Officially, Nick Walker is withdrawing from the 2024 Olympia for the second year in a row.
Nick Walker, the 2024 New York Pro champion, will have to wait another year to compete at the Olympia. Nick Walker’s coach, Matt Jansen, announced on Saturday, October 5th, both directly to Generation Iron and on Instagram, that Walker would not be competing at the 2024 Olympia. This marks the second consecutive year that he would miss the greatest exhibition of the year.
As per Matt Jansen’s statement, the footage that was released was shot on Thursday, October 3rd, earlier in the week. He made the announcement that Nick Walker would be withdrawing from the Olympia competition without much introduction.
“It is Thursday afternoon October 3, this is not a video that we wanted to make especially after the video that Nick had to make last year but we made a decision this week for Nick to be not competing in this year’s Mr. Olympia.”
Matt Jansen continued by outlining the rationale behind the abrupt last-minute withdrawal. He mentioned that they wished to provide all the information on Nick Walker’s withdrawal from the Olympia.
“Honest truth is that Nick right now in terms of his body in terms of the bodybuilder that you guys know, his body is just not there. I’ve been wrestling with this for a couple weeks. Obviously Nick and I have had very intentional conversations but we feel that it’s best not only for himself, his career, what’s most important, but also for the Olympia, for the current physique that Nick has to not be represented on the Olympia stage.”
In a note to his supporters, Nick Walker also explained his reasoning for his choice to withdraw from the tournament.
“My body just said I need a break. I need to relax. That was it,” shared Walker. “I think a lot of the stress that I endured over the past year, it just kinda caught up and this prep obviously did not go the way we wanted it to and it sucks because this is the second year in a row that I got to miss the Olympia that I worked so hard for.”
Last year Nick had a hamstring injury that also prevented him to compete at the 2023 Mr. Olympia. It prevented him from using the gym before the competition. Walker got back to training right away, in order to prepare for this year’s Olympia.
Walker came back to win the New York Pro in 2024, but many people criticized him for not bringing a good enough performance. Even though many people thought Walker wouldn’t bring his best game to the Olympia as well, he initially welcomed challenges. As the race approached, Walker was predicted to place among the top five in many of the forecasts.
