Fitness Competition Journal: What on EARTH am I doing?

Two years ago I decided that before I turned  25  (ok fine)  a certain age that I wanted to do a fitness competition.  I wanted to transform my body into looking like the strong women that I admire so much. I signed up for personal training and thought "Oh well maybe I can compete in 3 months."  Well after researching and realizing what a challenge this endeavor is, I resolved to spend the rest of 2012 and all of 2013 getting ready to compete in 2014.

I gave myself a deadline to contact the coach I wanted to work with by Feb 1.  Well she contacted ME first on January 30 and I figured, "Well you may as well go for it.  There's no time like the present"

I have my eyes on a show in July which means I have about 18 weeks left to go.  My coach wants to wait until I am 12 weeks out before we make a final call.

Nicole Wilkins, Figure Olympia Champion

Why am I doing this?

Great question!  I ask myself this when I start thinking about being on stage naked under bright lights.  I can think of several reasons.

• I've always wanted to do it and I don't want to look back and think "What if?" or "Why didn't I?"
• I want a new challenge: I want to work toward something challenging
• It scares me: If something absolutely terrifies me, I know I need to do it.  There's a lesson that I need to learn
• It will teach me a lot:  It will help me grow as a fitness professional.  It will also teach me some life skills that I need to learn such as: discipline, organization/preparation/, sacrifice, not giving up when the going gets tough or you can't predict the outcome, standing in the face of criticism, and taking risks.  Risk is my word for 2014.

The Diet

The Diet isn't horrible right now because it is early on.  In fact, she INCREASED my calories because I wasn't eating ENOUGH.  No more Powercrunch or Quest bars, but I get Gaspari Myofusion shakes and fruit which make life lovely.  No complaints from me on this end.

I know the diet will get tougher as I go on but I'm ready for it.  I want to do this and if that means saying "No" to cheat meals and going out to eat...that's what it means.  It's discipline and besides after the show I'm going in (within reason)

Workouts

Workouts are great.  She incorporated different exercises and a lot of the same ones I had been doing before.  Rather than bodybuilding splits, we're on a higher intensity/higher volume regime right now which I'm enjoying.  It is challenging, but I like it because I am pushing myself out of my comfort zone.  If I feel like I "phoned in" a set I will do it over again.

Walking in Heels

Other than getting up naked in front of an audience in bright lights, walking in the 4.5 inch heels has me the most worried.  I wear Nikes most of the time, so prancing around in heels isn't my forte.  I've put on Beyonce and RuPaul and tried to chante sashay around my basement.  I think this may be the scariest part for me.

I am looking forward to sharing my journey with you.  I will most likely begin sharing pictures around the 12 week out mark.  I'm looking forward to seeing how my body changes and transforms.