It's the 12th round of a brutal bout. Women's bodybuilding hangs relentlessly on the ropes. Blow after blow, we keep holding on.We get knocked down. We keep getting up. We keep on fighting. Fighting for respect. Fighting for fairness. Fighting to keep our sport alive.
Bam! Ms. Olympia, the premier female bodybuilding show, gets axed by American Media Inc. The sanction rights are on the auction block for a mere $4,000, according to sources. It was bad enough the largest purse for a female bodybuilder who wins a major pro show is about $20K. That amount is about one-fourth of what the highest paid male bodybuilder can expect to earn for winning a major show, and $30K less than what we used to earn.Show promoters say the fan interest for female bodybuilding doesn't meet the demand anymore. That's not a personal attack against us. That's just business.
Bam! Fitness publications refuse to feature us in their magazines, let alone on the covers. We have been relegated to Internet web sites for exposure like some esoteric, underworld genre. Perhaps that's the only place for promoting androgyny.The 2004 debut of Ms. Olympia on pay-per-view could be the last. The media gives us minimal show coverage, if any, beyond a few photographs and statistics. Our personal and professional feats often go unnoticed because they hesitate to include us in hardly any fitness publications. The people who sign the checks say we are just not marketable. To put it bluntly, female muscle simply doesn't sell magazines.Ouch!
Bam again! Supplement companies won't give us sponsorship contracts that are readily available to our male counterparts, some of whom get offers before they even reach pro status. It doesn't seem to matter if you're a very attractive female bodybuilder (yes, there are many of us) or a gender bender. Women with big muscles are shunned. Too many people, including male bodybuilders, consider us grotesque. We realize we may not ever appeal to the masses. Yet it is imperative that we do whatever is necessary to get the full support of the people within the fitness community and to increase our dwindling fan base. This should be a collective effort. But it will never be until we focus on the primary agenda and not our personal agenda.
Ironically, women's bodybuilding was never meant to be a moneymaker. It started out as a novelty sport instituted to give the men something else to look at besides other men. In 1985, the Felt Forum in New York sold out. We couldn't sell out a high school gymnasium these days. The idea of men wanting something to spice up their show hasn't changed much over the past two decades. Except now female bodybuilders aren't exciting to look at anymore. Thus we have Figure. Yeah. Go figure.
The defeat of eight-time Ms. Olympia champion Lenda Murray at the 2004 Olympiad marked the end of our lifeline to the glory days of the past when women were required to bring a complete package to the stage. The current crop of winners seems to be confused about what complete package means on a woman. Beauty. Brains. Brawn. Lenda had it. Cory Everson, Juliette Bergmann, Rachel McLish, Kiko Elomaa, Carla Dunlap, Valentina Chepiga, and three-time Ms. International winner Laura Creavelle had it too. These women are pioneers of femininity redefined. These are women young girls can look up to and aspire to be like. The public embraces them. Why not bring back the look of the 1980's? It's more fashionable. We all know fashion reverts every 20 years. It's time.
Opponents argue that bodybuilding is not a beauty contest. How naïve. Bodybuilding is just as much about beauty as Fitness and Figure and every other sport being judged and viewed by men. Men want to see pretty muscle, pretty shape and an attractive face to match. Hell, me too.
You still arguing that's not true? Then argue about this. Show me a female bodybuilder who makes anything close to half a million dollars a year to look as freaky and as manly as Ronnie Coleman. You can't. Many female pros are barely making ends meet. They can't live off prize money so they keep their day jobs while others do whatever they can to turn a buck. Some spend thousands of dollars on androgenic drugs trying to achieve a look that is taking them nowhere. Then they turn around and spend thousands more on cosmetic surgery trying to correct the damage of the drug abuse. That's insane.
While bodybuilding is an extreme sport, women don't have to be. We choose to be against our better judgement.
Female bodybuilders who believe in winning at all costs aren't real winners in the end.
Selfishly they rejoice in their victories while the rest of us suffer. The sport suffers. We've been trying to pick ourselves off the canvas since 1992 when the prize money dropped and never recovered. The fan base dwindled along with ticket sales. The overwhelming majority of amateurs and many of the pros who strive to become Ms. Olympia some day won't make it because we don't agree with the current criteria being judged.
Recently, the IFBB and NPC sent out a memo saying the women, (fitness and figure included) must drop their muscularity by 20 percent. Word has it that more changes in women's bodybuilding are on the horizon. Those changes should include:
- Mandatory drug testing. Enough of this chatter about how hard the women train. That's the foundation of bodybuilding. However, the level of muscularity, vascularity and hardness we see today is not. That's chemical enhancement. And it's the worst thing to ever happen to our side of the sport. What the men do has nothing to do with us. (Hello, Anita Ramsey). The testing should be comprehensive beyond a simple check for diuretic use.
- Make the women pay for their own drug tests. If they pass, then they should get a refund. Athletes who doubt they will pass will be reluctant to waste time and money doing that particular show.
- A judging panel which only judges women's bodybuilding. This group should include experts in health, wellness, dance and cosmetology. This will ensure uniformity in the sport.
- More female judges, particularly former athletes, not just bodybuilders.
- Add some celebrity judges. 'Tis more exciting to see celebrities get paid to judge than to host our shows. This will help us attract a wider variety of fans and bring entertainment value to the sport.
- More emphasis on posing routines and overall stage presence. This will help promoters sell tickets.
If we don't do something fast that knockout blow is coming. Lights out. Game over.
