2009 Olympia Blog

It was fantastic!!! I was all excited like a kid at Christmas. I met so many great people and witnessed one of the most amazing shows on the planet from a floor seat. Victor martinez was my winner hands down! I worked in the Ironman booth and had the pleasure of dining with the fine people of Ironman magazine who graciously provided my tickets to the shows. I met one of my best friends Rob Carbo from RealGainz magazine and had my 1st photoshoots. 3 in a row actually. I got to visit Red Rock out there and the scenery is beautiful. I worked with Dave Goodin in the booth and he is a wonderful and kind man.

Everyone was terribly nice and made my weekend the best I have ever had. okay, I had to sleep in an airport chair in Philly overnight and arrived a day late, but I am going to overlook that part. I met with the brainiacs of gaspari nutrition and the invited me to join their team to help women understand supplemental needs. Keep your eye out for the new addition to their forums (addressing women and their need to take supplements as much as men do.) I appreciate their realization that women are pretty much sold fat burners exclusively and left in the dark about everything else available! THAT needs to change! Hope everyone had a super week. i was jet lagged and dragging ass,but managed a few workouts this week. Drop by my profile and say hi.

Fern

Post by: MsFitness

Let’s see…  I met dave G for breakfast.  Spinach omelets are the ****! The expo was really crowded on Saturday.  Then my friend Rob Carbo showed up and made my day!  We had been friends since March and he helped me with my contest deplete and my crazy carb depleted chick emotions.  He is bigger than life!  I introduced myself to Charles Glass.  You can see him on here in "getting cut with Glass". I really wanted to meet him because it’s his videos I get most of my training tips from.  I could never afford a personal trainer on my own, so I walked up to him and told him so!! I also got approached by NBC for their American Gladiator series.  Yeah right, I was thinking!  I asked competitor or Gladiator and they said either.  I’m too old to get hit full force by another human being.  I like my kidneys, thanks!! I’m trying to think what else happened.  I did go off to look around a little, took a peek at the guys in the UFC booth.  Forrest Griffin was there, but you had to pay for autographs.that’s just bull**** if you ask me.  people with money shouldn’t be able to get everything, you know? What if you are some little kids idol and he finds out you don’t evn give a crap he is your fan. Lou Ferigno was there and you had to buy a picture just to take a picture with him.  Whatever happened to a little PR?

The expo was great otherwise.  i took some video of this little kid who is about 8 kicking ass using weapons in his  little karate uniform.  Ok, don’t know all the lingo for that sport but the kid was amazing!! I then ran into crazyhorse and jumped over to the Gaspari boot to meet Dan and see what was up with them.  He and I did an interview.  I looked bad, he looked good, I was nervous and my accent was so bad, he dropped the "f" bomb..hahhaaaaaaaa.  too funny.  He introduced me to the VP of marketing Joe V and we just chatted a little about their stack they were trying to get women to take.  It’s the same as the male version for the most part,but women are scared of the "sizeon" due to the word size alone.  As for pre workout drinks, like Superpump250,most women skip them altogether.  they know I used them, know I don’t talk crap and misleadpeople on products I don’t believe in…so they asked me to be part of the team.  There will a new section of their forum for women Not sure if I can say the new name yet, but anyway, it’s about what women can  take in supplements and a general Q&A.  Possibly some other stuff in the future as well. Onto the next night of the Mr Olympia show…….

1st off, tickets were a problem.  I did score one from the Ironman team, but it wasn’t on the floor and they thought they could get me xdown there, but it was a hassle, so I sat with Dave in the back. This was the big night!  The posedowns!!

My man Victor was tight!  I thought he had it all the way. Jay looked better on the 2nd night, but I am just not impressed with his physique.  Going for sheer size.maybe, but aesthetics?  NEVER. Ronny Rockel looked amazing as well.  Ronnie Coleman, massive in size was nearly matched size with Dennis Wolf and these 2 were often put against each other in pre judging.  Dennis Wolf had alot of new fans there!  I think he was a huge crowd favorite.  then there was a teary eyed Coleman, giving his speech as it was his last show ever! Everytime he launched into a most muscualr pose, the audience went nuts.  he got a standing ovation.  As for the posedowns…..as a chick, (yes, I am still a girl) it was HOT. Jay would walk to one end of the stage and the others would follow, all trying to out do each other. Then Victor would turn in front of him and pull a lat spread that was out of this world. I was once again like a kid at Christmas…amazed..I am truly a geek.  Thats kind of a good thing because many people at my age have done many thing.  I have experienced nothing like this, no traveling,no plane rides, just going to work and taking care of kids.  Almost everything I see still amazes me.  NEVER lose your childish wonder people.  I was very dissapointed the Victor didn’t win.  HANDS DOWN, he should have one.  yes, i know I will get someone here who is going to argue with me, but too bad.  The guy is fantastic. HUGE with a small waist, no bloat, ripped….and he has a good looking face to boot.  What else to write about?  Went to dinner after my major upset with a couple people from Ironman.  It was sweet because I got to have filet mignon!  Holy crap…real beef! Oh, and who can resist garlic mashed potatoes? Notme dammit!! ARE YOU STILL READING? It was a looooooong day……I probably left stuff out.  after that we went to the Rio hotels rooftop club called VOODOO.  There I met the Gaspari Girls and that dude with the crazy tat in the cytolean ads who used to weigh 300lbs, but is now ripped. I also met their spokesmodel Marzia Prince  who wom Miss Bikini universe .  She’s really very sweet and friggin funny!  No mistaking a bikini model, that’s for sure! Tanji Johnson was there too as well as Dan. I admit to having 2 drinks, but that’s it.  OH, standing in line for the ladies room, some drunk guy tried to feel me up…….his hand kept coming closer and I had to smack him.  I then told him if he touched me, he’d lose his front teeth. Cocktail dress or no cocktail dress…….

Thats about it.  It flew by…the whole Saturday.  I got back to my hotel at 2:15 am and had to get up at 7am to get ready for my photoshoots and pack my bags .  checkout was at 11am..THAT SUCKED.

i’ll finish up the story tomorrow.  I did workout last night.  I did abs and lats and am so sore.  No workout tonight.  It’s UFC night…time to chill.  I also threw in some legs cus I am back on 2 legs day a week.  still not happy with the quads.  I want them more ripped and need size, so when I lose some of the fat, I do not end up with chicken legs…ya know? I did 15 of cardio.  I still feel tired….

Note: originally posted here.

Post by: MsFitness

Congratulations to MHP Athlete Joe Mazza for winning the lightweight division at the Kings of the Bench contest at the 2007 Olympia!

The complete MHP’s Kings of the Bench contest video is now posted up on Bodybuilding.com. Click the link below to view:

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/2007olympia_vids.htm

(Scroll down to just below the Graphic Muscle Interviews.)

CONGRATULATIONS AGAIN JOE!!!!

Post by: bbcom_developer

Hey everyone!  Here are some shots from the expo and show.  Hope you enjoy them.  T-

Expo-Did you stop by the Bodybuilding.com booth- I did!

The stage was set- The Finals!

Most of the top six

Must pay tribute-  Ronnie Coleman, 4th Place

The Top Three

Dexter “The Blade” Jackson, 3rd Place

Victor Martinez, 2nd Place

Jay Cutler, Mr. Olympia 2007

Post by: arieseyes

Despite an agreement that barred Bodybuilding.com from shooting any video (ourselves) at this year’s Olympia venue, Pro Bodybuilding Weekly and The Fit Show were, however, allowed to shoot some incidental video for us.

Thus, here are some videos that you may or may not have seen yet from the Olympia:

• Fit Show: Brenda Kelly, Kim Oddo & The Olympia Ladies
• 2006 Supplement Awards
• Pro Bodybuilding Weekly Olympia Predictions
• 2006 Olympia Highlight Video
• Bus Ride Video (LOL)

Enjoy!

I took a lot of pictures over the weekend at the Olympia Expo, so I thought I would post a few of them up here for ya’ll to see… Enjoy!

View from the entrance.

Phil Heath and Jay Cutler (Future and Present)

Me and Bob

Stone Dragon Models

Champion Nutrition Models

Being my 3rd straight year going to the Olympia and the Expo, I had a new gameplan comapred to the previous years. This would be the first year that I planned to go both days.

I arrived to the LVCC on Friday around 10:30 or so with some friends of mine, and were amazed at the size of the expo. It seems like it keeps getting bigger and bigger each year. Because the expo was downstairs this year, it allowed more room for the vendors to try and one up each other with booth size and attractions. We quickly decided to start on one side and go up and down each row… although we kept getting sidetracked with free giveaways and sexy fitness models. We spent most of the day just walking around getting the free stuff while I took mental notes on the booths I wanted to visit again later that day when my friends left, and also the following day when I took most of my pictures.

Instead of writting about every booth I visited, I will just give an overview of my favorites and least favorites at the expo:

Favorite booths                 

Scivation/Primaforce                 
This was one of the first booths I visited while at the Expo (both days) for many good reasons. First, it was towards the front side where we started each day. Second, I wanted to meet all the faces of these comapnies like Chuck, Derek, and Layne, which I did meet and talk with. They were all super nice and were glad to meet their customers. I even enquired about Chuck’s diet services which he is well known for, and this is something I might take advantage of. Finally, one of the real reasons I stopped by was because of the great deals they had on their products. I purchased some Xtend and some Substance WPI for a great price! They even threw in a free shirt, a free book, and a free gym bag. How cool is that!?!

BSN             
Even though I dislike how big their company is and how overpriced some of their products are, I must admit that they did a great job with their booth at the expo this year. Almost everyone at the expo had one of their shiney bags in hand with a ton of free goodies in the bag! I believe when I finally went through my bag, I had free samples of every product they make from Syntha-6 to No-Xplode to True Mass to Cellmass. They even had free stickers, magnets, and pens! Also, to my surprise, I was actually able to talk with one of their representatives about some of their products. Being how busy they were, this impressed me a lot. I even got a 4 serving sample of one of their newest products, Endorush, which is supposidly stronger than NO-Xplode! I can’t wait to try it out for my next wrokout.

Bodybuilding.com           
One of my favorites from the past turned out to be a present favorite as well. With models like Christina Lindley and Fawnia Dietrich working the booth along with IFBB pro Bob Cicherillo, this booth was a must see for any fan at the expo! I stopped by both days in order to get a chance to meet everyone and it was worth it. I talked to Christina for a bit, and then got to pose with Bob (and his championship belt!) for a picture. They also had some laptops set up so that you could sign up for their website to get a free shirt. This year they were promoting their latest craze, BodySpace. I believe with their current marketing and word of mouth, it is only a matter of time until this thing gets huge. Some other companies were promoting simliar sites to BodySpace, but with bb.com’s size and power, they clearly stand on top of all the others. Great job this year bb.com!

Vyotech         
Not only was Vyotech’s main booth stacked with Pro’s like Melvin Anthony and Bill Wilmore and some hot models, but they had 2-3 more smaller booths in the expo hall! This may sound like overkill, but it wasn’t. Their main booth had great giveways as they were promoting their new goat whey… yes, GOAT whey. I’m sure you will be hearing much more about this new whey in the coming weeks. Also, they had a brand new motorcycle on display that they would be giving away on Saturday afternoon. I didn’t win it, but I made sure to enter as many time as I could throughout the day. As with the previosu booths I mentioned, the Vyotech booth stayed on course with all the cool features, including the most important, friendly and helpful representatives. This is what sets a good booth apart from the great booths. Even the “only there to look good for the crowd” models knew their products. Way to go Vyotech… you guys keep impressing me with good stuff.

MuscleTech                 
This is going to sound a lot like the BSN review above, but it applies to MuscleTech as well. I don’t really care for thier overhyped and over advertised products, but they had one my favorite booths in the expo. Even though their giveaways and customer reps were lacking, they made up for it with the quantity of athletes at the booth. I got a chance to meet Jay Cutler, Chris Cormier, Gustavo Badell, and King Kamali. Also, Phil Heath stopped by and was chatting with Jay, so I was able to snap some pics with the 2 of them together (the current Mr. O with a future Mr. O). The lineup of atheletes is what set this booth apart from the others. With Muscletech’s bankroll, I am glad they could bring all their athletes out to meet the fans during the 2-day expo.

Least favorite booths                 

ThermoLife       
I know that some people who attended the expo will disagree with me on this choice, but hear me out. Yes, I did like to look at the almost naked models standing in front of their booth, but it did cause a lot of problems. For one, I was afraid to approach their booth because the models were being swarmed by people taking pictures and it seemed like the booth reps were more consered with watching the girls too rather than helping people. Secondly, the girls were standing out in the aisle, which caused a huge traffic jam to the already packed aisles. My suggestion would have been to put the girls behind the table (inside of the booth) to help with traffic. They had the right idea with the girls to help promote their booth, but it was poorly executed, and caused more damage than good for the company, IMO.

LVCC Food Court     
I was actually looking forward to getting in a meal at the expo this year, because last year was so good. In the food area last year the LVCC served up griled chicken breast plate with a sweet potato and vegetables. This year was different, and disappointing. The choices were a hot dog, a hamburger, and a chicken sandwhich, all served with french fries. They also were serving beer throughout the expo. This is a health and fitness industry event, who wants to buy that grabage? After spending all day promoting health and seeing all these fit people, who wants to eat fried food? Not me! I was very upset, and had to resort to eating free protein bar smaples for lunch. Hopefully next year will be better.

Expo Review, 2 days in the making…

We caught the shuttle from the hotel over to the convention center. We had gotten some VIP wristbands with our ticket package so we got to avoid the ticket lines and made a beeline for the entrance. Wanting to see the whole expo we decided to start to the right and work our way around. We first noticed the Thermolife booth and their topless girls (their breasts were spray painted with tigers, oh my!). This startled the mom next to us, who was quick to cover her child’s eyes.

Next we were off to see the BSN booth, never to be out done they had some of the hottest booth girls around, on Friday they were in these silver little space-like outfits, I even got Richard’s friend Will to take a pic with them. The girl who we talk to explained what exactly Endorush does and loaded us up with some full size samples; this is heaven for a caffeine addict like me. You couldn’t walk through the expo without seeing the sparkly silver/red bags.

The Promax booth had some wonderful samples and well informed booth girls, nothing turns a consumer off more than asking a question about a product you’re putting into your well tuned body than the person looking at you and saying, “ask the person over there. I bought a box of their cookies and cream bars for my post workout meal. They also were giving out samples of their product Oat-Rageous bars.

http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/promax/promax.html

http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/promax/oat.html

There are 2 kinds of people that attend expos, people who LOVE all the free samples and leave with 2-3 bags full of goodies. Then there are people like me who already push the weight limit on my bags when I fly so I only go for the samples of things I already use or if it interest me as a future product.

One such future product I found not for me but for my fianc©, was New Whey Liquid Protein, it comes in 25 grams and 42 grams servings and with a range of flavors. They are in what looks like shooter tubes and actually taste pretty good. I threw a couple in my purse for the judging that night and when you need to eat every two hours like he does they made going out even easier.

http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/ids/new.html

Who could miss the Women’s prejudging going on in the back of the expo.  They looked awesome and it was great too see how the general public reacted.

Next I had to look for the booth my trainer, Ali McKnight, was working, Ultimate Nutrition. I had to let her know I had just seen her face on the outside of the transfer bus we came over on.  The booth looked great! All of the reps behind the counter were well informed on their products and even showed me a few I have never tried.

I tried to get into the EAS booth “arena as it had been one of my favorite booths at Europa, but that wasn’t happening. Needless to say with the dancing girls on the platform in the back throwing t-shirts it was a fan favorite.

Twinlab came to the rescue with giving me a few new shakers after the evil TSA lady took mine while flying out here. I got the chance to sample their new citrus flavored energy drink, I really liked it. Kind of reminded me of like a Sunkist soda flavor.

The Bodybuilding.com booth was awesome, I got the chance to meet up with Richard and Ian again and take some cool pics. I also got an awesome license plate cover that said ” Kiss my abs this thing is totally going on my new car.  They were also giving out 10% off coupons for their store, anyone who orders knows with their already low prices this is a deal! I got the chance to meet and take some pictures with Bob Cicherillo!

Another product I discovered was Syntrex Nectar “to-go size, basically single serving size. My favorite protein ever is the Fuzzy Navel flavor so the idea of being able to mix it in a simple water bottle really excited me! Needless to say this was a booth I hit both days!

http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/syn/grab.html

Last but not least on new products, Java Fit. They make a gourmet coffee that also has an additional fat burner and appetite suppressant. After trying a sample I had to have it and bought 3 bags! As a coffee lover, my eyes lit up like Christmas morning at the thought of a super coffee.

http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/jlu/diet.html

Many people are lactose intolerant so I was really excited about getting the chance to try Vyo-techs new “Oryx Goat Whey, It brags to be 300% greater absorption, 100% lactose free & sugar free, but the important thing was does it taste good, the true test was Bryan who hates all chocolate flavored protein and he actually thought it tasted good, me on the other hand, I have no access to chocolate so I thought it tasted awesome.

I was a little disappointed that they weren’t selling any, the rep told me it should be out in about 3 weeks, I will all over that. To top it off I asked her if she had any of the “GO GOAT shirts I had read about and she had two left and gave them to us. As a matter of fact I am wearing it right now as I type this up!

While I know I missed a lot of booths, give a gal a break, there were what seemed like over a hundred and all were well ran and packed!
  
Something that ran through my head on the shuttle ride back today was how much fun the expo was. All the athletes and booth personal were super nice. Even better was I always ask a salesman who carries their product or the easiest way to get it. 9/10 times I heard, oh you can go on www.bodybuilding.com and get it for a really good price!

I posed the following question to several familiar faces at the Expo today, and their answers are quite funny…

“What’s the weirdest thing you’ve seen here so far?”

Fitness Model, Christina Lindley: “Mike Summers lifting me up onto his shoulders.”

NPC Figure Competitor, Halcyon Duarte: “The girls in the booth over there that are almost naked.”

VPX Girl, Crystal Matthews: “The ARLI girls dancing and their tops fell off.  I saw full breasts and nipples.”

IFBB Pro, Phil Heath:  “No comment.  LOL.”

IFBB Figure Pro, Carla Sanchez:  “The woman I saw wearing short, short, shorts that really should’ve been wearing pants.”

NPC Fitness Competitor and Model, Gina Ostarly:  “A real Las Vegas pimp - outside last night, not here at the Olympia.  I took a picture with him!”

IFBB Figure Pro, Tara Scotti:  “I’m a New Yorker, so nothing shocks me.”

Fitness Model, Gina Lara:  “A man in a skirt.”

NPC Figure Competitor, Ginger Redeker:  “A huge lady in ‘daisy dukes,’ yuck.”

IFBB Pro, Quincy Taylor:  “The topless girls are too much.  I mean, as a man, I like seeing that, but as a father, I don’t want to see it.  There are people here with young kids, and maybe some short shorts and some cheek is okay, but they really should’ve put shirts on.  I have daughters, and I don’t want them to have to see that.”