classic

Samson Dauda, over the weekend, made history as he beat the likes of Nick Walker and William Bonac to claim the 2023 Arnold classic title.

This moment, for the English-Nigerian, marks a potential turning point in his career. Just a few years ago, Dauda was not even a mainstream name in the sport, struggling to win national and international titles. After years of struggle, he has managed to stay positive, and recently revealed the secret to his success in an interview with RxMuscle - Hard work.

"Its exciting, it just secures that idea you know, when you are in that 'down' moment for so long and you keep thinking - 'okay maybe this isn't gonna work, maybe I'm just wasting my time, maybe I'm just being deluded', and some part of you says 'just keep working anyway, just keep going anyway, just dont give up' ... To have this result now happen, it just reinforces the idea that hard work, works. There's nothing else to it, hard work does work."

In an inspiring dialog, Dauda emphasized the importance of pushing through obstacles and focusing on the things you want to achieve.

"If you don't quit, and you just keep pushing through those obstacles that come your way, one after the other, eventually you will get there. You keep banging on that door, and it will open up to you. And this is exactly what people following my career have seen and this is what they are seeing happen now ... So I'm so proud of that, I'm so happy that I had the support system and the network to help me, to tell me, when I felt down, when I felt like this isn't for me, 'nah, just keep going, you can do it.' Now we are here, and I'm just so grateful for it."

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"We were never gonna beat Nick in conditioning" - Dauda on facing Nick Walker at the 2023 Arnold Classic

Walker took to the Arnold Classic stage looking peeled to the bone. His mature muscles combined with his thin skin really gave him a chance to compete for the top spot. Dauda admitted that Walker's conditioning is unparalleled in the sport of bodybuilding:

"We wanted to make sure that I looked a lot tighter than the Olympia, we wanted to make sure our lines were as deep as we could possibly get it, not just from the front, but from the back, from the side. We wanted to add those things ... We knew with someone like Nick [Walker], with his crazy conditioning that we were never gonna beat Nick in conditioning, we knew that, so we can't play that game."

Dauda said that his win came after he started focusing on his own strengths:

"All we gotta do is play your game, you know that you are big and round, and you have the lines, so lets highlight that, keep that size and make it as big, round and hard as you can possibly get and we knew with that change that judges are going to see that ... And thats what we were hoping for, so when we came in last night, and saw that theats exactly what they did, we were like 'man, okay, so we definitely had our mindset in the right place when we did that', so it feels amazing."

Samson Dauda represents everything sports stand for. Overcoming one struggle after another, Dauda thoroughly deserves the sweet taste of victory from here on out.