kinkoshinkai’s BodyBlog

I lost my camera at the Olympia Expo AFTER taking a BUNCH of photo’s that are irreplaceable to me!!  It was in the afternoon, between the Muscletech booth and the 4EverFit booth on that aisle somewhere.  I’m devastated, not for the camera, but for the photos!  Any help through extended blogs would be GREAT!  The view screen doesn’t work, so identifying it by the photos themselves can only be done by downloading them.  Whoever found it is welcome to do so.  It’s a Sony, cheapy and a little older model.  Don’t have the number.  Silver/gray. PLEASE help me track it.  I contacted lost and found at the Convention Center, but it hadn’t shown up by the time I had to leave.  Help, help, please!!

It wasn’t totally true.  While I didn’t find a lot of my bodyspace friends, the lovely and always superb Ava Cowan (more beautiful in person even) was at the BB.com booth, along with Bob the Chickster and crew.  My photos came out blurry with her, though, so I’ll try again today for a postable shot.  The list of bodybuilding pros I actually got to talk to and meet is long.  Fluent Spanish got me a little extra time with Gustavo and Silvio, and a smattering of Japanese got me a bit of time with the recently returned from exile Hidetada Yamagishi.  Brandon and his fiancee (who is repping at the Flex booth and trimming down for Figure Nationals!!) were super friendly, having gotten acquainted already at the USA’s.  The list goes on.  I was in heaven, and I’m up and getting ready for Day 2!!

The Expo was a BLAST!!!  Meeting models (gorgeous, friendly ladies) Olympians (my heroes), company representatives (especially the athletes at their sponsor booths), seeing the Ms. Olympia pre-judging, (my 3 favorite gorgeous faves, as well as the rest of the phenomenal, muscular ladies - LOVE THEM), and bags FULL of goodies that wore out my traps and delts to carry!!  What more can be said?  I didn’t find any of my bodyspace friends today, though.  Maybe tomorrow!

For the few years I’ve been training, I’ve basically been alone.  It’s allowed me to learn to push myself, the freedom to plan and execute my workouts as only I see fit.  While I’ve made friends at the gym with whom training tips and tidbits are shared, I’ve still trained alone essentially.

This week, I’ve had a training partner for the first time.  We set a time to meet at the gym.  We alternate sets.  Spot, support and encourage eachother.  It’s really been a delightful new experience for me.  He’ll only be in town for six weeks while our performance contract is running, but for that time, I’m looking forward to seeing what new growth and training insights I gain.  Thus far, being the "new guy", he’s been content to pretty much follow MY routines, altering them for himself where needed, but we match up extremely well in most regards.  

I’ve read and seen the pros and cons of training partners, from partners who chat too much or are incosistent or late, to those who really are well matched and supportive of one another.  Thus far, I am extremely fortunate to be paired with the latter, and this week’s training has me REALLY feeling it.  I’ve done my training exactly as planned, and as I would have trained alone, and yet the partner variable feels like it has pushed me a little more, which given how hard I push myself anyway, is pretty cool!!  I think I’m really going to like the next 6 weeks and expect some good growth.