So, although it feels like I went to Las Vegas YEARS ago, I’ll give you the
low-down on what happened at the Olympia Expo!
So, after my Thursday from heaven (two incredible photo shoots, meeting my coach and some of my fitness idols!), I woke up on Friday not thinking it could get any better! I first wanted to get my workout out of the way, and by the time I got to the hotel gym, it was PACKED! As in people staggered between machines and all over the floor to lift weights! But, as the expo began at 10, by 9:30, the gym had thinned out to a reasonable volume. I was even able to claim a bench! Then, it was time to jump on the shuttle bus to the Convention Center!
As soon as the bus pulled up, I understood why people left the gym so they could be there at 10:00 sharp. The lineup to get in was INSANE! It ran all the way back to the parking lot and then looped around to the entrance again! It did move relatively quickly, but standing in the hot sun was still not pleasant!
By the time I made it inside (in typical fashion, the AC was FREEZING!),
sporting my new Ava Cowan tank (my new favourite top!) the expo was in full
swing! Booths as far as the eye could see, with fitness models and athletes at
every booth and walking around. What a strange and wonderful industry that you
can find all of your fitness idols gathered in one place (imagine if Hollywood had a
meet-and-greet with all of the stars you’ve ever wanted to meet!).
So, after my Thursday from heaven (two incredible photo shoots, meeting my coach and some of my fitness idols!), I woke up on Friday not thinking it could get any better! I first wanted to get my workout out of the way, and by the time I got to the hotel gym, it was PACKED! As in people staggered between machines and all over the floor to lift weights! But, as the expo began at 10, by 9:30, the gym had thinned out to a reasonable volume. I was even able to claim a bench! Then, it was time to jump on the shuttle bus to the Convention Center!
As soon as the bus pulled up, I understood why people left the gym so they could be there at 10:00 sharp. The lineup to get in was INSANE! It ran all the way back to the parking lot and then looped around to the entrance again! It did move relatively quickly, but standing in the hot sun was still not pleasant!
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| OLYMPIA! |
I had no idea where to start, so I just started wandering
aimlessly through the aisles (I wish they had given out maps to help orient
me!), my heart racing every time I saw someone I recognized from Facebook or
out of a magazine. There were protein bar and shake samples everywhere (if I
hadn’t been in the midst of my competition diet, I would have loaded up on
those for lunch!) and more fit people than I’ve ever seen together in one
place!
I was able to catch the last part of figure prejudging.
Cameras can never capture the way the suits glittered in the lights! It was
incredible seeing all of those perfect physiques (yes, one woman has to win,
but to me, they all looked flawless!) on stage together. I was surprised at the
variations in posing, even though figure has relatively standard (in comparison
with bikini) poses, and learned a lot about what I don’t want my posing to look like (even in bikini, I don’t want any
of my poses to make me look cheap!). Unfortunately, I got in too late to see
the bikini prejudging, but I had tickets to the finals later that night!
After I’d wandered past all the booths, I decided it was
time to start introducing myself to some of my fitness idols and grabbing some
pictures! The first person I met was Christina Halkiopoulos with Muscle Warfare.
She’s an Australian fitness model (originally from Greece), and she was so nice and of
course, just as beautiful as she is in her pictures!
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| Christina Halkiopoulos |
Next, I decided to meet THE Pauline Nordin of Fighter Diet!
I love her no-nonsense, unapologetic approach to fitness and diet. She tells it
like it is, even if the truth hurts (she’s never going to tell you to eat “in
moderation” or sit on the adductor machine at the gym!), and I love
her dedication and commitment to eating right year-round! After some
difficulties with my iPhone camera, we finally snapped a pic!
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| Pauline Nordin! |
After Pauline, I decided to head to the Labrada booth and
meet Kelsey Byers. Kelsey’s cover of Oxygen’s Off the Couch issue had just been
released, and it has an article in it describing her personal body
transformation and how she finds balance in her fit, healthy lifestyle. Her
motto is “Eat clean and follow your dreams,” and her success as a fitness model
is well-deserved! She was so friendly and posted her picture of us on her
Facebook page later that night (she even remembered my name and that I was
competing!). Her advice for competing was to remember that any shaking while
I’m up on stage can’t be seen by the judges or the audience, so I shouldn’t
worry about it. That was VERY useful advice for when the big day actually came!
Another thing she advised was for me to create an athlete page on Facebook, so
anyone who wants to follow along with my fitness-related posts can (and I won’t
annoy the rest of my Facebook friends with motivational quotes and fitness
articles!). So, without further ado…my Facebook athlete page! “Like” it, and
I’ll start posting soon! I should start getting some edited pictures back soon,
so this is where I’ll post them!
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| Kelsey Byers! |
Next up was fitness model Amanda Adams at the Oh Yeah! booth.
I’ve been a fan of hers on Facebook for about a year, and more recently, she
started following me on Instagram (follow me @mimibikini!), where she left a
really nice compliment on a photo of mine the week before! She recognized me
right away (I know! These fitness girls have incredible memories!), and was
also so friendly and energetic! My lovely friend Sophia had given me two
letters to give to her and Jamie Eason, so after giving her Sophia’s
handwritten letter, I got to film her thanking Sophia and wishing her luck at
the competition. So nice! I know I’ll meet Amanda at other fitness events in
the next few years…maybe the Arnold
in the spring?
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| Amanda Adams |
I decided to bite the bullet next and stand in line for the
bodybuilding.com booth. Whereas at most booths, the line was at most 10 people
long, the line for bodybuilding.com wrapped around the extra-long booth and
extended far down the aisle, past many other booths! I ended up waiting in line
for 45 minutes, and when I got the front, I finally got to meet all of the
bodybuilding.com athletes! Kathleen Tesori, Ashley Horner, Laura Bailey (her
shoulder workout on bodybuilding.com is incredible!! A must-try!), Alicia Marie, Courtney Prather…everyone was there! (Some male models were there too,
of course, but I was only interested in meeting my female fitness idols!)
Sophia had given me another letter to give to Jamie Eason, but she had already
left for the day (nooooooo!!!), so I vowed to come back the next day and get it
to her!
I spent the rest of the day meeting other fitness icons like Dana Linn Bailey! She has an incredible physique and manages to stay super-ripped even in the offseason!
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| Dana Linn Bailey (curse you, shaky camera man!) |
I also got a picture snapped with Nicole Wilkins (the
then-reigning Figure Olympia champion) at the Met-Rx booth.
Surprisingly, the number-one place to meet fitness
models was in the bathroom! I met Justine Moore and Vanessa Tib in the
bathroom, but felt a little silly asking for photos in front of the sinks (but
I did introduce myself and say hi!). By the time I got back to the hotel, I was
exhausted from an overwhelming day, and I still had a show to watch in the
evening!
After a quick chat with my hubby, I made my way to the Orleans Arena for the
Bikini, Fitness, and Ms. Olympia finals!
Fitness has always been my favourite event to watch, because the competitors
always make it look like they’re able to suspend gravity on that stage! The
amount of control these athletes have over their bodies and the fact that
they’re able to perform such energetic routines while dieting down for the show
(they’re also judged on their physiques in a swimwear round) is mind-boggling
to me!
After the fitness round was over, it was time for bikini!
Watching all of those women walk on stage was super inspiring, and it was
amazing to see some of my favourite physiques live on stage! The best part was seeing the different styles the competitors had; not every walk was the same, and the poses varied quite a bit. I learned a lot about what I do and don’t want to do (basically, I’m not a fan of the super-fake exaggerated poses. The more natural poses appeal to me for many reasons, but mainly because the competitors are still able to look classy and respectable). I couldn’t believe
that in just one week, I would be on stage in my own competition!
The Ms. Olympia competition was really interesting, since
I’d never watched a female bodybuilding competition before (this is the class
with the reeeeeaally big, often masculine-looking competitors). They all had
routines (with music) that they performed, and some of their routines really
wowed me. It’s not often you see such a muscular person perform the splits or
do backflips!
By the time the prejudging for Mr. Olympia began, I was so
exhausted from the day that I left after watching a just a few competitors.
Although I have a lot of respect for the hard work these athletes do, this girl
needed her beauty sleep! After all, I had some more fitness people to meet the
next day!
The next day, bright and early, I did my scheduled HIIT
cardio workout in my hotel room. I love getting creative with cardio intervals!
I was off to the expo earlier than on Friday, but when I got to the expo, it
was more packed than it had been the day before! First stop was the
bodybuilding.com booth, as I had to fulfill my mission of giving Jamie her
letter from Sophia! I made my way to the end of the line (after first making
sure that Jamie was there this time!), and it was SO LONG! It took almost 3
hours to get to the front! But when I got there, one of the coolest things
happened! I had been chatting with the guy behind me in line (who had just
competed in his first bodybuilding competition), and when I saw Kathleen
Tesori, she smiled and waved at me (she recognized me from the day before). The
look on the guy’s face was priceless! “You know her?!” He asked, incredulous.
(This was the same look he gave me when I told him that Layne was my coach.
“THE Layne Norton?? Is he here??”) I felt a little bit more like I belonged ;)
Once I was at the front of the line, it took another bout of
waiting until I finally got to see Jamie. Sweet as she was, she took the time
to talk to everyone, and when hundreds of people are in line specifically to
meet her, that takes awhile! (Plus, Amanda Latona came to interview her at one
point. AMANDA LATONA! She’s so stunning in person and has such a knockout
physique!) By the time it was finally my turn, Jamie’s husband had packed up
all their things, and she was on her way out! I got there just in the nick of
time! I gave her the letter from Sophia, and she even let me record a thank-you
video for her! A quick snapshot (and a compliment from her that I looked
great!), and that was that! Jamie Eason is a HUGE name in the fitness industry (the BIGGEST fitness model out there, and she’s been in every fitness magazine out there. Her 12-week
LiveFit trainer was actually what got me interested in eating clean and having
a workout plan! (Check it out for FREE on bodybuilding.com! It's not just for women either; there are meal plans for men as well!) She’s also very
open about her life (her faith, her past regrets, etc), which is why so many
women (myself included!) can relate to and find inspiration from her!
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| JAMIE EASON! |
Walking around, I met Bry Jensen, who competed in her first
bikini competition in March and is currently training for her second in
November. Another Facebook friend! It always feels awkward approaching people
who have no idea who you are (it always makes me feel like a stalker for
recognizing them!), but she (like everyone else) was super friendly and
encouraging.
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| Bry Jensen |
I also met Bry’s former coach, Leigh Brandt, at the Pharma
Freak booth.
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| Leigh Brandt |
At the BSN booth, I introduced myself to Amanda Latona
(swoon! Before she competed, she was in the girl group Innosense and dated
Howie from the Backstreet Boys, so she’s a bit of a non-fitness celebrity too!)
and met Jennifer Nicole Lee (who’s made a HUGE career from her fitness journey.
Books, clothing, ebooks, seminars, magazine articles, modelling…it’s
incredible!).
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| AMANDA LATONA! |
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| Jennifer Nicole Lee |
Finally, I made my way over to the Scivation booth to meet
up with Layne. His wife, Isabel, and I started chatting, and it was just
refreshing to meet such honest, genuine people who give their true opinions on
things. I let Layne know about my post-competition goals (I would like to look
more muscular than most bikini girls. More like the Diva Fitness Model girls
from the WBFF, which is a bit in between bikini and figure), so we decided to
work toward that and see where I best fit in (should I be a small figure girl
or a muscular bikini girl?). It was the perfect end to a perfect weekend!
Once I left the expo, I had to pack…and with all the samples
I had accumulated over the past few days, I was thankful to have brought an
almost-empty backpack with me! (One of those big backpacker-type backpacks!)
Olympia
was definitely a weekend I won’t soon forget. Just the atmosphere and being
around so many people who care about their health (OK, and appearance as well)
makes me really want to be involved in fitness in some way or another (haven’t
quite figured that out yet!). Hopefully, I’ll be able to make it down to the
Arnold Sports Festival next year in March (in Ohio),
but I think I might have to make Olympia
an annual event! It definitely gave me the boost I needed before my
competitions!
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