The above HD Physiques samples were taken at the cusp of a remarkable contest season for Jill Blondin (aka Jill Diorio). A couple of days after this shoot she made a promising competitive start to 2018 at the IFBB Champions of Power and Grace (good name!), winning the Over 35 title and placing 2nd in the Open Physique class.
Her next three shows were, however, less successful. 7th at the Optimum Classic was followed by a barely believable 11th in Toronto. She did one more Physique show in Omaha, and placed 6th. It proved to be the turning point in her year. As their booth toured the pro shows, Wings of Strength had been reaching out to some of the Physique competitors - Jill included - but ultimately she was pushed, rather than pulled, in their direction. [It wasn't] because of my placings, but the reasoning behind those placings and the judges' feedback that I found myself having to make some decisions, she said. After Omaha, the decision was made to follow the judges' suggestions [my bold] and move up to Women's Bodybuilding. She would compete again in just four weeks.
The fact that just one month later in Chicago Jill won her first Female Bodybuilding title at her first attempt says a lot for the strength of the line-up and blurring of the line between the two divisions. It also says a lot for her muscularity and, above all, her conditioning. Though she has bigger calves than anyone, she is no giant by any means. To cut it in pro Female Bodybuilding, she needed to be razor sharp. And she was.
She beat other Physique to FBBing novices - Natalia Kovalyova, Amanda Smith - and she beat bigger, more experienced women - Maria Mikola, Jay Fuchs, Rita Bello. I had zero expectations going into the show because this was all new for me, she confessed afterwards, clearly in shock. My only goal was to not look out of place or like I didn’t belong. Regardless of what happened, I was proud of myself to taking on a new challenge, pushing myself out of my comfort zone. I’m still not sure I’ve really grasped that I actually DID win. I’m waiting for someone to pinch me.
So Jill started to prepare for her night on Female Bodybuilding's biggest stage, and the "pinch Jill next time she can't believe that she's won" queue started to form...
Predictions on the forums before the show (you may remember from FMS passim) made mention of Jill as a possible top 6 finisher, and so it proved. She was - to my eyes (on stalks) anyway - even more cut than she had been in Chicago, and bigger too.
Her pre-routine film suggested she knows which side her bread is buttered too, with a montage of some of her better-known shots, including the very big finish of a closing zoom into that shot of her bulging vascular calves (taken some time ago now).
If any of the ladies' films on the night whipped the heads in the audience into a female muscle lovin' frenzy, this (or should I say these?) was it. Probably the best calves in the world, and probably in the conversation for the best calves ever, but clearly Jill is so much more than just the sum of these bulging, epic wonders of the female muscle lovin' world, and I think the judges' decision to place her in the top 6 - ahead of Virginia Sanchez, and way ahead of Jay Fuchs - was a fair reflection of that.
Congratulations to Jill, and I hope she'll forgive me for ending by returning to those calves once again, but this female muscle lovin' boy just can't help himself...
Enjoy!
For Elms, enjoy my friend!
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