If you think Flex Lewis is pissed that a photo he posted in the spring of 2014 is a viral meme today, you don’t know Flex. There’s no one in pro bodybuilding more willing to laugh at himself than the 7-time 212 Mr. Olympia. In fact, the Welsh Dragon is the person who told us the pic was ripe for lulz, when he reposted it in 2017 with “meme me ??.” It just took the Internet a while to accept his offer.

The original Facebook post:

Flex Lewis typing

The challenge:

Flex Lewis on a laptop

Then, earlier, this year “Buff Guys Typing on Laptops” became a meme in the anime community. The first viral post was a photo of an unidentified, shirtless dude (the shot is taken from an Adobe Stock video):

buff guy on laptop

Soon, the memers were employing the Flex pic.

Flex Lewis meme

Flex Lewis on laptop

Flex Lewis became a viral hit with the following tweet, which garnered over 5000 retweets and nearly 19,000 likes:

Flex Lewis funny post

Next, a new meme launched: “Buff Guys Help Out Nerdy Kid.” In the meme’s logic, Flex has teamed up with the original shirtless guy and shirt-wearing bodybuilder Mike O’Hearn to answer the questions of a nerdy kid.

Many of the tweets are written in anime lingo, but here’s three examples more accessible to the rest of us:

buff guys typing on laptop

buff guys typing on laptops

buff guys typing on laptops

Because it spread mostly via the anime community, there are anime versions of the meme:

anime buff guys on laptops

anime Flex Lewis

Flex Lewis art

Flex Lewis leopard

Over five years since Flex’s initial post, the Internet won again.

And as for Flex Lewis, his reaction to my texting him a couple of the tweets was “WTF!!!,” followed by “Looking forward to reading this as I had no clue lol.” And so today, when he read this very article, the Welsh Dragon found out, because memes move fast once they move, that an old forgotten post led to him being drawn as a leopard helping a nerdy cat. No doubt, he’s laughing out loud.