Soooooo, the last few months I have been writing about all things “first show” and my experiences leading up to my first physique show (if any of you bums have been paying attention) and so far I have covered diet and training leading into a show.
This month I am actually going to talk about the otherworldly-weirdness of the show itself, those strange rituals and snippets of advice I got, and the week leading into the show, as well as discussing the show itself. I don’t know if anyone cares, but I am going to be talking about getting buck naked and basically getting everything including my b-hole spray tanned with the coldest stream of the weirdest color brown I have ever seen.
But…..(butt)…..I digress. So without further ado…….
THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH!!!! (and trust me the circus reference is intentional)
So let’s start a ways out, shall we?
About the time I realized I was in over my head was when I was counseled to buy Preparation H…..to smear on my loose and increasingly baggy butt-skin (as I dropped like 30lbs for the show).
Apparently, this miraculous substance not only shrinks up those distressing and unsightly hemorrhoids, it also shrinks up the distressing and unsightly skin on one’s saggy rear.
Who knew??!? (even better, who ever really WANTED to know??!?!?)
And let me tell you that stuff smells awful and is slimy as fuck.
Ugh.
The next affront to my dignity?
Realizing that not only was I going to have to wear a ridiculous spangly glitter-bikini…..but that I was literally going to have to be GLUED INTO IT so that nothing untowards would pop out mid-flex, on stage, in front of like a hundred people.
Applying it is about as bad as “popping out” on stage, because the lady spraying it on backstage IN FRONT OF EVERYONE literally pulls out your postage-stamp size fupa cover far enough that everyone can see your junk ANYWAY, sprays your whole lady-business, and lets go making it like a rhinestoned rubber band from hell. Once that bastard slaps back into place it isn’t coming back off without an act of Congress, or, at least, not without half your DNA coming with it.
Annnnnnd now we come to the horror of all horrors….the spray tan.
Since I am covered with tattoos, I had to get the max-allowable THREE FREAKING COATS (or, “applications” as the kind spray-lady corrected me), which are about 8 hours apart.
So you get funneled into this room with like 8 three-sided teepee-tents, with a fan in the back of each one sucking noxious fumes out (and into the next tent, yay lung cancer), with like 7 other chicks.
You all have to get BUCK FUCKING NUDE, and then you get sprayed with literally the same device dudes use to spray paint on cars. The best part is when you turn your back to them, and they sing-song in fake cheer “now bend forward!!” and you then get a jet of freezing cold brown death right up your hoo-ha.
Once this whole 360 degree process of ridiculousness is done, then you get herded OUT of your tent, and line up with 6 other naked women….and now you get to all air-dry for 30 minutes, nude, just awkwardly looking around but trying not to make eye contact, cause if you do, what then?!?!?
I did it accidentally, and half-smiled at some tiny Asian girl, and she looked like she was going to stroke out. So I turned around, and the gal on my OTHER side was bending over to get something off the floor, so I got a look at the female anatomy I have not seen since the great Pornhub marathon of ’15. NOT what I signed up for, but oh well.
Basically, if you have a shred of dignity left AFTER a physique/aesthetic show…..you’re damn lucky.
As for the show itself, it’s a trip.
There is a morning show and an evening show. So in the morning you do mandatory poses, and the judges basically decide who “wins” at that session……and then you come back in the evening to do a posing routine of about a minute set to music, for the crowd, where you dance-flex around and try not to look like a total idiot. (I, of course, looked like a total idiot.)
The part that is the “trip” is that I spent a year and a half….training, dieting, bulking, doing cardio, spending a fortune……totally obsessed with the show and everything that went with it…..and at the end I was doing an hour and half of cardio a day, plus training about the same, and all this time, and effort…….and you spend literally 2 minutes on stage.
TWO. MINUTES.
Would I do it again?
Heck yes.
It’s just part of the deal, and I knew it going in, logically, but when I was there on the stage I can’t say I wasn’t screaming in my head “WHAT THE FUCK AM I DOING HERE?!?!”.
In the end it was all worth it.
It is one of those things that almost becomes a testament of your will, a test of your ability to see things through, and your sheer stubbornness in the face of glaring stupidity and asininity (is that even a word?!?!?) .
No matter how silly the process, I can look back and say that I did it…..and it is no easy feat to commit to, and actually make it to, a physique show. I also learned a lot….about diet, myself, about training, and about what it really takes to compete in aesthetic sports.
And……most of all I learned my b-hole looks best in a dark walnut, almost rich cherry wood, shade. You just can’t get that kind of knowledge anywhere else, folks.
