FBBUK: Anita Tryc Counts Her Blessings

UK Physique competitor Anita Tryc started her fitness journey back in 2009. Despite having studied at the Academy of Sports Education in her native Poland, she admits she "went downhill". I smoked, and I used to drink too much, as students do, she says. It was after finally giving up cigarettes and gaining 20kg in a month that she decided to get back the fitness she had lost. I was size 16/18, quite a big girl, she remembers. I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror! (She doesn't seem to have that problem now...)



She began running again, and was soon looking to move to England. Beforehand though, a medical check-up revealed a tumour on one of her ovaries. It was borderline, she says. I was told that if it hadn't been found for few more months, it could have turned cancerous. I consider myself a very lucky human being.



Relocation to London complete, Anita set about changing her training as well - I wanted to have muscles and be stronger. Lifting at home progressed to lifting at the gym, and before long she began wondering whether one day she might be able to compete. I wanted to be like Dana Linn Bailey, she says, but when I told people I want to do Women’s Physique one day, they all said I would do OK in Bikini. And, it turns out, nothing could have been more motivating to hear than that. If someone tells me that I can't do something, she says. I will prove to them and myself that I CAN!


Hanging out at the 2016 UKBFF British Championships with her "sweet friend" Linda Gartside

And she did. Her first show was in 2015, a qualifier for the UKBFF where her runner's-up placing took her to the national championships. She's been at those British finals every year since, but last year Anita broke into the top 6 for the very first time.


UKBFF British Championships 2017, 6th place

2018 has seen a new approach from Anita though. A new coach - "much stricter than I am used to" - and a prep that has been harder than she has ever known. This is how the professionals do it, she says, and the results are mind blowing! I don't even recognise myself, my conditioning and posing. I have learnt so much, it's like being at school!



And the first sight we have had of this new, improved Anita was at the PCA contest held during the BodyPower Expo. This was her first ever non-UKBFF show, and also, as she lined-up in the Trained Figure class, the first time she'd ever been on stage in heels.



Anita didn't win the show, but there are ways to judge a performance other than by placing. I loved every minute and I couldn't be prouder, she said after seeing herself up there. My best condition ever, my best posing ever... I actually shocked myself!



Not surprisingly, she can't wait to do it again, but in the meantime, that beautiful smile will be staying put - I'm so blessed that I am able to wake up every single morning to work towards my dreams, she says. I'll be coming back and coming back better.



Follow Anita on Instagram

UKBFF British 2017: Donna Murphy

Runner-up in the taller of two Bodyfitness classes in 2014, victim of the judges "firm stance against the more muscular [Bodyfitness] competitors" the following year, this was Donna Murphy's third British finals, but her first in the Physique division.



To qualify for the British Championships she had placed first in the Physique division at a regional show - the UKBFF West Midlands - two weeks previously. Prepared by Mr Corinne Ingman, Jordan Peters, tanned (and egged on) by Britain's IFBB Physique pro Carly Thornton, Donna was way too good for the competition on the day, but more importantly, "absolutely loved" the Physique experience. I feel I've found a class that suits me, she said afterwards. It felt great to be in this class for the first time. Women's Physique is a class I have always enjoyed following. And she epitomised everything she loves about it - "muscularity, elegance, and feminine muscle".



Two weeks later and she was "sipping on wine, chilled and having fun before show day" in her hotel - "naked wine drinking is the best part", apparently! - Donna was shadowed by friend of FMS and Brit super muscle photographer Rebecca Andrews, who captures her in all her golden glory (Donna says "tangerine", I say "golden").



Quite honestly, it would have been an enormous let-down if she hadn't won, but even the UKBFF couldn't f*** this one up. Donna has achieved, to borrow a phrase from Paige Sandgren (who we featured on Monday), "a package the judges can't deny".




So here she is, Britain's new Physique champion.



Endearingly, it seems like the only person who wasn't expecting it was Donna herself. And it also seems like she still hasn't quite realised what she has built, and what she might yet be capable of. With her looks and genetics, and the top-notch team she has behind her, the only limit to what she might achieve is the limit of her own ambition.



Follow the next stage of her journey on Instagram.



Congratulations Donna!

Igor Kopcek @UKBFF British 2017

It's absolutely unprecedented! Krish Kataria (centre, 1st), Livia Melo (right, 2nd), and
Zulmira Woodrow (left, 3rd) flex their muscles after the up to 163cm Bikini class awards

Yes yes YES! It's absolutely unprecedented, and most welcome - FMS' favourite female muscle contest lensman, Eastlabs' Igor Kopcek, was at the recent UKBFF British Championships doing what he does so well. For once, I am able to put together a report on the show where my problem is not where to find images without big f*** off watermarks saying DO NOT F***ING COPY all over them, but how to choose which of the 2,799(!) images of the female classes to include. I've been in heaven for the last few hours, and I don't mind admitting it. Mr Kopcek, I doff my chapeau to you, sir!


Jo Griffiths, 6th, Masters Bodyfitness

Of course, I'm still going to have whine about the paucity of information available regarding the results. Were it not for John Plummer's excellent reports on the UKBFF Facebook page (I ask you, what kind of federation has its results released via Facebook by a third party?), I'd know even less than the top six in each class that I do know.




Many of the winners and high finishers from Nottingham (the show's now traditional setting) were those who had competed and in many cases done so well for Britain in Barcelona at the Arnold Classic Europe a few weeks before. Sandra Mackie became Britain's first ever "Wellness" Queen, and Marta Mila the new Junior Bikini champ. Connie Slyziut won her second consecutive Junior Bodyfitness title, and Samantha Forbes the up to 163cm Bodyfitness class before being crowned Overall winner too.




However, Danielle Osborn, Britain's big Bodyfitness winner in Barcelona, didn't fare quite so well. In the over 163cm Bodyfitness class, she placed only 3rd. Now I've got nothing against class winner Anna Banks, good on her, but if any of the UKBFF Bodyfitness judges would like to get in touch and explain to FMS exactly why it is that the woman on the right beats the woman on the left, I promise I will be all ears.



There was a tense few days after the photos from the Saturday had gone up on Eastlabs before Sunday's were added. Tense because Women's Physique was the sole female event on the Sunday. Had Igor just come for the Wellness and Bikini bums and flown home early? I wondered. Thankfully, the answer was no, and while he took more photos of just bums (and I mean "just", whole frame = a bum) in the Wellness and Bikini classes than all of the Physique division put together, by the following Wednesday, our Linda and her UKBFF Physique sisters had been added to the gallery. Phew!


Physique Dreams: FMS fave Hayley Brylewski (left), and Anita Tryc (6th)

And talking of bums... Linda had a bit of an issue on and off stage. I couldn’t contract my quads or lower back, and I was shaking like a shitting dog, she explains. People have said it was because I was posing too hard and nerves, but no, it was my ASS. It had locked up and trapped my nerves in my back and legs. And despite the pain and the "locked up" glutes, and her inability to flex her quads or lower back properly, and the "shaking like a shitting dog" (don't you just LOVE her!) she still placed 3rd!



The contest marked the UKBFF British debut of the current NABBA Trained Figure Ms Universe Emma Gormley. Like Linda before her, Emma has made the switch to Women's Physique from the most venerable federation of them all. A lot less peeled, and somewhat more covered in the bum area than she was when she won last November, she placed 5th here in her first UKBFF national level appearance.



4th in the Physique class was UKBFF vet Ade Bishop, who FMS knew of (thanks only to Mr Kopcek and Eastlabs) from international contests such as the Arnold Europe and various Diamond Cups over the last couple of years. This was Ade in by far her best ever shape, and she was perhaps a bit unlucky not to be rewarded with a top 3 placing.


Ade Bishop (left, 4th), and Andrea Corbett (right, 2nd)

A lot happier - probably the happiest woman on stage even though she didn't win - was runner-up Andrea Corbett, another UK Physique trooper in European contests who rarely gets placed near the top. Again, nothing against Andrea, congratulations to her, but while I've got the UKBFF judge on the line educating me about the Bodyfitness criteria, perhaps they could also fill me in as to why Andrea finished above Ade.



And the winner was...

Tune in tomorrow for a dose of serious star quality.



Isn't it a shame we - and more importantly all the wonderful UKBFF British ladies - have had to wait until 2017 to get top-notch, comprehensive, and freely available photo coverage? I can't help wishing Igor had been there in 2014 to see your Hot and Hard 100 #5 Sarah Williams win the Physique title, or Ria Ward the year before that, or he'd been there back in 2011 to see Rene Campbell become the UK's Queen of Muscle, or indeed the year before that, when Rene was runner-up to Lisa Cross... [seriously? 2,799 photos and you're still not satisfied? tut tut - ed.]

Full galleries here. Enjoy! It may be the one and only time...

Celebrity Muscle UK: Megan Prescott

I have been doing ab exercises since I was 12 in a desperate attempt to lose the elusive (and wrongly named) 'belly fat' that so many stupid teas and websites tell you can be got rid of by drinking their shit/doing a certain exercise. It can't. And I wish someone had told 12-year-old me that! If you want them to seriously show then body fat has to be reduced. The only reason mine are showing so bloody much right now is because of the crazy amount of body fat I had to lose to compete (and I will soon gladly be gaining back!) and the way to do that is WEIGHT TRAINING YOUR WHOLE BODY. I guarantee if you start eating right and weight training rather than abusing the running machine (and yourself) by not eating and only doing abs, then they will begin to show. PLEASE STOP KILLING YOURSELF ON THE TREADMILLS FOR ABS!



Now I can't say Megan Prescott was a name I'd come across before today, but I have to admit that so far, I'm enjoying getting to know the 25-year-old "actress, writer and cool person". Her Instagram is a riot (in a good way), and among many other things charts her journey as a UKBFF Bikini competitor through last year, and tells us that we should watch out for her forthcoming documentary Dumbbells & Donuts.



That journey took her through regional qualifying all the way to 4th place at the UKBFF British championships and a box of those donuts about as big as she is. Megan had to stop training for a while to recover from a neck injury, but the good news is she's back in the gym now, and remains rightly proud of what she achieved last year.



Follow "Megartron" on Instagram and/or catch her podcasts.