~Michele~’s BodyBlog

One of the things that I am most excited about at the Olympia this year is the Powerlifting Supershow, taking place on Saturday at 3pm on the expo main stage. A year ago I might not have taken such an interest in it, but since then I have been learning a lot about sport and admire the work and dedication that these guys put into their training. I first met Brad Heck at the Arnold Classic in 2007, where he claimed the world record in the 181 weight class by benching 679 pounds. I met a few of the other guys on the Big Iron team that weekend, but had no clue at the time that I would soon be training at their gym, and that we would all become good friends.

Big Iron Gym in Omaha, Nebraska is one of the most respected powerlifting gyms in the world, and although I am not a powerlifter myself, its hard not to get excited about the amazing accomplishments that the lifters achieve meet after meet. When I first started training there, I didn’t know what a monolift was. After a few weeks in the gym, I understood what it was all about. And after watching my first meet, my level of respect for powerlifters increased dramatically. Led by coach Rick Hussey, the Big Iron team has some of the top powerlifters in the sport, and I am very excited to see some of the guys in Vegas benching on the Expo stage!

Shawn Frankl (810 at 198), Jim Grandick (800 at 242), Brad Heck (705 at 181), and Richie Briggs (866 at 275 & is 23 years old) will all be competing at the Powerlifting Supershow. Make sure you don’t miss it on Saturday afternoon, I’ll be there cheering for these guys - its gonna be a good show! This competition in a slightly different format from traditional bench press meets. They will be not lifitng the standard one-rep max, but the lifters will be required to do a two-rep minimum. This is more of an exhibition so that bodybuilders and other fitness enthusiasts can relate to it, but I encourage everyone to check out a traditional full meet to see the big numbers, as well as the squats and deadlifts.

And if you’d like to see what the training atmosphere at Big Iron Gym is like, or want to learn more about the techniques that these guys use, they just made a really cool DVD that is on the gym’s site www.bigirongym.com .

I miss competing! Plain and simple. This has been the longest break away from the stage that I have taken since I started. It was a much needed break, but at the same time I am itching to bust out my Jan Tana and clear heels and get my little brown butt back under those stage lights. And the million-dollar question: What is next?

This is where I need some help. Any advice from my competitor friends would be so great, so please chime in!

I competed in the NPC for over 2 years. I know that organization, I am familiar with it, and I like the exposure that it provides. BUT… I don’t think I have what it takes to make it to the top, for reasons that have to do with my own personal values and preference to remain marketable and feminine. At the national level, there are 200 girls at these shows and I am afraid I will get lost in the crowd. But that isn’t too much of a worry to stop me from trying!

I am also curious about other natural organizations, where I feel like it would be a much more realistic goal to get a pro card. But I don’t know a lot about these shows, so that would be like starting all over again, although I wouldn’t expect it to be too difficult.

So basically, I haven’t made any decisions yet so I don’t have a set plan of what is next. What do you think?

So I can’t give anything away just yet, but I thought it would be fun to drop a little teaser: A fun project that I recently worked on is due to be released in the near future. Boy, that is pretty vague, huh?

Check out the SecondFocus bodyblog in the coming weeks for the official announcement, I will leave that up to my good friend and SecondFocus blogger, Ian. He is an amazing person and a very talented photographer. And he writes an awesome blog, too.

http://blog.bodybuilding.com/SecondFocus

Want to know how to impress a company that is looking to sponsor you? Stuff yourself with italian food and chocolate cake in front of them… while they are paying the bill…

Trust me, it works!

This is one of the many reasons why I am so happy to be with AllMax. After a long day of working the booth at a HUGE expo in Anaheim, we headed to Bucca di Beppo for a nice dinner. Now I had just competed about a week and a half prior to this event, so I was still in my "let’s see how much I can eat in one sitting" phase. In terms of calories consumed, I think I beat all of the AllMax guys that night, because when that cake came around you better believe I was eating some of it. Or a lot of it…

Another great thing about that event was that it was the first time I had tried RapidCuts Hardcore. This was prior to it’s release in stores, so I didn’t really know what to expect except that Sales Guy Mike told me it was pretty intense. Okay so he wasn’t kidding, you want to see me dance around a booth for 8 hours? Just give me some RapidCuts and the party has begun!

So thank you to AllMax for putting up with my post-contest-italian-food-binge-eating behaviors, I am happy to be a part of the team!!