Forza e Bellezza: 6ft1swell in Italia

I went to live and work in Italy in late August 1997.

Before I left London, I moved out of the flat I shared with a friend and moved my stuff into my Mum’s attic and garage, and had one of my female muscle purges – one of a few I’ve had over the years. Into discreet black bin bags went the magazines, and from there into the stinky communal bins.

I walked away feeling a little sad but a little liberated at the same time. I was going to live in a different country. It was a new start. Perhaps a new me? A new me who wouldn’t be compelled to periodically duck into newsagents and nervously purchase Women’s Physique World or Female Bodybuilding. A new me who wouldn’t be compelled to buy any issue of Flex, MuscleMag or Muscle & Fitness if I noticed Cory or Sharon or Lenda on the cover.

And for a while I was fine. I was too busy with the new job and with living in a new country to think about female muscle. I had to get to know my colleagues, my new surroundings, and enough of the language to decipher a menu and open a bank account. So much to do. There was simply no time for Cory or Sharon or Lenda.

One Saturday I woke to a glorious blue sky and decided to go for a wander. I’d find an English paper and have a leisurely breakfast in the autumn sunshine. I was, after all, in Italy. A cappuccino, some pasticcini, a catch up with what was happening in Blighty and a spot of watching the Bolognese would do very nicely as a start to the weekend.

But my Saturday morning didn’t quite pan out that way.

As I strolled along unfamiliar streets I spied a newsagents. It didn’t look very likely to have foreign press, but I headed for it nonetheless. It wasn’t really a shop, more the converted lower floor of a house, and the entrance was the old front door. And on the wall to the right of that door was a glass display case. There were a few different foreign magazines in there, but I only had eyes for one.

My first reaction was to keep walking, and I hurried on up the street, away from the paper shop and the glass display case. My heart was pounding, and I felt the familiar adrenaline rush: ‘The Madness’.

I could have kept going. I needn’t have gone back. I could have found a thousand things to take my mind off what I’d just seen. But ‘The Madness’ is powerful. And that day it told me there’d only been one copy in that case, and that if I didn’t buy it today I would regret it and come back tomorrow to find it already sold. It told me I had to go back and buy it now.

So back I went. And as I’d learned to do as a teenager, I spent a little time browsing the other mags and papers while I waited for an opportune moment. And then, with a little of my basic Italian and a little bit of pointing I communicated to the proprietor what I wanted. I guess I had expected him to produce a key and unlock the case and take it out, but instead he led me inside and from under the counter he produced another copy that was sealed inside a plastic cover, handing it over as if he were passing me a fragile holy relic. I accepted it with due reverence. He said a number I didn’t really understand and I gave him a really large note.

While he counted out the change, I realised I had another problem now the thing was actually in my possession. Did he expect me to walk out of the shop with the magazine on display under my arm? Didn’t Italian newsagents wrap them up in brown paper bags like they did in London?

I mimed putting the magazine in a bag. Another customer had come into the shop behind me. The proprietor noisily greeted them, speaking over my shoulder. For a moment I imagined the other customer was my new boss, or one of my colleagues.

Dry-mouthed, I stood and waited while the proprietor hunted around behind the counter. Thankfully, he found a little black plastic bag and my purchase was now being hidden away.

Grazie, I said.

Now, dear reader, do you think I went and enjoyed my leisurely breakfast in the autumn sunshine? Well, no. What I did was to turn and leave without looking at the other customer and go back out into the street and then home as fast as my legs would carry me.

And all the time my heart continued to pound, and I could think of nothing else but breaking open that plastic seal to reveal the visual feast of female muscle within.

I was enslaved. I’d never really been free.

But as I gazed upon the glorious women on those pages, I didn’t care.


And for today's clip, everyone's favourite 'blink and you missed her' FBB, Angela Cilione from the 1995 IFBB European Championships. This is, as far as I know, the one and only clip we have of this woman, which, unlike Angela, is not ideal.




Buon divertimento!