As a competitive athlete, I started my journey towards attempting to achieve my IFBB pro card in March of 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic started.

When everything shut down, I made a decision that this pandemic was not going turn me into a slob, sliding off the couch and regretting that I didn’t use my time wisely. That’s when I started first by early morning walks with my dog Osha.

Then, I started adding a workout at the end of those walks like a 30-minute Beachbody workout. Then I started adding some supplementation with Team Kattouf. I had a discussion with Dr. Rick Kattouf, the company founder and owner, about competing.  He was my coach for my first full marathon. We were having a discussion about becoming a brand ambassador.

As we were talking, I blurted out to him, “Hey, I would love to be a competitive athlete in bikini division.

What do you think?” And he said, “Let’s do it.”

Yes!

We started in June of 2020. We began putting my fitness and nutrition under a microscope. This is when my workouts went from 30 mins to several hours at a time. Next, I booked coaching for posing with Lauren Bair and ultimately moved over to Bair Aesthetics when I realized their specialty is training bikini athletes and competitive athletes for stage.

Fast forward to my first two shows in November, have 2020. At the first show I placed last in every class and felt horrible about it. I signed up for another show, changed a few protocols and went back and placed better in Fort Lauderdale. I received feedback. I needed to work on my glutes. So, that has been my focus since December of 2020.

Today, as we approach the end of May 2021, I continue busting my butt in the gym, focusing on building glutes and overall muscle mass.

My Coach Lauren successfully guided me through a reverse diet. It was interesting because it was a slow progression from following prep protocols that took my daily macro amounts from super-low up to a more reasonable and eventually a pretty high macro count.  As I built muscle mass, I never got fat. I just got bigger. I truly experienced the meaning of growth and change.

Now I am back in a prep; 19 weeks out at the time of this post. My Coach Lauren is slowly cutting my macros back down again. I went from 124 pounds show weight at my last show to currently fluctuating between 141 and 143lbs. We have only cut 20 grams of carbs per day and added five extra minutes to each session of cardio. I’m seeing my body shred slowly and it’s fascinating. I’ve also practiced my posing for hours and hours. I notice something new every time. I simply didn’t know what I didn’t know in the beginning. You never do when you start something totally new! I went into this whole thing thinking: I’m totally going to crush this because I had a performer background. Now I’m finding it’s actually a challenging transition. My coach gives me feedback to make my posing routine less dance-y. With 40 years of dance behind me, “not dance-y” is hard for me to do. I have to simplify, simplify, simplify. And then my little dancer mind will be like, “Let me just put my finger up here and look cute.” Then, my Coach reins me in again: simplify.

If you want to be a competitive athlete, Bair Aesthetics is the Team you should go with for prep. If you see this goal as completely unattainable and you a little bit scared to start, let’s chat. I can get you from where you are now, to a place of being feeling confident enough to get on the trajectory to compete. I’m here to say that even though I’ve been a fitness professional and professional dancer, for more than 20 years, I still need my coaches and the accountability that’s involved. Even though it’s MY goal, having the accountability of a Coach gives me the mindset of wanting do what I need to do so I don’t let my coach down by not doing what I promised to do.

Accountability is important.

This journey is hard. I’m not going to sugarcoat it. It’s brutally hard. It’s also really fun. The person I am becoming as I continue to progress is someone I am super proud of and excited about. Stay tuned. My upcoming show schedule for 2021 is as follows:

• October 2 – Ohio
• October 16 – Kentucky
• November 6 – Arizona

Have questions? Want to get started on YOUR UltraFitLifestyle and looking for help.

Contact me HERE today!

You’re worth it!