Just 17?!

Turning 18 on 1st July, Indian teen sensation Europa Bhowmik tells her Instagram followers (like it's next week or something). Began my journey 3½ years ago...



Europa comes from "a small town" in West Bengal, and is trained by, and romantically involved with, the considerably older, "several times" former Mr India Indrail Maity. Bit sinister? Well, judging by her Instagram, both Europa and her proud mother seem more than happy with the situation. I guess that's how they roll in West Bengal.



And she can certainly stand up for herself.

I get comments like "This is not attractive. This is not feminine. Why are you trying to be a man? I like girls with curves. I like girls with boobs" blah blah blah, she writes. Well, in case you people don't already know, I didn't choose this lifestyle to sexually appeal you. I chose it because I felt confident and stronger with these muscles. And the bigger they get, the better I feel. I don't care whether you find it feminine. Face the fact that some girls don't work hard to look like a sex doll. I love my muscles. And I don't wanna be any smaller or "curvier". I wanna get bigger and bigger.



Last year Europa finished top 3 at the national Mr India contest, and a couple of months later she went one better in the placings at another "national level" show, finishing runner-up at the marvellously named 9th Mr Satish Sugars Classic.



Granted, the national female bodybuilding standard in India is perhaps not quite what it is in many other countries, but as teenage starts to female bodybuilding careers go, Europa's has been a spectacular one. And she's already been at it for 3½ years!



The mind boggles what she might look like at 21.

Readers' Choice: The Best of Marja

What's your favourite pic of Marja?

We asked, you lovely readers, and you answered. Here, today, are the pics you've chosen as The Best of Marja Lehtonen. And what a lovely little collection it is.

Not a lot of off-season Marja here. Off-season she was like "Mmmmm", as one reader put it, but all ripped and pumped in contest shape she just makes you go "WOW!"



I did ask for a "brief explanation" as to why you had chosen your pic, and I wasn't expecting literature or anything, but the above is about as highbrow as it got. Seems that when we are thinking about Marja, it's all about the base thoughts.

Such an hard choice, another reader said. I looked in my whole collection and I did search, a lot. And I had to cum of course. A lot before I made my choice!



I knew it would be a pic of Marja on stage before searching. Her look is totally insane on this one: confident, smiling and... oh boy, SO HUGE!!! No prizes for guessing what that reader did right after typing that sentence. His personal choice is the hands on hips Marja at the 2008 Atlantic City Pro, above right, same contest as the another reader's pick to its left. Different suit, different expression, but the same HUGE!!!



Even the non-stage photos of Marja you chose show her very much in top shape, big, bulging muscles rippling everywhere you look. Similar poses too. Abs and thigh(s) to the fore, one from HerBiceps, another from WPW. The latter has the added bonus of her biceps ("as big as her head") being on show as well. Both readers followed the general rationale to make their choice - I simply can't look at this picture without my cock instantly getting rock solid and ready to go, as the WPW Marja lovin' reader put it.



Back on the stage, a very tanned Marja at the 2007 Jan Tana in slightly more than a posing suit got one reader's vote. Marja in blue at (I think) an earlier show was nominated by another, not so much for her muscles as her look. I fantasise she's looking at me in the audience, he says. As she flexes, she sees my eyes roll back in my head as I... - no need to be coy, son, we all know what you mean, paint the picture properly in future - and seeing me like that turns her on, having that power...



And finally, a picture of Marja I was especially glad to see nominated because it had been one of my own personal final two. All the usual Marja bits are there - abs, biceps, thigh - but here you get the calves and the veins all over her arm and the veins all over her inner thigh too. If this doesn't stiffen your cock, one reader reckoned, nothing will.

Thanks to all of those who chose their Best of Marja. Without them, today's post would probably have been poorer. But even more importantly, a massive thanks to Marja herself. Without her I reckon all us would be considerably less, er... stiff.

Enjoy!

Denise Hoshor's Good Stuff

Denise Hoshor is certainly one woman who would have been a contender had FMS been running our Hot and Hard 100 back around the turn of the millennium.




Her contest career was brief, the highlights being the Overall title at the 1999 North Americans and 2nd place in the Heavyweight class at the Ms International the following year, but her WPW and Ray Martin videos from around that time are, even today, among their best-selling products. And when older muscle heads (like myself) compile "best ever" lists, Denise more often than not appears at or near the top.



After a 6th place (out of 7) at the 2000 Olympia, she disappeared, returning after a six-year break not as the bodybuilder of legend we remembered but as a Figure competitor. At the 2006 Tournament of Champions she failed to place and that, for the best part of a decade, was all she wrote, but far from all that was written about her.



She really was my crush in the late 90s and the early 2000s, one forum poster admitted before asking the question we all wanted to know the answer to: I wonder what happened to her. Even the guys on the muscle brah forums confessed they had gone into withdrawal after her apparent retirement from the sport. She was a freak! I always loved her look, they said, I would love to see her back as a bodybuilder.



Now Denise Hoshor really is back.




Sorry to disappoint you, but she's not back as a bodybuilder, more as a kind of buff Home Economics/Crossfit guru. Good Things In Life Are Homemade is the name of her YouTube channel, and as one forum wag has pointed out, while we've all aged in the meantime, it seems Denise, who must be well into her mid-40s by now, has not.



Denise, apart from the workout clips (of which there are currently only two, plus one about climbing a rope), will show you how to make all manner of good stuff at home - protein pancakes, sourdough bread, Greek yoghurt, pumpkin pie, banana flour cornbread, and my personal favourite, New England clam chowder. And what's more, she'll also keep you up-to-date with Drake's recovery from surgery. Drake is her dog.



Not quite what I imagined when I imagined Denise's return, but hey, I'll subscribe to her YouTube channel and watch her harvesting sweet potatoes because for all the pleasure she's given me over the years, I feel it's the very least I can do for her.

When it comes to Denise, it'll always be all good.

The 2017 FMS Hot and Hard 100: Votes Please!

Yes, it's already that time of year again...

I HAD A DREAM...

Every year, in case you don't know, "gentleman's" magazine FHM carries out a readers' poll and publishes the results in a special issue. The UK edition even holds an awards ceremony in a plush London venue to publicise it. The subject of the poll and the title of that special issue is misleading: THE SEXIEST WOMEN IN THE WORLD.

Where, I wondered, is our list?

I dreamed about compiling an alternative list to FHM's. A HOT AND HARD 100. I could have just chosen 100 women myself, but I decided I'd much rather make it a collective effort and get the input of FMS readers. The call went out, and, I am eternally grateful that many of you, for the last three years, have answered that call.

THE WINNERS

HOTTEST HARD WOMAN IN THE WORLD 2014



ALINA POPA


HOTTEST HARD WOMAN IN THE WORLD 2015



SHANNON COURTNEY


HOTTEST HARD WOMAN IN THE WORLD 2016



CRIS GOY ARELLANO


HOTTEST HARD WOMAN IN THE WORLD 2017




THE VOTING

It's not complicated. There are just two rules...

1. You can vote for up to 100 women.

Want to vote for just one? Fine. 15? Fine. 50? Excellent! 100? Magic!

But don't vote for any more than that. Simples.

2. It's the Hottest Hard Women of NOW. Not Ever.

Don't vote for your all-time favourites who have fallen off the radar in "retirement".

Quite simply, it's a waste of a vote. It won't be counted. Not sure if one of the ladies you've voted for qualifies? Just put an alternate name next to hers in case she doesn't.

But you don't have to limit yourself to "bodybuilders". There were more WPD women than FBBs on last year's list, and there were women from the Figure, Fitness and Bikini divisions. Crossfitters always get a significent number of votes, and there are always at least a few votes for powerlifters, weightlifters and women from other sports.

All clear?

You are at liberty to rank the women from 1 (your favourite) to 100, rank some of them (eg. a top ten), or just list them in no particular order. Rankings are only taken into account if there's a tie on the number of votes two or more women receive.

Use the comment box below, or email 6ft1swell@gmail.com

Voting closes on the last day of February, so you have four weeks from now.

Now get busy making my dream come true for the fourth time!

Tube Watch

FMS picks a few of the very best new clips from YouTube from the first few weeks of January for your viewing pleasure in our second installment of Tube Watch.

MICHAELA FAILS...

But only after a mind-boggling 225lb (just over 100kg) 32-rep set of deadlifts.



The woman is a freak. More jaw to the floor stuff from Michaela on her channel - 111 (yep, one hundred and eleven) squats with her bodyweight (circa 60kg) on the bar.

For Your Consideration

And staying with the WPD, defending Physique Internationsl champion Autumn Swansen's preparations are being documented by Midwest Muscle Report. You can watch an interview with her in a bikini in the ocean (actually it's not quite as sexy as a beach shoot with Autumn should be, but her velvet Southern accent saves the day - for me anyway!). You can also follow her as she builds up to and performs a shoulder/ bicep workout. Not as intense as Michaela, it's true, but lawdy that accent...

BAYRES NOT BARE!

Probably better-known for being a muscular woman not shy about taking her clothes off and getting up to all sorts of naughtiness, Karyn Bayres is clothed unusually modestly while pumping up and flexing in this Double Biceps preview.



Bet that look she gives the camera at 1.39 had you imagining all sorts of naughtiness.

Satisfy your cravings on her blog.

For Your Consideration

And elsewhere in Europe, Zoltan Veigh continues to find more beautiful, sexy muscle models to shoot in his own inimitable way. FMS recommends pretty much everything he's ever done, but this "Behind the Scenes" look at Karina Gavrikova and her tanned, vascular midsection is brand new and well worth a minute of your time.

RENE DOES ARNOLD

Remember that scene from Pumping Iron (not II) where Arnie goes on about the pump making him feel like he's "cumming day and night"? Ever wondered how it would sound if a female bodybuilder re-enacted the scene? Well, thanks to London-based director Emile Rafael with help from Rene Campbell, you don't have to wonder anymore.



How I missed this when it went up in September is beyond me.

The research team have been most righteously chastised.

Tube Watch will return towards the end of February.

Around the World: Iran

Around the World will be an occasional series celebrating the female bodybuilders of a particular country, and examining any issues peculiar to muscle women there.

Today, from bad to worse in Iran.



The last time FMS reported from Iran, female bodybuilders were being summoned to court for taking part in an international competition. Some male athletes have trained women and arranged for these half-naked pseudo-athletes to compete in competitions abroad, reported Mizan, the news agency of the Iranian judiciary, in September. Now their semi-nude photographs are everywhere on social networks.

According to IranWire, on October 2, Tehran’s prosecutor, Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi, confirmed that the male coaches involved in training two female bodybuilders had been banned from continuing their athletic activities and banned from travelling.

Now it seems one of these women has actually been jailed.

A female bodybuilder was arrested on January 17 after she posted a "semi-nude" photograph of herself on Instagram, according to government sources, and was jailed after she was unable to pay a bail amount of 200m tomans (about $62,000).



The news was picked up by the Mail Online, who added that, though "unidentified", it is thought she may be Shirin Nobahari, one of the two female bodybuilders who had been banned from bodybuilding as well as travelling outside Iran last September.



From there, the story went, as these things always seems to do nowadays, global, with the Mail's text repeated almost verbatim, and images of Shirin from her Instagram (@shirin_muscleking), "semi-nude" as the mullahs would tut, for illustration.



Whether the arrested woman is, in fact, Shirin Nobahari is still - as far as I can ascertain - unconfirmed. On the one hand she has, if anything, toned down her posts somewhat in the last few months, with the only skin on display being that on her striking face. On the the other hand though, she had been warned, and she is still, quite obviously, defying the ban imposed upon her bodybuilding. Furthermore, her Instagram - with its 70,000+ followers and three duplicate "fanpage" accounts (no doubt there as insurance should one or more be shut down) - makes her by far the most high profile Iranian bodybuilder still pumping iron in Iran, and therefore a prime target for a regime obviously keen to set an example to bring others into line.



This is not the first time Shirin has faced opposition. My parents were university professors, the 27-year-old said in an interview with a dissident Iranian news source at the end of 2015. One of my sisters has a Master’s in Food Sciences and the other sister a Master’s in Physiology. One of my brothers is an inventor and has a few inventions registered to his name. The other two are graduates of Computer Science and Accounting. Unsurprisingly, her parents tried to persuade to follow a similar path into a "good" profession rather than pursuing her passion for muscle.



She describes herself as a "one-woman army", and compares the authorities to "crows and vultures". She told her Instagram followers last autumn - around the time of her previous collar - that "however we live it is important to live with dignity". What a tragedy if attempting to do so has meant she has been robbed of her freedom.

Thunder! Irene Mateos

We don’t usually talk about female genetics, but Iree Mateos has such an impressive physique it’s hard to simply ignore. You’ve heard of alpha males before I’m sure. There’s no doubt in our minds that Iree Mateos is certainly an alpha female.
Generation Iron, "Iree Mateos is the Definition of an Alpha Female", 11/11/16



Barcelona's Irene ("Iree" is her social media moniker) Mateos has received a fair bit of coverage in the mainstream (ie. for dudes) bodybuilding media in the last few months, none of it actually shedding much light on her story. Other than the fact that she’s a Figure class fanatic, we couldn’t find out much else about her! BroScience exclaimed. But let’s be honest... you’re not really bothered about her bio...



Well, actually...

I guess this is what separates me from the brahs.



In the absence of bio, we will have to make do.

Sigh.



Her role models are, as BroScience points out, mainly from Figure. Cyd Gillon's tiny waist is "perfection", Nicole Wilkins is "the kind of woman who inspires me", and Swann De La Rosa "is Bodyfitness". Her brah-magnet Instagram also features Candice Lewis-Carter, Tina Nguyen, and Joan Smith among others.



But she's also featured Dani Reardon, Olga Belyakova, and Heidi Vuorela - "great examples that teach us that having muscle does not mean being male, or having a big jaw" - and lately, one of FMS' 2016 Women of the Year, Anastasia Papoutsaki - "a beautiful woman, strong, feminine and incredible!" - who all compete in Physique. In fact, Irene, despite her protestations that "I do not use photoshop on my waist...", is given to occasionally putting up fakes of herself as a Physique competitor.



I wouldn't complain. Though it might be too much for the Brahs.

The one on the left at the bottom is the fake. In case you were wondering.