1999 Women's Extravaganza Weekend (Fitness Strength Event)
By -jabber



Okay, my favorite part of the show, the three events were interspersed
throughout the day.  The competitors were 4 of the same 5 we saw last year,
Darlena Kirzoncic, Cynthia Bridges, Min Kim, and Lindsay Mullinazi, with the
5th from last year, Martha Lombardo (who at the North Americans happened to
look physically stronger than ever) curiously not showing up.  Because Kenny
Kassel announced a couple times that some competitors did not show up, they
drafted two females from the Fitness Amateur Event, who although they didn't
train for this event, good-naturedly got up to the plate.

Those two additions were Jessica Bixler, a very young lady with nice
abdominals (actually incredible abdominals) and IMO the most gorgeous woman
at the show, the brunette Heather Lackner.  She would just stand on stage
relaxed and I'd take pics of her; she was that attractive.  I have to think
one of the no shows (Kenny never said who was supposed to be there but was
AWOL) was a young lady named Nesci Loredana who had recently bragged in a
WPW issue (if it says so in WPW, it's GOT to be true - LOL) that she can do
100 one-arm push-ups with each arm!!!  

After I took a deep breath, I was looking forward to seeing her smoke Ms.
Min Kim - winner of last year's one-arm push-up contest with a total off 99
one-arm push-ups (I believe 57 with the right arm and 42 with the left).  Of
course seeing is believing and Ms. Loredana was a no-show - shucks!

Straddle Press:

Probably the interesting thing to note here is that the two who didn't
"train" for this event (Jessica and Heather, the late additions) fared much
worse than the four who did "train" for this event (Cynthia, Lindsay, Min,
and Darlena).  As with last year, Cynthia "Iron Abs" Bridges won this event.


Although I don't think the judging was bad last year for this event, it
seemed a bit more strict and stringent, resulting in shorter times, overall.
This also seemed to be necessary due to the cramming in of a host events in
such a short time.

Curls:

In this event, Lindsay "Arms" Mullinazi, one of the thicker, more muscular
amateur fitness competitors, strong-armed this event.  Ditto with the last
event, the new additions, Jessica and Heather, trailed.  Mostly because of
many complaining about the lax enforcement of curl strictness last year, but
I believe also due to the time constraint, Mr. John Parillo chose to have
all women go up/down with the curls at once - not allowing them to go at
their own pace, but positively, enforcing strict form.

I personally think seeing the women go at their own pace but enforcing
strict form would be the proper happy medium.  This way, while fair to a
competition, resulted in a less impressive number of curls.

One-Arm Push-Ups:

As with the curls, all the females were to do the one-arm push-ups in
unison, on Mr. Parillo's count of up/down, up/down.  This, too, resulted in
a much less impressive total number, but IMO did fairly award the strongest
in this event.  No real surprise, whether going at her own pace or not, Ms.
Min Kim strong-armed this event with 39 reps.  Quite impressive considering
she had to slow down to Mr. Parillo's pace.  I still feel seeing them belt
out as many as possible one at a time is more of a show-stopping spectacle,
but...

So, who won?  We had Cynthia in the straddle press, Lindsay in the curls,
and Min in the one-arm push-ups.  The judges had to go to the scorecards,
scrutinize, I think take specific reps into consideration, and I had to
squint, but I thought I saw the judges consulting an Ouija Board (maybe that
was a piece of Bill Dobbins camera equipment - I don't know my eyes are
going at my age :-) ), and crowned Cynthia Bridges the winner the second
year in a row.

Congratulations to Ms. Bridges - first upon winning her Pro Card at the
North Americans at the end of August, and then "bulking up" to win this
event once again.  I'm looking forward to seeing next year's event -
hopefully Ms. Loredana will show up...