#transformationtuesday

It's Tuesday, and that means that all over social media, women of all muscular shapes and sizes will be cutting and pasting and posting their before and after pics for Transformation Tuesday. They aim to inspire, to motivate, to show what is possible, either by showing off their new, improved selves, or - increasingly common - by bigging up a woman they've helped transform in their role as trainer/coach.




Before they were overweight, perhaps after giving birth (perhaps multiple times), perhaps after living the party life a bit too hard in their 20s. There are also those who have triumphed over eating disorders such as anorexia or bulimia. Melissa Wee and Lisa Cross are two better-known women to have done so, and their, and many other such stories are the ones that tend to make it into the mainstream media.

Each woman has her own unique story though.



Alex O'Hanlon (above) was a PA, "bored out of my brain, wondering what my next move should be". She joined a gym and "fell in love". She wanted to be there 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. She went on to compete a few times in 2013 and 2014, and then last year, after being made redundant from her PA job, she got herself qualified and now she runs her own training and nutrition business. Fat loss, better skin, more energy, better sleep, more power, increased strength and bags more confidence, are what she promises, her own transformation an advert/reference for her services.



Diana Schnaidt, former Figure now Physique pro, and previously, from the age of 13 into her late 20s a fashion model, doesn't necessarily look back on her former self with totally negative feelings. Exchanging clothes for weight training was "swapping one passion for another", she has said, but she has also exchanged a diet of "some lettuce and a maybe protein bar" for "healthy balanced meals throughout the day", and ultimately this had led her to becoming "happier and stronger, inside and out".



Gabrielle Tongol, a national level Figure competitor from Canada was a teenage binge-eater, who started off by following workouts and diet plans she found on Bodybuilding.com, and by her 18th birthday she was standing on stage as a competitor. That was in 2013, and since then, as well as sculpting what Fit Gems has called "one of the most eye-catching physiques in all of figure", she has graduated college, become a graphic designer, social media consultant, and make-up artist.



As well as the muscles, there are often other "improvements" that take place as well. Cast your eyes over these two comparisons of Tina Nguyen before and after and see if you can spot the difference between the two befores. As one Tumblr wag puts it, the recipe for "hot" is "build muscles and buy tits". I would never be so crude.



More seriously, these transformations are always, it seems to me, accompanied by a more general transformation in appearance. Better hair, make-up, accessories, dress sense, more attention to appearance full stop. This is, I suspect, partly because the girl is becoming a woman, but even among the more mature transformers such details, as it were, complete the transformation, and for some, tattoos, piercings, and breast enhancements - whether you love them or loathe them - are a part of that.



Every fan seems to have their own most beloved transformation, though I think I'm right in saying that probably the most popular - and the most likely to be put together by the fan rather than the woman herself - are the ones where the motivation for the transformation is not immediately obvious. Before we have either the good-looking (in the conventional sense) young woman or the competitor in one of the less muscular divisions, even perhaps already a competitive Bodybuilder. After, she's HUGE.



I’ve always wanted to be there when one of them decides, "I want it that badly, I know there will be no going back, I'm willing to do whatever it takes", confesses one Tumblr blogger, shedding some light on the appeal of these fan-created juxtapositions. I want to look deep into her eyes when she decides she wants to be huge. Every single FBB has had to have had that moment. Just the thought gives me a huge erection.



You know, however, there are actually some guys who would honestly prefer the picture on the left. "At least she looks like a woman," they say - some of them, rather pointlessly, on fan sites. You can admire the musculature all you want, commented one, er, fella re: before and after Brooke Walker (above), but the squaring of her jaw, dried-up skin and loss of feminine curves is not an improvement in any way.




Seems there are two types of people. There are those who prefer the picture on the left, and there are those who prefer the picture on the right, and not only prefer, but also project all kinds of fantasies onto it. I, you can probably guess, am totally, firmly, and deeply committed to the RIGHT on this issue. And it's not often in my life I say that.



Enjoy!

Lots more of this sort of thing here.

Then & Now: 1989

In the days before the Hot and Hard 100 voting closes (and you've only got 8 left by the way), FMS likes to avoid influencing your decisions unduly by bringing you some historical, rather than contemporary, female muscle. This year we've come up with a kind of time machine idea, used a random date generator, picked a contest winner from that year, and tried to find out what that special lady from the past is up to now.

Today the year is 1989, and Bernadette "Bernie" Price is NABBA Ms Britain.

THEN



All-time UK great Bernie finished above the also great Colleen Yates and Beverly Hahn to win her first big title, and the same year won her class at the NABBA Europeans (there's another contest that has sadly disappeared). She won her class at the 1990 NABBA Worlds, and in 1992 was Overall NABBA Ms Universe.



Boyhood fantasy she was, confessed a Bernie fan in 2007 on the better UK bodybuilding forum. Anyway - where the bloody hell did she vanish to?

Funnily enough, Bernie herself replied:

After I won the World Championships and the Universe, I had a little girl, Hannah who's gorgeous! I had a real tough time giving birth to her because my abs were too tight - the midwives said I was too fit! They were even more surprised when I had a scan and they discovered a six pack on top of a huge bump! Life is really good for me. I have my own business and I'm still training hard in the gym as well as martial arts and yoga (can you be lethal but strongly calm?!!!) and I still miss the smell of coconut oil backstage and the sound of Michael Jackson's "Can You Feel It"...

NOW



Bernie kept going with her martial arts, and made it all the way up to instructor. As far as we know she still teaches Tai Chi in the Wirral. She is a massive fan of Moto GP, and last year got to meet several of the riders at the British Grand Prix. Lucky fellas!



Enjoy!

Did you miss Bernie's most recent FMS appearance? Catch up here.

And don't forget to vote!

FMS RP2016 Preview: The Queen

MARGIE MARTIN Ms Rising Phoenix 2015





A CHAMPION'S YEAR



3½ years ago I started this journey, Margie Martin told her IG followers just under a year ago. I loved lifting weight but I loved eating more. But once I made the commitment it was a labour of love. It came with its tears, joys, pains and rewards. This wasn't about just losing weight it was about living a dream. A dream that was so scary I would wake up in tears. The hardest part sometimes is believing in yourself.



And basking in her post-win glow, she had another message, To all my sisters in Iron in every division, every shape, every size... keep being you: fierce and wonderful!




Her off-season began with some time "cha-cha-chillin", and after having competed in all four pro events in 2015 before her triumph in San Antonio, she reckoned she deserved it. She ate chocolate, enjoyed the American football (as we say here) season, looked sensational in everything she wore - "Love how muscle just makes the dress pop!" - and had some wild hair days. But there was no break in her training, no big holiday from work. She was even already looking for improvements. It's Leg Day... Again, she wrote as the winter nights started to draw in. I spent yesterday working on my Deadlift form (I normally just do straight leg only). Now it's time to make them bleed!



At the end of January she was excited to be joining some of her "sisters in Iron" at the first Daily FBB Show in Paris, and after meeting and giving the fans a day to remember, and then "walking all the way up the Eiffel Tower... with my eyes!", she returned home from the City of Love feeling the love. Love yourself completely, she told her followers, reminding them on St. Valentine's Day that "you're the real MVP".



And then she was off on another trip, the FBB get-together put together by Wings of Strength. And the Champ was feeling honoured. And humble. If you had told me that I was spending the weekend with Alina Popa, Helle Trevino, Isabelle Turell, and The One and Only Lenda Murray, I would have told you to stop smoking that stuff, she said. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think this could happen. But today is the day. Thank you to the wonderful people who put this all together.



Winter turned to spring. The temperature started to rise. I love that late night pump, she confessed, her dark skin glistening with sweat, the sight of which got FMS' temperature rising too, as I recall. I want to make these the biggest ear muffs in the world! was how she explained her latest quadgasmic selfie. Swoonarama!





She filmed those quads dancing in the gym, broke at least one heart (mine) showing off a new dress, and, once again, Margie took time to look back at how far she'd come, all the way back to her very first contest in 2007 while she was still working for the US Defense Department in Okinawa, Japan. I ate 3 cans of tuna for 8 weeks with some pop tart binging because I was starving myself, she wrote. It took a long time after that show for me to learn my body but I did and now I'm here.



And then, 12 weeks (81 days exactly) out from the defence of her title at RP2016, Margie starts to really count it down. When I first started I really enjoyed documenting the journey and I plan on doing it again, she explained. Stay tuned.



Just under six weeks later, she looked like this. The work she had been documenting was starting to show results. And she was pleased. Getting closer to the woman I want to see on stage, she said. I can almost taste it. But even before the first six weeks of her "journey" had passed, she had seen another woman onto the stage. Margie had a protégé, and when that protégé got up on the stage at the NPC USAs, it was a bit like seeing the future. Brittney O'Veal - "my client, my sister in Iron" - took the overall title and a pro card, and was immediately dubbed Queen of Glutes by her mentor.



And Margie very much enjoyed the time spent in the Las Vegas heat while she was supporting Brittney, and I for one very much enjoyed seeing her enjoying it. Love the vascularity, she said, providing us with one of our "Picture Perfect" posts in August.



Hard to know where to start with this picture, I wrote at the time. And unusually, I stand by everything I wrote then! As soon as you notice those mighty shoulders, your eyes are drawn to her big juicy pecs. Or her massive arms. Then you're back at the shoulders. Then you notice the quads, but you still can't take your eyes off those biceps. Or the pecs. Muscle everywhere. Prime championship beef.



Margie was not only looking like a goddess, but she was feeling like one. And acting on that feeling to the extent that she had made a little shrine at home. To herself!

And why not? Is that conceited? she wondered, before deciding she didn't care. The quads (becoming breathtaking fast) were getting some IG clip time, she was loving her heart-shaped delts, rating her "diet face" at "level 7" and "not letting up off the gas, keeping the pedal to the metal" with two weeks to go to Scottsdale.

The suit arrived. It's glorious. And as she showed off her current back situation (every bit as breathtaking as her quads) last weekend, Margie, I sensed, had reached the point where the message was no longer for her followers, but by herself to herself.

Just a quick snip on whatever blah blah days before the show, she wrote. I want to say some thought provoking shit but quite often there is nothing but the work. Don't think about it, don't analyze it. Just do the damn work.




Her win last year was unexpected but joyful. After Iris had dominated for so long, here was not just a new Queen of Female Bodybuilding, but a completely different type of champion. Margie is, absolutely, everything that a female bodybuilder should be, everything the fans (even the most so-called "hardcore" fans) could want. All muscle.

And at the same time, as I hope this retrospective of her year as champion has shown, she is every inch a woman, and a gorgeous, sassy, stylish, sexy woman at that.



Will she, can she, hold onto her title in the face of Alina's return? You've only got a day left to find out. It wouldn't be the biggest surprise in the world if she did. After all, champions in bodybuilding (and not just female bodybuilding) are notoriously hard to unseat from their thrones, and let's face it, she's always ready to fight.

But even if she doesn't repeat last year's success, she has been - for one year at least - just the new champion the sport needed. A GREAT champion. Fierce and wonderful.


And with that, FMS will be taking a little break. See you sometime after we've enjoyed Alina Popa, Margie Martin et al in The Greatest Female Muscle Show on Earth - The 2016 Wings of Strength Rising Phoenix IFBB Pro Women's World Championships.

She's So Shredded: Hayley Hirshland

I remember posting the picture on the left (above, right) in 2013 and all of the positive comments I got. Unfortunately, that physique was achieved by forgetting to eat, was fuelled by caffeine and cigarettes, and was supersetted with pretty dangerous Insanity workouts. Think what you want, but I love being strong and I'm hella proud of the work I've put into completely reconstructing my body. No special supps, no pills, no waist trainers, but whole foods and A BUNCHA HARD WORK.



Shredded Hayley Hirshland isn't backwards in coming forwards about her love of her own muscles and strength, and the key to that self-love is, I think, to be found in the story told in the above quote. The old body was loathed, the new body is loved. And Hayley is all about spreading that message to young women far and wide.



The 25-year-old from Wisconsin was a competitive figure skater in her youth, and comes from a golfing family. She started lifting initially at school, but became serious about it during her second stint of living in Japan - she had previously spent a term studying there - working for a Japanese golf channel. It was not uncommon to work for over 12 hours a day, she says. I would take the easy route when it came to nutrition by eating out constantly and not making the correct choices when at work functions. I was never overweight, but found that I had gained quite a bit after a few months of living abroad so I decided to make a change. I joined Gold’s Gym in downtown Tokyo, began lifting first thing in the morning before work. By August 2013, a matter of months after she had begun to train consistently, she was featured on the cover of Woman's Shape and Sport, a Japanese fitness magazine.



By 2015 she was also writing for a Japanese fitness magazine, and it was after a request from her editors there for a story that she first competed, "so they could get an idea of how the competitions in the United States work". She chose an NPC contest, Pride of the Midwest Championships, and finished 3rd in her Figure class. I didn’t enjoy myself, she says. I knew that I couldn’t succeed against athletes that may have been using PEDs, but I thought I would give it another chance in a drug-tested competition.



Whether you agree with her reasoning or not, without the opportunity to compete in a "natural" show, Hayley may have never competed again. Instead, though, she cleaned up at the Wisconsin Natural Championships, winning both her class and the overall title in the Figure and Fit Body categories, resulting in not one but TWO pro cards! I wanted to give bodybuilding competitively one more chance, she says, so I went into the competition solely for the experience. I honestly was so shocked!



Success there was followed by success at her first pro show, the Central USA Natural Championships, and most recently she finished 2nd in the Figure class at another pro show in Sacramento. And there will be no stopping her now. After meeting all of the incredible athletes, coaches, and attendees and feeling confident in my performance in the gym and on stage, I've caught the bug and can’t get enough! I'll forever be grateful to the WNBF for making competing one of the best experiences!



And while all this has been going on, this "truly mesmerising" beauty has not escaped the attention of the brethren. Some fans are just as all about natural as Hayley herself is, enjoying her "natural breasts" as well as her "natural muscles", but even those who are not can't help but love her "hard and sensual" bottom, her "electric smile", and those abs - "if I put my fingers in those grooves between her abdominal muscles, it would hurt like a vice if she flexed!" I'm no purist, but count me in for all of the above and those gorgeous delts she's fashioned. Hayley is one stunning young woman.




Her travels have taken her back to Japan again now. She speaks (and more impressively writes) the language, you know (as well as Mandarin and Spanish), and she's on a mission to spread her own version of the strong-and-shredded-is-sexy gospel. The bodybuilding scene is just starting to make waves in Japan, but it is still relatively underground, especially for Japanese women. Unfortunately, there are still social stigmas for women that do not have extremely "skinny" body types and much of the fitness industry targeted at women is still flooded with gimmicky "diet" products. I went from someone who was sickly thin to an athletic, strong woman with curves, strength, and confidence. I personally believe that weightlifting allows for a woman to build a beautiful physique, but more importantly, gives her the confidence to love and appreciate the body she has for what it is capable of doing as well as what it looks like. If you feel good about yourself, you begin to radiate confidence and can spend time and energy focusing on the things that truly matter!



She's an international traveller, a polyglot, a natural bodybuilding champion, a writer, and a female muscle advocate. Follow Hayley's Japanese adventures on Instagram.



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