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With the female bodybuilders becoming more and more extreme
in their muscular appearance, a backlash of sorts occurred.
It is unclear, if this reversal of trends was started by the
women not wanting to be so outrageously muscled or whether the
public at large was just not interested. Maybe a combination
of the two. In any event, the novelty of the female bodybuilder
was gone. Some
of the women who were champions in female bodybuilding world
had switched to new classes of Fitness and Figure. A good example
of this was Kim Chizevsky.
Kim
was a 4-time winner of the Ms. Olympia. Suddenly, the "rules"
were rewritten so as to penalize the awesome muscularity that
she possessed. Kim re-invented her shape and turned to fitness
competitions.
It became clear, the ruling powers of the "sport"
were trying to force the women to tone-down their physiques. It appears as if the women's version of bodybuilding has almost
come full circle to their glory days of the 80's when they were
forced to wear high-heels and not allowed to clench a fist while
hitting a bicep pose. Indeed, fitness and figure competitions
are more of a beauty contest with gymnastic and dance routines.
The size of their muscles is not only secondary, but possibly
a liability. This
change has both supporters and opponents. Supporters argue that
it helps get the drugs such as steroids out of the sport and
allows more women to compete. Opponents argue that the women
should be encouraged to be as muscular as possible, after all,
it's bodybuilding. Either way, it's clear that the debate about
femininity is still raging. Also, it's important to note that
there is no similar debate with the men becoming more extreme
every year. It's definitely a double standard.
All of this controversy makes it extremely difficult for the
competitors to know what the judges want to see. It takes months
of training and dieting for these women to get their bodies
ready for the competitions. All of that hard work can be for
nothing, if the judging criteria is not what they expected. |