nothing teaches more than exposure

[Steel 0]

So I went to this bodybuilding competition last Friday and learned more than I expected. First of all, I thought since it was in the Dallas convention center, it was a local competition. It wasn’t. It was a national IFBB competition. So competitors came in from all over the country. It was an open competition, which meant anybody who payed the $125 entry fee can compete. (In my opinion that is the only fair way to hold any competition) However the results of that were surprising. I expected to see many unqualified competitors on stage and expected to have a good laugh from that. This was not the case. Instead, I left thinking it was a good thing I didn’t enter, because I would have been laughed off the stage. But this was not the disheartening revelation that I got from this event. After all this was a serious competition for which the competitors have been working very hard for years to excel in.
I had this guy sitting to the right of me that I spoke with throughout the competition. He had been to many other competitions and himself was a local competitor. So he could answer a lot of my questions and had lots of other useful information to contribute. Had it not been for this him, I probably wouldn’t have noticed that a former Masters Mr. Olympia winner was sitting directly behind me, that the current Mr. Olympia himself Ronnie Coleman was standing within 20 feet of us along with Dexter Jackson, Chris Cormier, Ahmad Haider, King Kamali, Tom Prince, Dave Palumbo and some whose faces I recognized but don’t know by name. So that was all cool but here is the catch. Most of these guys competed in the Mr. Olympia competition in Las Vegas on Oct. 30 so they weren’t competing here. Well less than 3 weeks after the Mr. Olympia, they were all fat already. It turns out that these guys spend most of the year at 15-20% body fat and go on hardcore diets 16 weeks before the competition. Apparently even with all the steroids that they use, they can get big without piling on the fat. So that whole appearance is one big lie. I mean I can go so far as to accept their steroid use. (even though I would NEVER join in) I can go so far as to say, to them it’s worth it. For them, there is nothing more important than to have the “perfect body”. But the reality is that even with all this, they do not have the “perfect” body. What they have is this so called perfect body for the competition. All goes to shit the second that competition ends. They lay on the floor with their legs up against the wall before they are called in efforts to get the water out of there legs so that there legs appear tighter.
I started working out because I wanted to push more weight, to have bigger arms, a bigger chest, legs and the whole nine. I constantly diet because all the size to me is meaningless without the definition. I always thought that this desire was something I had in common with professional bodybuilders. However it seems like this is not there position at all. It seems like they are driven by one sole desire, to look huge and ripped for 1 day, the day of the competition.
Don't get me wrong I had fun, I just wish it was possible to be competitive while looking your best throughout the entire year. Oh and without the steroids, but I had already given up on that idea.

If I could make a wish, I think I'd pass.
Can't think of anything I need
No cigarettes, no sleep, no light, no sound.
Nothing to eat, no books to read.