2005 Ms. Olympia competitors: Where is everybody?

I'm not sure there are "more" muscular women nowadays, but I do agree that the Internet and pay sites are keeping interest up in muscle-women (now that the "mainstream" muscle-mags are ignoring them); if not for pay sites and such I think we'd definitely see a sharp decline in the numbers of FBBs as they become discouraged at the lack of opportunities to benefit from the hard work they do (pro contests, modeling/endorsement work, etc.), and the social ostracization they face from the general public.

Not entirely certain that I agree, I think there are far many more muscular women non-competitively speaking today – you just don't notice them since they have a tendicy to cover up this fact in their choices in clothing – socially in public or even the work place.

Competitively, however, I think there's been a sharp drop off in the numbers of "elite" level physiques – and what we're seeing now is only the natural consequence of several socio-economic factors that have been coming along for several years now.  From the non-acceptance by the general public for such hyper-built female physiques to the lack of financial payback for putting one's self though tortuous hell in order to achieve an appearance that is ephemeral at best.

Lastly, this came up a number of years back, but I can still recall someone (I think he was closely tied into the Jan Tana contests) in AAWA stating, words to the effect, that if the fitness women got only slightly larger (at the time they were approaching the level of FBBrs of the mid 80's) that FBBing as we knew it was over – mainly due to a combination of femuscular attractiveness and the acceptability by the public even as FBBing was inversely going in the other direction.  Something that the average-athletically inclined woman would be drawn to as a form of lifestyle development or taking it further, as a competitor.

In otherwords a level of muscularity that has a personal comfort zone.