Woman of the Week: Thea Dougher

I first became aware of her by the name she's more commonly known as, Thea Renee (sometimes with, sometimes without the last name Schuler added as well), a few years ago. Big, blond, beautiful and tattooed, I remember being impressed, she may even have featured on the blog - though I can't recall in what capacity - at some stage.



She seemed to disappear, I'd read something about her getting married - or did I dream that? Anyway, off the radar she went, until the back end of last year, when a bunch of images appeared on GwM, along with "news" that she had a new Instagram moniker - crazy_fitfreak. She looked fantastic - bigger, more beautiful. And as 2017 turned to 2018, it looked more and more as though Thea was preparing for something.



Ah yes! That's right... MILITARY.

Scrolling through her IG one night jogged the memory, explained why she wasn't on the radar (geddit?!), why I'd been so keen in the first place (tough as nails, uniform) and why the only YouTube video I could find of her was a 2014 contest in Guam.



The something she was preparing for turned out to be the NPC Los Angeles Championships, where she competed, not under Schuler, but her married name of Dougher - Thea Dougher. Despite my suspicions that she'd got married some time ago, she was in fact a bride only this year, and quite the outfit she got married in. However, at the time I checked the pics of the contest, I didn't know any of that, so I wasn't expecting much from the Physique winner, because experience tells me that at regional NPC shows, it's best not to expect too much, even of the Physique...

WOW!!!




Even then - perhaps because I was a bit, you know, "worked up" - I didn't immediately equate this vision of muscular beauty with the (largely unglamorous and unsmiling) Thea I knew before. It was the back tat - "that horroble [sic] back tattoo" as it is known in some circles - that eventually made me realise exactly who I was looking at. Big, blond, beautiful and tattooed (yeah!) AND glammed, tanned and striking those poses with power and elegance, she really ticked EVERY SINGLE ONE of the boxes.



Full swoonspin. Felt pretty damn good up there! she said after prejudging. Looked good too, pretty much like my idea of Physique - a huge, powerful and yet very feminine woman. No surprise she won first in her class and Overall with a body (and styling) like that. She had a package, as Paige Sandgren once put it, that "the judges can't deny". So proud of what I brought to the stage and very happy with it all! she wrote as she celebrated. I’ve come a long way since my last show years ago.



We’ll see what happens next, she continues...



This was four years after her first show. And she apparently made her fella wait a few years. I'm seriously worried it might be 2022 before we see her on stage again, though I very sincerely hope not. Still, imagine how big she would be able to get by then...

Enjoy!

Woman of the Week: NOT Emma Paveley

No pictures today I'm afraid. And no name.

This week's Woman of the Week is the lady I saw last week as she enjoyed some lunchtime sunshine with friends/colleagues on the green near where I'm working now.

I saw her twice. Once, very briefly, last Tuesday, and then again a week ago today.

TUESDAY, 3rd JULY

We've had a so-called "heatwave" in the UK (I'm sure we just used to refer to weather like this as "summer"!) recently. Sunshine every day, temperatures in the mid to high 20s where I am. It's been great, and when out and about, I've been as alert as always to any female muscle among the (mainly flabby) flesh on display in the heat.

Largely, I've been disappointed. The city where I'm currently based is not a large one, hardly a hotspot for female muscle, but I had some luck in the spring with sighting muscular women so I was hopeful. But apart from a few women with "toned" arms, and/or flat tummy, my female muscle radar has been pretty much dormant.

That changed last Tuesday. As I walked back to the office from a working lunch with a colleague, the radar went crazy. Ahead, to my left, was a woman in a workout vest with shoulders. Big, muscular shoulders. She was sitting on the grass, leaning back, and supporting herself on her arms, making those shoulders pop. I felt my heart rate rise, felt the adrenaline rush. I fought the urge to stare, tried to maintain the conversation I was having... But those shoulders were proper balls of muscle.

I was side on to her now as we passed, and could see a proper tricep too, bulging outwards from under her shoulder then curving back in towards her elbow. No more than a glimpse but more than enough to make me have to suppress a gasp.

My colleague has a bit of a power walk on her, and I cursed her for it. We'd gone past her too quickly, to see any more now I would have to stop and turn around. My heart still beating fast, I tried and failed to think of a reason to do just that. It was over.

WEDNESDAY, 4th JULY

Over the following 24 hours, I somehow managed to convince myself that the woman I had seen was none other than Britain's Fitness Olympian Emma Paveley.


IFBB Fitness Pro Emma Paveley - NOT the woman I saw

It seemed perfectly reasonable at the time.

For one thing, Emma is based not a million miles away from where my sighting had happened and the woman I had seen was, I surmised, more or less the right height. She was the right colouring - blond, pale - and had the right hairstyle. The muscles, I guessed, were about right too. Shockingly developed next to the "normals" she was with that day, they were still nothing like a full-on Female Bodybuilder's.

Piece by piece my Madness-stricken mind assembled the glimpses I had had of the woman on the grass, and when they were all put together they added up to Emma.

I was back at that green the following lunchtime. Waiting and watching I ran through what I would say to her - "good luck in Vancouver" and so on. Would she think it weird or would she be flattered that I knew who she was and when and where she would be competing next? My tone, I decided, would be key - that and not gushing out everything little thing I knew about her all at once. So I rehearsed as I sat watching and waiting for her. I ran through my lines over and over again.

THURSDAY, 5th JULY

She was there when I arrived at the green with my lunch. And I realised very quickly that though she did bear a passing resemblance to Emma, it was not in fact her. This was, I'll admit, somewhat disappointing, but I was glad to see she (whoever she is) was once again in a workout vest. And there was a vacant bench close-but-not-too-close to her with a great view of her arms, her shoulders, and even a little back.

I settled down and drank her in.

When she spoke even the smallest gesticulation made her muscles ripple a little, and with no one in earshot, I was able to let out little moans and gasps as she did so. It didn't take long for my loins to start acknowledging her - I did get rather hard at one point and had to cross my legs - but I felt more like an art lover in a gallery gazing at a particularly beautiful work than a man on a perving mission in a public place!

A good 45 minutes I spent like that, melting into a full-on swoon at one point when she leaned back on her arms (as I had seen her first), triceps and shoulders bulging, and stretched. As she did so her quads visibly flared in her tight leggings. I felt my eyes widening, my loins tingling, and bit my bottom lip hard enough to draw blood.

I desperately wanted to see her stand up so I could get a better look at those legs, desperately wanted to watch her walk so I could see if her glutes were as tight as I imagined. She remained on the grass, however, and I really had to get back to work.

It wasn't difficult - and nor, at the time, did it seem in any way wrong - to take a few long range pictures of her, and I later spent some of the afternoon at my desk cropping them to focus on her, delighted her impressive definition came out.

That evening I spent some quality time with those pictures, then deleted them all - partly because of the surge of guilt I felt immediately after I had paid my secret tribute to her, partly because I knew deep down I would never have been able to keep them to myself and by sharing them open myself up to all sorts of embarrassing (and possibly legal) situations, and partly because I wanted to spare her the shock of one day coming across a bunch of photos of herself she never knew existed.

She may well be aware the muscles she has built give her more than just physical power. She certainly wasn't shy about showing off her arms and shoulders, quite rightly - I hope and expect she is very proud of the physique she has. She'll never know what she did to me, though. Never know the power she had over me for those few days last week, and clearly continues to have over me as I sit here writing now.

She's my woman of the week without question - whoever she is.

Emma, by the way, finished 3rd in Vancouver, so she didn't manage to defend her title. She was nevertheless "feeling really proud at being soooo much better than ever before" at the show. If I see her, I'll tell her I thought she's never looked better either, though the chances of that are slim. Yes, she's based not a million miles from where I'm currently working, but the only public place Emma ever seems to be is in the gym.

Woman of the Week: Jessica Booker Williams

These days it is (hopefully) not necessary to have to prove to anyone that women with muscles can't be feminine, but should that need ever arise, you could do a lot worse than produce an image or six of Jessica Booker Williams to make the point.



FMS readers will certainly need any convincing - Jessica has been a fixture on the Hot and Hard 100 since 2016, with one voter going so far as to suggest she "should be submitted to the OED as the new definition of the word 'gorgeous'." Swell needs no convincing either - "I've got such a crush on her," I've gushed (more than once) in the past, left breathless by the gusto of her on stage presentation, her sweaty gym selfies, and her all round "sassy, classy and a bit badassy" alpha female muscle appeal.



Why are we returning to Jessica now? Well, why not? is as good a reason as any, but aside from the fact that I would be quite happy to make a Jessica post for every 10 new Instagram selfies she puts up, Jessica was back on stage recently for the first time since the 2016 IFBB North Americans, and in my house that's an occasion worth celebrating!




The event was the NPC Steve Kuclo Classic in Dallas in the middle of May - yes, believe it or not, Jessica is still in an "amateur" - where she won Overall Physique and the Masters class - yes, believe it or not, Jessica is going to be 40 before long!



And, as always with Jessica, the contest shots have had me drooling all over my keyboard. So glam and so ripped. Such beauty, and such sex appeal, born of the confidence she seems to have - regular readers will know there are few things in the female muscle world I love more than a women who loves it up there and makes you feel it, and I reckon Jessica is one of the best right now. Believe it or not, I get nervous, she says. I look at a competitor with more mass and my initial feeling is "uh-oh". But no way do I allow myself to entertain that feeling for long. If I don't believe in me, how can a judging panel believe in me? How can a crowd believe in me? Convince yourself that you can do it, she adds, and your confidence becomes infectious.




I'm so infected.



At the previously mentioned 2016 North Americans, Jessica was placed 6th in her class - "the most conditioned competitor, but also definitely the smallest in terms of mass". And when she competes at her next national level show, the problem that she "will almost always be one of the smallest dogs in the fight" (her words) remains. However, just as at the 2016 NPC Southwest Championships, which she also won, Jessica was a class apart (of a not insignificant field) at this national qualifier.

And thanks to Best Muscle Video, we can enjoy Jessica's victory in full.

(Get comfy - there's 14+ minutes of this!)



Took me a few goes to get through to the end, I don't mind telling you...



But we haven't quite finished for today, so steel yourself, you lovely reader.

JESSICA'S TALES FROM THE GYM

He Who Laughs Last...



Oh how Jessica's followers laughed at "the putz in the background"! I don’t think Cleatus behind you is wearing proper gym footwear, roared one. The guy behind you is texting his friend about how this ripped blonde is checking him out, smirked another. Poor dude! If he's been going to that gym for a while (and I say that in the full knowledge there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that's true) then repeated viewings of a sweaty Jessica may have caused him to experience repeated, dangerous levels of "Madness". And look what it's done to him. The man is a bloody wreck.

Jessica is far too classy to mock the afflicted, of course, but it does occur to me that "Cleatus", while I don't condone his choice of footwear, or (somewhat more reluctantly) his (possibly) pervasive actions, definitely had the best view of Jessica in the house and may even have managed to record it for...er, let's say "posterity" (sorry).

So, I ask you, who's laughing now?

The Comfort of Strangers

I had a random dude comment yesterday, something along the lines of "aren’t you worried about losing your femininity lifting heavy weights". Damn. What would I do without the opinions and narrow-minded guidance of complete strangers!?



Then! The cutest little old man (like 80+) came up to me three times in the gym today. He told me I sure was attractive every time, and then proceeded to tell me I should probably do more light weight reps (although he couldn’t remember the word for "reps" at first (adorable!) because I kinda "looked like a man from behind", aaaand then proceeded to tell me one more time I sure was attractive. So... I concluded two things today from this/these encounters: 1. Old people are cute as shit, regardless. That sweet little thing didn’t know if he was coming or going and honestly didn’t offend me one bit, bless his heart. 2. The likelihood that anyone over the age of 80 read my rant on Instagram yesterday about this very topic is slim to none.

Just another day in the life of an NPC Physique goddess...



Follow Jessica on Instagram for more Tales from the Gym.

Enjoy!

Woman of the Week: Marina Keemann

I first came across NAC physique competitior Marina Keemann thanks to the genius that is Hemuvisa. There she was, all hair and ripped muscle, four minutes into his 2016 FIBO edit last April. Jaw to the floor. The tan, sexy bulging glutes packed into pink leggings. The belly piercing and the ripped abs framing it. And OMG the HAIR!



It took me a while to get round to actually tracking her down, but finally, here she is on FMS our very first Woman of the Week, a new regular (but not in fact weekly) post.



Here she is. Marina. Her muscles. And that hair.

I am a sucker for long frizzy curls even when they're not attached to such a sexy muscular body. And Marina's go down all the way to those sexy bulging glutes...



*SWOOOON!*



Marina, now in her late 30s, has been fascinated by muscle since she was 11. Inspired by Arnold - "my role model then and now" - she joined a gym as soon as she was 18.



She competes in the NAC federation, where even the Bikini competitors are ripped, and in 2016, Marina had a good year. She was runner-up at the German Masters, and 3rd at the NAC World Championships in the "Ms Physique" category - think IFBB Physique with a few more striations, and fewer posing and posing suit restrictions.



I'm so glad I've found her! Thank you Hevumisa!!!

Here she is at the 2016 NAC Worlds.



There's also her routine at the German Masters to enjoy, and after that you might like to check out a 10-minute training clip of Marina from 2015. If your German is fließend genug, or you just really like watching gorgeous muscle women speaking a language you don't understand, you should check out this interview with Marina too.

And she's on Instagram.

Enjoy!