[xandertreffers]

Indeed: all the blah-blah about the sport "going too far" "too extreme", "steroid abuse" etc. is coming from a very narrow mind…The women aren't that bigger than years ago at all…

They are better…They are more ripped…

If you don't like it, too bad, but this is a sport not something to get your seuxal fix at…

I am not attracted to women in contest shape that much…But for the sport I love to look at the competitions…

The sport isn't going down at all..

It's now divided in figure, BB, fitness, and similar stuff like "physique" "body", etc…

The BB class is for the very few that have the talent & dedication to go for this class…It's an extreme sport and it will always be…

WIth the internet, the influence of magazines has decreased to a low…That's good…They can't hurt FBB that much; only the competitive side…

I used to know all names of FBBs that were in magazines…

Now with the internet there are soooooo many FBBs, that I discover new girls every day, even when they have had sites for years already…

So the magazines don't show FBB anymore?…I would never have noticed, if it were not mentioned here…I haven't bought a BB magazine for years…

The intedrnet is here and the fans have huge influence there; not some anti-FBB-magazine-a$$holes!…

We got the power!…What we like and appreciate, is what we buy and this way we can support the women that we like to the fullest…

Much better situation…

Bye bye magazines, hello FBBs & fans themselves…

I do worry about people not getting press access to events…This further proofs the absurd ways of the BB organizations…I bet some day a succesful FBB organization will be set up…The internet has grown strong enough to make such a thing possible now..

Xander
Xander

[cpbell0033944]

Indeed: all the blah-blah about the sport "going too far" "too extreme", "steroid abuse" etc. is coming from a very narrow mind…The women aren't that bigger than years ago at all…

They are better…They are more ripped…

If you don't like it, too bad, but this is a sport not something to get your seuxal fix at…

I am not attracted to women in contest shape that much…But for the sport I love to look at the competitions…

The sport isn't going down at all..

It's now divided in figure, BB, fitness, and similar stuff like "physique" "body", etc…

The BB class is for the very few that have the talent & dedication to go for this class…It's an extreme sport and it will always be…

WIth the internet, the influence of magazines has decreased to a low…That's good…They can't hurt FBB that much; only the competitive side…

I used to know all names of FBBs that were in magazines…

Now with the internet there are soooooo many FBBs, that I discover new girls every day, even when they have had sites for years already…

So the magazines don't show FBB anymore?…I would never have noticed, if it were not mentioned here…I haven't bought a BB magazine for years…

The intedrnet is here and the fans have huge influence there; not some anti-FBB-magazine-a$$holes!…

We got the power!…What we like and appreciate, is what we buy and this way we can support the women that we like to the fullest…

Much better situation…

Bye bye magazines, hello FBBs & fans themselves…

I do worry about people not getting press access to events…This further proofs the absurd ways of the BB organizations…I bet some day a succesful FBB organization will be set up…The internet has grown strong enough to make such a thing possible now..

Xander
Xander

You've unknowingly proved my point, Xander – you're a hardcore fan of bodybuilding as a sport.  As you say, you don't look at the women on stage sexually, you see them as sportswomen.  The point is that FBBing cannot rely on people like you because you're too rare!  To survive, it must tap into the "wow, she's hot!" market, even if you don't like that fact.  I agree that the competitors now aren't necessarily bigger than before, but if you compare Iris Kyle at the Ms O this year to Shelley Beattie in th video I linked, you'll see the difference; Shelley was ripped, Iris is dry and shredded.  Her cheeks look pinched and, quite frankly she looks like she's been in a concentration camp.  Yes, it's the perfect pure BBing state, because all you can see are muscles and veins, but it's very unattractive.  Shelley, by contrast, looks much better.  The point is that steroid use has increased to the point where most Pros show facially the signs of overuse and many have damaged voices too.  This has happened not because of the need for greater size as for the requirement for the women o pose at bodyfat %ages way lower than their bodies can really cope with.  I fear it may take an FBBer collapsing or even dying on stage to force the IFBB into making common sense adjustments.  Women aren't slightly smaller men as their biochemistry is different to men's.

[xandertreffers]

Just a few things:

Stroid use:
how do you know steroid use has grown?…Women were always using…Even figure competitors use…If you have ever seen Iris in person you would not say the things you are saying now…

Shelly was 23 on the clip thast you linked…Iris is 34…

So there you have it…10 years age difference, 10 years longer FBBing, more talent (Iris is simply a very rare talent in FBB) and all you can do s point it out to steroid use…

To me that is a huge insult to Iris…

And then I didn't get into this yet: today the supplements are better, the training techniques are better, there is more knowledge about food, etc…And yes, more type of drugs, more effective etc…But by no means do we know how much Iris uses, compared to Shelly…

Second point: not enough support for hardcore FBBs?

If you would have the knowledge that I have, you would not state this…

I have made several sites…For some of the biggest, hardest girls out there as well as for smaller girls and even of girls that are athletic, but no figure/BB at all..

This is what I can say: the bigger the girl, the higher the daily visitors, the more members and the more fans are willing to spend money on her…

There are two reasons for this: the big girls are rare…There are less around…But that is not the only reason…There are simply way more hardcore fans out there than we ever know…

A hardcore FBB cn make a decent living with a site…The smaller, softer, girls can't…Unless they go nude, topless, do wrestling/domination clips etc…A hardcore FBB can do it wth her muscles alone…

All people that make statements which imply that FBB can't survive and there isn't enough suport for it, fail to give actual facts for these statements…

While people that can see the webstas, know people of other websites, etc. see the exact opposite on their sites…

For instance: Steve told me that an update of Colette Guimond on Awefilms.com is super effective and gets the most business…Cheryl of Ironbelles will tell you the same…Ask any other site that has girls from smaller to extremely big…

This was already so in 1999 on Worldofmuscle.com when Cedric made the Dangerous Curves series…Colette didn't just sell twice as good as al other girls…No think about 5-10 times as much!

Same goes for the wrestling videos that we did with Worldofmuscle at the time: Fatal Attraction (Colette Guimond) sold way, way, way more than Redhead Hot (Sheila Burgess)…(I was the "poor" victim in those vids)…And I still think Sheila has one of the hottest bodies I have ever seen and been squeezed by (oh my God, I go all nuts just thinking back at it…LOL…Am all "schmoozy" instantly!)

The fans of harcore FBBs are more loyal, more willing to pay, more reliable, and not at all smaller in numbers than those for the smaller, more feminine look…

This is what 10 years internet statistics, of quite a few websites, tell me…

The point that wouldn't be any support for hardcore FBB is one that I will never believe in…It's the lack of support from the organisations, big magazines etc. and personal preference that may make you think that way…But my experience shows the exact opposite…

The girls like Iris that want to be as good as they can be, can taken control of their business themselves and don't need the competitions that much…If Iris would stop competing and focus on the internet, she would be making more profit than she is now…

People should be grateful for her to be competing instead of bashing her all the time…I never heard any negative remarks about her personality, she looks awesome in person, way more attractive than I anticipated and she is simply the best FBB the sport has had ever…

Xander

[cpbell0033944]

I never bashed Iris.  Neither did I state that she uses steroids.  I'm sorry that you reacted to what I wrote, but I feel that you've read what you thought I was going to write, not what I did write.

My response to your post would be thus:

You are only really mentioning the online saleability of the women's physiques.  You evidently know more about the business side of FBBing than I do, so I won't argue on that point.  I'm not surprised that the bigger women such as Iris and Colette Guimond have the bigger online following, as they will attract the schmoe crowd, who are pure muscle fetishists.  More power to them, as far as I'm concerned, but you cannot run the Ms O on the gate receipts from those guys, because we're comparing a three-day show with a year's web suscription plus possible extras.  Same goes for the wrestling sites and the likes of Awefilms. 

You also seem to be relatively uncorncerned about the prospect of FBBing contests dying and the business being entirely web-based.  This would kill the sport element stone dead, and would allow the pursuit to end-up as a "who can be the kinkiest on a webcam" activity.  Hardly edifying IMO, but I don't blame women like Heather Tristany for doing it; as you say, it pays better than being an active, competition BBer.

Unfortunately, you forget that any sport needs adiverse audience to thrive.  You can't expect the hardcore guys who are unconcerned with women showing pronounced brow arches, square jaws, enlarged noses and with rough, growly voices to keep the sport thriving.  You need people like me who love buff women but who are interested in more than just how big a woman's biceps are, and you also need the casual sports viewer.  Why do you think FBBing isn't shown on American TV any more?  I get the impression that you are sayiong "good riddance" to TV and magazine coverage; what you'll end-up with ispurely a webcam fetish show that will be viewed by most people as just more web porn, with no access to the sport for the average person (turning the TV on to ESPN, picing-up a magazine from the rack, reading about a local FBBer in your newspaper.

[alex]

I pretty much agree with everything you said CP.

Without a more mainstream exposure, FBB will become more and more an obscure internet fetish product. Like japanese girls puking into each others mouth.  Well, maybe not THAT obscure. 😛

Anyway, I do wonder what would be need to regain some of the status that it had a decade ago or more.  Perhaps more control over steroids usage?  Less rigorous muscle definition standards and less breast implants?

I don't have much faith.   Unless there are some major pharmacological improvements that will help women achieve big sizes without damaging androgenic effects, I don't see it getting any better any time soon.

[Lingster]

Test

[cpbell0033944]

Yay!  I can post!  Thanks Lingster!

[cpbell0033944]

I'm not seeing Xander's most recent reply, but he was saying that TV coverage peaked in 1988.  TV viewing figures are cyclical for most sports, and I'm not aware of anything happening in 1989 to trigger a decline.  My point is that I'd be astonished if the decision of TV executives not to screen FBBing had nothing to do with the marketability of the women.  Like it or not, even if we eliminate the sexual aspect, humans are fussy about looks.  People aren't going to watch men or women BBing if they find their appearance unattractive or ugly.  I can assure you that, based on personal internet research, most young women prefer the 100 metre swimmer-type male physique to male BBers in contest shape.  I've read many, many comments about how unattractive the guys look from young women who love buff guys.  That's in the situation where the BBer is male, and is therefore appreciated by society as a whole when he has good muscularity.  If the BBer is female, old prejudice will reduce the attractiveness further (I KNOW it shouldn't, but it does). 

The stereotype in society of muscular women is that they are thought to be unfeminine, unattractive, possibly homosexual, and having "penis-envy" – wanting to be a man.  We here know this is unfair an inaccurate (not that there's anything wrong with being a lesbian, before Mimi comments), but the ugly, unfeminine stereotype is generally incorrect.  That stereotype is hardly assuaged when the women, through a combination of excessive steroid use and extreme low bodyfat (lower than is safe for women – see my earlier fears of FBBers possibly collapsing on stage) have pinched cheeks, raised hairlines, squared jaws, enlarged noses and sound like Ving Rhames.  t only reinforces the anti-femuscle crowd.  Look at the comments on FBBer videos on YouTube if you think I'm exaggerating – many can accept muscles, and many more like or love them – but, if the FBBer has an extremely dry, shredded appearance (I mean veins everywhere, paper-thin skin and striations all over) the proportion of negative comments SOARS.

I have long said that FBBing will go one of two ways.

1.  It will continue to become ever mre extreme at the top professional level.  This will continue the low prizemoney, back-of-the-woods venues, no TV coverage nature of the Pro contests with increased fetish web content to support the women and decreased influx or new talent from the amateur ranks either due to few being able to acheive the ultra-low bodyfat conditioning required, and many more deciding that the side-effects of the highly-virilising steroids needed to be competitive are too extreme forthem to contemplate.  Result?  The same few women dominate, year after year, then retire, and the Pro sport dwindles, or at least becomes stagnant.

2.  Common sense will prevail and the extremes will be toned-down.  The anti-FBB bias and ignorance that leads to the judging criteria treating the women like men in two-piece posing suits will go, to be replaced by a rethink of approch to the women's sport.  Judges would look for conditioning but subtract points for the sake of the health of the competitors for drawn, pinched-cheek appearance.  Muscle fullness, balance, flow and overall aesthetics of the women's physiques would become the important factors, with sheer size being a less important, but still potentially decisive criterion.  There would still be big women around (if the Ralabates and van Akens of this world could acheive the size they did with the training of the 1980s and early 1990s, then the current women could even with a shift in emphasis).  The internet would still be there to provide titilation and a way of supporting one's favourites, and TV, magazines and the press would be more inclined to cover the sport because the athletes would be marketable to a wider proportion of the population.

[Holiday]

If there was a printed magazine completely dedicated to women's bodybuilding and fitness, I'd subscribe to it. For now I'm reliant on the Internet. I don't think there can ever be a magazine that caters to both men and women. That would still end up favoring men's bodybuilding, indirectly creating negative views of women's bodybuilding. It's a real shame MDM is ending their coverage because I've learned there are many more women out there who do lift weights.

But bodybuilding in general is pretty much about getting stronger and building muscle mass. Like all sports there is a competitive progression towards 'more'. That's why today baseball players look like early football players. Some fitness and figure professionals now look like early female bodybuilders. And drugs have spread to other areas of sports.

[Author]

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