Olympia Results
I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s posted about this, but may as well put in my two cents…
First off, it was a great show. Court and I watched the webcast last night and after having watched the pre-judging earlier yesterday, so seeing the improvements in competitors’ physiques and conditioning was great. As for the placement, obviously the word is out that Jay is still the champ. I’ll be honest, that bothers me a little and I don’t agree with it this time. I agree with the top 10 and definitely the top 6. The difference between those really came down to conditioning. Everyone looked great, but there were some little things that maybe are my personal preference in aesthetics.
Myself, this is how I would’ve ranked last night:
1st: Victor Martinez
2nd: Jay Cutler
3rd: Dennis Wolf (Myself and audience were not pleased about his 5th place!)
4th: Dexter Jackson
5th: Ronnie Coleman
6th: Melvin Anthony
Melvin’s conditioning was great, but something about him on stage just didn’t make him seem big enough against the remaining 5. Ronnie came in huge as always, but he’s got a big waist and his back just wasn’t where it needed to be last night due to the size difference in his lats. I put Dexter before Ronnie since he didn’t "bulge" anywhere. He looked awesome and I felt any weak points Ronnie had from behind, Dexter was where he needed to be. I put Dennis 3rd because I believe he really dominated the upper body in the group and his quads were great and cut. I very much like the V taper of Dennis’ physique and any bodybuilder who can pull it off (Side note, I’m very curious to see how Trey Brewer is going to look when he starts competing again next year). I felt Dennis’ symmetry was also a huge strong point that beat out Ronnie and Dennis just appears to have more, but not too much, size than Dexter, in my opinion. The one area Dennis needs to keep working on are his calves. They’ve come along a lot this past year, but still one area he needs a little more size and definition. Dennis will definitely going to give Jay a run next year if he keeps up like he is…
Jay, I felt didn’t deserve 1st place. Yes, he’s wide in the back, he’s thick, but I felt he wasn’t quite as conditioned as he needed to be. He looked a bit soft Friday night, but tightened things up a bit for Saturday. I didn’t feel it was good enough and that Victor was dead on both nights. Again, I’m a fan of the V taper and I felt Victor’s upper body was a bit larger than Jay’s and gave him this. In particular, Jay’s biceps get dwarfed by the rest of his arms in his front double bicep pose, where I think Victor beat him out and still had.
Jay really doesn’t seem to like the front double bicep post much. Maybe one at a time, but I think he knows it’s not his strongest. His biceps just don’t pop out like they need to. Front lat spreads, again I thought Victor was a little bit more ahead. I also thought Victor had better definition and separation in his quads than Jay.
Overall, like I said, I didn’t think Jay’s conditioning was where it needed to be and that he was not hit hard enough for these shortcomings when the other competitors hit them dead on. But hey, I’m not an IFBB judge. Guess we’ll just have to see what happens next year.
