Magnificent Maria Luisa Baeza Diaz (& Other Figure Phenoms) @New York Pro 2018

It wasn't that long ago - 2010 to be exact - that Cathy Lefrançois became the last Female Bodybuilding champion to be crowned at the New York Pro. Since then, however, there has been plenty of female muscle interest provided by the Physique division. Juliana Malacarne won there three times in a row between 2012 and 2014, and after Michelle Cummings had successfully moved "down" from Bodybuilding to claim the Physique crown there in 2015, Shanique Grant took over from Juliana as the Queen of New York, winning there in 2016 and winning there again last year.



Given that kind of history as the show where Women's Physique's brightest stars are born, it was disappointing to see the show's promoter(s) had ditched the class this year, although thanks to the wonderful women of Figure, it was only slightly so.



Shuffling between the two divisions seems to be a thing now. This year in New York, for example, Maria Rita Penteado - runner-up to Shanique in Physique here last year - and Liz Montalbano both made their Figure debuts. Liz had competed in Physique as recently as May 6th at the Champions of Power and Grace, less than two full weeks before she competed in New York. Doing it the other way round we find FMS swoon and Figure Olympian Jessica Reyes Padilla dipping her toe into Physique in North Carolina, then 13 days later returning to Figure and finishing runner-up in New York.



Has Physique become Figure without heels? Has Figure become Physique without flexing? Either way, the lines, or rather the physiques on show in the two divisions appear to be getting more and more similar, and despite predictions from the forum prophets of doom that Physique will get phased out in the near future, I personally prefer to point to the positives. Firstly, more muscle in Figure is - and I think we can all agree on this - most definitely for the better. And secondly, if the IFBB decides it doesn't want to have Physique, that could well mean the division ending up with FBBing under the Wings of Strength regime. Not only would I suggest that it would be more likely to flourish than disappear should that happen, it would also be the next logical step on the road towards an all-female federation free from IFBB control.

Anyway, back to New York!



A special mention for Deepika Chowdury, India's first - and only - IFBB pro. Regular readers may remember we first celebrated her back in the summer of 2016, admiring the drive that had led her to leave India to compete with the best. After a flawless record of 5 wins in five NPC shows she was awarded IFBB pro status, and made her pro debut in New York in 2016. She finished 12th, and has since been back home leading her own seminars to promote fitness among Indian women both young and old.



Under the guidance of Olympian Figure phenom Gennifer Strobo, she's also clearly been hard at it improving her physique. Just five years ago she was a molecular biologist with a fitness dream. Now, on this second visit to New York as a pro she placed 4th. But as excited as she was to have gained her first ever Olympia qualification points, Deepika is such an educator that she used her social media to explain to "all to my dear friends in India who lack the information" both how the Olympia qualification system works, and where they can find all the scorecards for IFBB pro events!



And we also think we should give a mention to the "big and very attractive" 10th place Amber Eutsey, who was competing in the fourth show of her debut pro season.



"You can't tell me this lovely lady couldn't compete in Physique," wrote one forum poster recently, echoing our earlier point about the blurring of lines between the classes, but that's not the only reason why Amber has impressed us. Great package, amazing structure, beautiful symmetry, and that's according to the Head Judge at her second pro show in Orlando! Recently, Amber caused much gnashing of teeth on the forum whose first rule is... for her Instagram comment that "if I can break you, I can't date you." In the very same post, however, she informed us that "boys with muscles, good looks, intelligence and money don't impress me... I have my own." All I will say is that the gorgeous, sexy Amber reminds this (chubby, plain, dumb and penniless) boy of a young Asha Hadley, and that's just about the biggest compliment I can give!

And so to the latest Queen of New York...



The ever classy Maria will need no introduction to most of you lovely readers given you voted in sufficient numbers for her to re-enter the Hot and Hard 100 this year at #28. What a woman SHOULD look like, reckoned one of those voters, and for once - or perhaps that should be once again - judges and fans are on the same page.



Until this show, 2018 had (apart from that Hot and Hard 100 re-entry, obviously) been quite frustrating for her apparently. 6th at the Arnolds in Ohio and Australia and 6th in Pittsburgh earlier in the month for many IFBB pros that would be a decent season, but not for Maria. "Repetitive", she called it. Changes were made to her prep, and after her "prestigious" (her word) win (New York may no longer have FBBing or Physique, but it's still one of the bigger shows to those who can compete) she felt those changes were thoroughly vindicated. I'm on cloud 9, she said afterwards. This is a show to come back to every year, and to win it is a dream come true.



Congratulations to Maria and all the Figure phenoms in New York.

Check out full results and galleries here, and incidentally, last week we brought news of actual Female Bodybuilders, particularly Maryse Manios, in action in Bari, Italy, but bemoaned the lack of contest pictures available. Well, now they've gone up on NPC News Online you can check out Maryse here, and all the results and galleries here.

"The Best Legs in Figure" and Other Figure Phenoms @IFBB Europa Orlando 2018

When three-time IFBB pro winner, top 10 Olympian and FMS heartthrob Jessica Reyes Padilla places 10th, even allowing for judging misdemeanours, it's a fair bet she was part of a quality line-up, and so it was at the 2018 IFBB Europa Orlando.



Canada's Melissa Bumstead, Canada's gorgeous Melissa Bumstead, provided some of it. Just look at the cuts on those legs! Perhaps at some point those legs have been called "the best legs in Figure", but Melissa's were not the legs being most talked about on this occasion. Melissa will doubtless go on to win many pro titles in a long and glittering career, but here she and her legs were not winners - Melissa placed 4th.



Sadly - and this is unusual - the quality of NPC News Online's coverage did not really match the quality of the line-up, not in terms of the pictures anyway. Bit blurry they look to me. Thankfully though, this is not the only coverage of the event we have, and perhaps better still, this other coverage - courtesy of Bodybuilding and Beyond - allows us to watch all 19 women in this obviously quality line-up in motion.

Here they are, from #30 Yordana Alayon to #48 Linda Simnick.

See if you can spot "the best legs in Figure"...



Well?

The correct answer was #40, Felisha Livezey.



Not the most familiar name in the line-up by any means, Felisha hadn't previously competed since the 2016 NPC Universe but "stole the show" on her pro debut. I just decided to do this one and it worked out kinda good, she said afterwards. I'm going to the Olympia, it's so exciting... I never thought in a million years it would happen.



Now, about these "best legs in Figure". Don't be under the impression that anyone of any note was claiming this, it's just the thoughts of some random forum head, and perhaps seems, at first, to be an impossibly bold statement to make. However, what's been interesting is that since that claim was made on her behalf, plenty of other heads have chipped in on Felisha's thread not (as is customary) to mock, but to confirm.




That is an understatement, writes one. If you have an account for HerBiceps, I'd suggest you check out her videos. The way she flexes her quads are unlike anything you've seen out of a Figure competitor. Again, this seems an impossibly bold claim. I mean I've seen a LOT. But he goes on - I kid you not. Her legs are THAT insane.


Felisha in 2016

The clips they are talking about are nearly two years' old now, dating back from that NPC Universe win when she turned pro. New footage will be available on HDPhysiques "in the very near future" apparently. FMS will not be the only ones looking out for it.



You can follow Felisha on Instagram. She isn't planning to do any more shows before the Olympia, but intends to "work on some weak points" over the next few months.



She's probably not talking about those legs.

Arnolds Review: Swell Digs Pros

FIGURE PHENOMS

JESSICA REYES PADILLA (9th)



I liked Jessica at last year's Olympia, and I liked her even more here.



She really attacks her walk on, really announces herself - as if her body needed any announcing! She moves very elegantly between her poses, but when she hits them, she does so with 100% conviction. She really eyeballs the judges too, and watching the live stream I was able to pick up on her little calf flexes and so on, little extras that may or may not win over the judges, but certainly win over an ol' female muscle head like me.


"Latina Power!" (with Sandra Grajales and Natalia Soltero) & 'meeting' Arnold.

More Jessica on Instagram.

CARLY STARLING-HORRELL (7th)



Just outside the top 6 another gorgeous woman we've featured on the blog before went one better than she did at this event last year, and looked better than ever doing so.



Spend any amount of time enjoying her Instagram and you'll see Carly is big with the Lord. And the Lord has revealed her true mission. He has used bodybuilding to rescue me from myself and transform my mind into wanting more out of life and to not just settle for mediocrity, she revealed in the build-up to this show. Good work, big man!



Side note: Carly has been a big supporter of the Arizona Pro, competing there in both 2016 and 2017 - another reason (as if we needed one) to like her. She finished 3rd there last year, one of Carly's better placings, and confidently predicted at the time that Cydney Gillon would go on to "slay the Olympia". She was not wrong.

MICHELE DA SILVA PINTO (4th)


At the "meet and greet" before the show & all smiles after

It's a close thing between her 4th and Bojana Vasiljevic's 5th place, but the division's result of the night just about went to Brazil's hottest IFBB Figure phenom right now.



Just two years' ago, Michele was turning pro here by winning the Overall amateur title, and since then she has most definitely shown she belongs at Figure's top table without getting into the first call out at its biggest events... until Friday March 2nd, 2018.


Last shoulder day before the Arnolds (veinzzzz!) & prepping for the Arnolds Australia this week

It wasn't just me who liked what they saw, the judges did too, and she finished ahead of more experienced (Maria Luisa Baeza Diaz, Jessica Reyes Padilla, Ivana Ivusic) and better-known (Sandra Grajales Romero) competitors to be the leader of the pack behind the three Figure legends who made up the top 3 here.

Truth be told, while I digged these three women just a tiny bit more than the others, as usual with the Figure division at such big events, all of the competitors looked utterly amazing. And thanks to NPC News Online, you can feel the Figure heat for yourself...



PHYSIQUE DREAMS

LEAH SOHN (10th)



At 47, Texas' Leah Sohn is, I imagine, inspiring and depressing in equal measure to women of a similar vintage. That's how I feel when I see the physique her (probably older) husband displays on the Instagram they share anyway. Inspired (I could look like that) and depressed (I may never look quite that good) at the same time.



She's never been to the Olympia, never placed higher than 4th in Puerto Rico in 2016, so this was a big deal for her, and watching her routine on the live stream, I was impressed by the gusto with which she performed as well as her (47-year-old!) body. Sheilahe Brown (remember her?) was Leah's posing coach for the Arnolds. Such an inspiration to me and so many others, Leah says. Sheilahe took me to new heights by using my personality and strengths to showcase and enjoy my time on stage.



NB. Before the (inspiringly and depressingly) shredded Mr Sohn made an honest woman out of her, Leah competed under the name Leah McDonald. Watch her interviewed after winning the Overall and earning her pro card at the 2015 Masters Nationals here. Competing for just over a year then, she looks absolutely stunning.

MICHAELA AYCOCK (4th)



She's SO hardcore, works unbelievably hard, lifts unimaginable weights for ridiculous numbers of reps. Her Instagram is Freakshow #1 most of the time (and I LOVE it) but despite - no - because of that, when Michaela gets glammed and tanned, she's all the more delightful for the extreme contrast with her pale, no frills Monday to Friday self.



She's even been "lured" (her word) into some glam modelling by HD Physiques - it's only taken three years for them to convince her! And we are very much looking forward to the fruits of that collaboration, especially so after the above sneaky peak.



This was a great result for Michaela, even though the big Physique guns of Heather Grace and Jennifer Taylor stayed away, and she took this package to Hawaii last weekend and won, securing her 2018 Olympia place before the clocks go forward.

MARGITA ZAMOLOVA (3rd)



Similarly, Margita Zámolová was able to maintain the muscle that gave her a top 3 placing at the Arnolds into the following week, and after winning in London (yep, for real - you didn't realise there was a pro show?!), the undisputed new Czech Physique Queen (move over Katka) will be joining Michaela in Las Vegas later in the year.



With the exception of the UK's Kate Errington in the Fitness division, no European woman placed higher here. No other European woman in Physique placed at all.



To not be from North America (or South America) and to achieve in the sport what she has achieved in the last couple of years has been nothing short of miraculous.

Here they all are, before prejudging (which it has not been easy to get pics of, so here I've made my diggings exclusively from the women who made the top 10 and thus the finals) getting oiled and pumped (and excited) before taking the stage in Columbus. Michaela gets oiled from 1.53; Margita's applicator will have you green with envy from 3.54, then (glistening) she will pump (you) up from about 6.15 and again from 7.15.

Enjoy!



Tomorrow, our final day at the Arnolds, it's the Figure to Physique trend.