The Evolution of Female Bodybuilding

The Birth of Women’s Bodybuilding

IFBB Historian for Women’s Bodybuilding Steve Wennerstrom was there writing articles about these women from the very start. “The birth of female bodybuilding did not happen by chance,” he writes. “The primary architect was Henry McGhee – an employee of the Downtown Canton YMCA – who carried a strong belief that women should share the opportunity of displaying their physiques and the results of their weight training the way men had done for years. “

These contests were very different than a conventional beauty pageant. An Ohio woman named Gina LaSpina won the first event in 1977, and it was made clear by looking at her lean defined physique that the evolving sport of women’s bodybuilding would be very different from any prior event where bikini-clad competitors were judged on their looks and bodies.

Miss Olympia

Both the National Physique Committee and the International Federation of Bodybuilders began officially recognized female bodybuilding competitions in 1980. Before that, women wore high heels and were not allowed to hit muscle poses. But the competitors at the first Ms. Olympia in 1980 did not wear high heels and they did flex and hit bodybuilding poses.

The fact that many still looked at bodybuilding for women back then as beauty pageant is clear when you note that the first Ms. Olympia was called the “Miss Olympia” at the time.

Even the biggest and most muscular of those very early women bodybuilders would not seem to be that muscular by later standards. Rather than being about muscle building per se, these were more competitions about diet and definition. However, lacking big muscles, as most of the women at the time did, many of them were nonetheless disparaged and criticized as threats to the culture and to our “cherished ideals of womanhood.” This made competing in bodybuilding for many women all the more difficult and resulted in a lot of very short competition careers.

For example, the late Kay Baxter probably looked more like a modern bodybuilder than almost anyone else from back then. But she was too big for most of the judges, who had never seen a woman that developed.

Breakdown of the Categories

I have written elsewhere that the gradual development of the size and muscularity of women bodybuilders in the 1980s and 1990s eventually evolved into fitness and figure — and subsequently physique and bikini.

Many don’t fully recognize that all these categories really just represent variations of the same basic activity. That is, all these women are athletes who train using the principles of the progressive-resistance bodybuilding method and a diet system developed by generations of competition physique competitors with the intention of sculpting their muscles and changing their body composition.

These women are all bodybuilders of a sort. The body itself doesn’t know whether your intention is to be a bodybuilder or to compete in some other category of muscle contests. It has no idea if you’re an athlete trying to improve your performance by becoming stronger and leaner, if you’re a model or an actress trying to shape up and look better or if you’re simply trying to improve how you look and feel by getting in better shape.

The Importance of Promoters

Of course, the federations are composed of individual competition promoters and events and their goal is to maximize success in terms of attracting competitors, selling tickets and increasing income. They could see there were many women who liked developing and showing off their bodies but who lacked the genetics or desire to compete in the sport of female bodybuilding — which can be incredibly demanding and difficult.

The promoters and the federation realized they could create female muscle events with different standards than those of bodybuilding and attract a wider range of women competitors. The more bodies on stage in any event, the more money could be made and the more fans, friends and family would buy tickets. The result is so many categories in amateur NPC events that you frequently see prejudging starting at 9 a.m. and going on to late afternoon, with (except for the bodybuilders) what seems like an endless line-up of women.

There’s No Show Business without Business

But just as there is no show business without the business, if promoters can’t make a profit there are not going to be competitions. While watching so many competitors parade on and off stage during a contest, it should be noted that the fact that there are so many women in so many parts of the world who want to train and diet to compete is a clear sign there has been a revolution. In 1977 there were only a handful of women interested in muscle contests. Now there are thousands.

And having so many different categories and height and weight classes creates an opportunity for many, many women to get involved who would never be able to (or desire) to compete in actual bodybuilding.

The Unification of Female Bodybuilders

All these women have a lot in common. They train with weights, cycle their workouts, hit each body part with the appropriate exercises; they go on extreme diets to create impressive levels of muscular development, muscularity and definition. That makes them all bodybuilders, whatever they call the competition.

Female Bodybuilding as a Sport

Competitive bodybuilding satisfies the general definition of sport, in that it measures an extreme of physical activity and performance and is progressive in that competitors get better over time. Categories like fitness, figure and bikini are specialized beauty contests for athletes, in which participants are measured by aesthetic standards that are deliberately less than the physical extreme which can be achieved.

There is also bodybuilding as an exercise system, used to increase performance in sports (football, basketball, tennis, golf, whatever) and bodybuilding used to create a body that looks and feels better, that is strong, has better shape and leaner body composition. Again, despite so many different potential goals, the basic system of training and diet is based on methods developed by generations of serious bodybuilders by trial and error over the decades, competitors have different genetics and goals — but do the same exercises and diet as female bodybuilders.

Overcoming Obstacles

All the women who compete in bodybuilding, fitness, figure, physique, bikini, or whatever the category, have so much in common they constitute a Sisterhood of Muscle. They often encounter the same obstacles from friends, family and people in general who resist the idea of women “going too far” in terms of muscle development and definition.

They are also often surprised at the degree to which their muscles become the objects of fetish by (mostly) men, which can be off-putting to many.

Any of these women in any category are liable to find themselves facing opposition if their genetics and efforts allow them to create a degree of development that exceeds what is expected. Even fitness or figure competitors are sometimes told they are “too big” or “too muscular” by competition judges. So, they find themselves having to do excessive cardio and starve away their shape in order to conform to standards that the fans don’t necessarily like, but which federation officials have decided are necessary to keep things from “going too far.”

Many models who work out to create fit and fabulous bodies also run into problems when agents and casting people feel that any kind of muscularity — a little bit of biceps, triceps or deltoid definition — disqualifies them from mainstream modeling jobs. Look at the major fitness-oriented magazines, and you’ll see the women featured are usually lean and fit but show little sign of having done any real work muscle building in the gym.

The Sisterhood of Muscle

Accepted or not, every woman who does progressive resistance exercise and follows a bodybuilding-type diet shares a great deal in common. They are a Sisterhood of Muscle and as such should support each other across the board.

Keep in mind, most of the general public doesn’t really understand the fine distinctions between one category and other. They see fitness or figure competitors and think they are looking at bodybuilders. If you have muscle but are not a competitive bodybuilder, and you say negative things about bodybuilders, be aware that much of the audience also sees you as a bodybuilder and responds accordingly.

Progressive resistance training inevitably leads to progressively more muscular and defined physiques. That is the whole point of the effort and is true for both females and males.

The Fitness Revolution

In this modern age we are witnessing a revolution in the ability of people to create stronger, leaner, more fit and healthier bodies.

The method for doing this was invented on a trial-and-error basis by several decades of competitive bodybuilders, and gradually refined until it is now the most effective and efficient system of physical training and developing ever devised. Starting in the late 1970s, women started applying these methods with increasing seriousness and intensity.

Nowadays there are gyms all over the country and the world full of competitive athletes, models, actors, professional people, housewives, and just about everyone else “pumping iron” in one form or another to make themselves look and feel better.

The Tip of the Spear

Female bodybuilders and the most advanced female competitors in other categories still encounter resistance to what they do and what they want to achieve, to the point where the continued existence of pro bodybuilding for women seems to be increasingly threatened. But other women in other categories are constantly facing pressure to be less than their best for mostly arbitrary reason.

All of these “fit and fabulous females” represent a Sisterhood of Muscle and need to stick together, to support each other and each other’s ambitions. Benjamin Franklin said, “We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”

The Return of Ms. Olympia

The new generation of pro female bodybuilders who are competing for Jake Wood and Wings of Strength are bigger and more muscular than ever and represent a further evolution of aesthetic female muscle. Just as the men continue to make progress, the same is true of the women.

And now with the Ms. Olympia back in the Olympia Fitness & Performance Weekend, these women will have the world-class stage on which to compete that they truly deserve. And they will continue to motivate and inspire all the other women who are part of The Sisterhood of Muscle.