Amateur Week @NPC Jr. Nationals

There was a grand total of only 14 Physique competitors at the recent NPC Jr. Nationals. This, compared with 22 in 2017, 28 the year before, and over 40 in 2015, might indicate that it will not be long before the WPD goes where the FBBing division at this show went in 2013 - off the bill. However, and much to my delight, what the Physique line-up lacked in quantity, it more than made up for it in quality.

We saw the Overall winner - the gorgeous Jessica Booker Williams - on Tuesday. Today, it's the best of the rest plus some news about one of the more well-loved competitors which (if you haven't already heard about it) is liable to have you punching the air with joy - or at least that's what happens in my experience.




Among the many beauties who left without pro cards were she-hulk Teneacia Smith (top left) and Amanda Martin - who looked good from the front but even better from the rear. Blond beauty Jessica Uthe surely has the thickness to nail her pro card at some point this year if she comes in with better conditioning, and then there was the very appropriately named Gentry Manley - not that Gentry is very manly herself, you understand, it's just a great name for any muscle woman to have!



One woman who did leave with a pro card and a big beaming smile was D class winner Alyssa Isley, whose glutes alone were probably worth the price of admission.



I woke up this morning still in shock, Alyssa wrote the morning after, before asking the question that many a new pro must ask themselves? Now what, what is next?



Even more shredz on the glutes, perhaps Alyssa? Just a suggestion.




And then there was the other Alyssa - Kiessling - bringing her own unique style to the stage, posing like a dude of yore, and going home a pro after winning the A class.

Here she is, "ready to bring back that pro status to room 2533!"



This is what I loved most about the weekend, she said afterwards. Posing to some music with my best friends watching and hyping me up. Vibessss man. Vibes.



More than a little crazy (in a good way), and certainly at least as crazy about female muscle as the most vehement among us, I don't ever see her stopping. The self-styled "Classical Queen" will be lighting up stages for years to come. Pro stages.

And so to the C class, where it was "buff" v "beef", a "nugget" v "nuggette", and former FMS Woman of the Week, the beautiful Destinee Bruch fulfilled her destinee.




It's time to relax, recover, eat a lot of food and have a lot of fun, "Miss Buff Nugget" told her Instagram followers, and while we didn't get to see so much of the relaxing and recovering, she did give us some eating, and seemed to be having a lot of fun doing so!



Destinee's victory, however, left C class rival Paige "Beefnuggette" Sandgren feeling rather deflated, which coincidentally is how she had been feeling at the start of the week before the show - Bloated, flat, tired, blah blah blah... although she looked absolutely sensational both then and at the end of her week in her red posing suit.






"Reflecting on the show and judging feedback", Paige came to a decision.

Get ready for the air punching thing... Since I’ve already come this far, she wrote. I’ll be doing another show in 3 more weeks to try again for my pro card... but this time, it’s in a division I think will better suit my thicker-then-a-snicker shape and size.



Need a translation? Paige will be competing in Bodybuilding now. Watch out for the Ms Wings International Classic, July 1st, Chicago. This feels right, is Paige's current take on her preparation. If things go well we could be seeing her at this year's Rising Phoenix.



Imagine!

21 Reasons (#11)

Due to some work commitments and Mr and Mrs Swell's now annual sojourn to the South of France (not the bit that was recently on fire, thankfully), the FMS offices are going to be closed this week, next week and the week after. Nevertheless, as always, we don't want to leave you totally FMS-less, so we've lined up 21 Reasons, one daily picture (or two or three), plus one reason why we love doing what we do, as if we were explaining it to one not so convinced of the glory of the muscular female.

Enjoy!

#11
THE JAW THAT PUTS YOUR JAW TO THE FLOOR

I love a conventionally beautiful face on a muscular woman, but having said that, and I know it's a personal preference, the square jawline to me is a woman who's saying "I'm willing to get huge, no matter what the cost", and that is whole different level of sexy and absolutely the biggest turn on. The squarer the jaw, the better!
["Deeper1234", forum post]



Alyssa Kiessling's jaw situation, June 2017. To be continued...

WATCH THIS FACE!

Woman of the Week: Alyssa Kiessling

They say Female Bodybuilding is dying, and to be honest, there are times when you have to admit that, despite the best efforts of Wings of Strength and so forth, it ain't looking good. The women competing at the majority of the pro shows, as in Toronto last weekend, are fewer in number and - with the greatest respect and some notable exceptions - not of the quality of the line-ups even just five years ago. Meanwhile, opportunities for FBBs from outside North America have dwindled to the point where only a handful of amateur federations now run their category, none of them within the IFBB umbrella that was once the means by which FBBs could progress to pro status. And even in the US, NPC shows all too rarely feature a Female Bodybuilding category, and when they do there is almost always only one, maybe two competitors.



Meet the good news - 23-year-old Alyssa Kiessling.



Alyssa recently won both the Physique and Bodybuilding titles at the NPC Orlando Europa Games. She didn't have to beat a lot of other women - two in fact, and that's combined for both categories - to do so, so perhaps one shouldn't get too carried away, but the sight Alyssa before, during, and after her triumph has convinced me that perhaps the future of Female Bodybuilding is, after all, really rather bright.




Now I'm not getting over-excited just because of all Alyssa's lovely lovely muscles. A little digging and you will find that she is quite the unique young woman. For one thing, she is a total junkie for the sport, not just its present but also its past. And not just the past of Female Bodybuilding, either, though she takes much inspiration from the likes of Juliette Bergman and Lenda Murray, but also the past greats of the male side of the sport. Her Instagram moniker, The Classical Queen, is perhaps an allusion to her admiration for the bodies and posing styles of a bygone era, the same era that the newest male BBing category - Classic Physique - is attempting to hark back to.



And she uses her research into the sport's past to great effect, using the slow, measured posing style of those women (and men) who had more than sixty seconds to perform their routines in her own, as well as incorporating poses - not just her fantabulous most muscular - previously unknown in Female Bodybuilding, and not common in Men's Bodybuilding since the days of Pumping Iron. Add a truck load of self-assurance to the mix and the overall effect she manages to create is absolutely mesmerising.



If you are going to work so hard on your physique, Alyssa says, you've got to show what you built, bring it on stage. It's art. It certainly is when she does it.



From her pre-contest double biceps with bonus stomach vacuum gym shots to her mouth-wateringly beefy hotel room posing in her suit. From the incredible pump room back footage shot by her friend, mentor and fellow freak of muscle Michaela Ayccok to the way she stands, hands on hips - so manly, so cocksure - throughout most of her NPC News Online interview with Ariel Khadr. And all the rest of it. The way this young woman goes about her bodybuilding business is, I find, quite irresistible.



Next stop, the Jr. Nationals, just under four weeks away.



See more of Alyssa in Orlando on the Bodybuilding and Beyond channel.

And apologies for the tardiness of today's post.